~*Welcome to the Otherworld, the alternate reality in which I reside.*~

jinx

I've noticed something. whenever I write about story ideas here, I end up not writing or posting the story. the only story I have posted is one I didn't say a word about before I started writing. I seem to be jinxing it by saying anything. :/ it's really bizarre... and annoying. :p I need to either stop saying stuff about the stories, or get rid of this stupid jinx. lol...

another story idea... already :)

my stash of story ideas for this site is getting kind of cluttered. I just had another idea for a time travel story called Elena's Key. I might change the name in the title... I'm not sure if it's quite right, but it's better than the names I came up with at first, anyway. I think I might name the guy in the story Simon, or something like that. it's all pretty much up in the air- I just had the idea, lol! this is always one of the most exciting times, when the ideas are new, and I'm trying to nudge them into the places where they seem destined to be.

UPDATE-- ok, I've changed the girl's name to Rachel, so the title is Rachel's Key. I think I'm going to call the guy, her boyfriend, Thomas. it doesn't sound quite perfect, but I'm sick of obsessing over it. I need to start writing soon.

the method to my madness

sooo... I just thought of and wrote a story in the space of only about five days. here's the formula I used:

brainstorm ideas.

sit down at computer to write and realize I never decided how to actually start the story. (but the rest of the storyline's good. I think.)

sit there staring stupidly at the computer screen for ten minutes, nearly self-inducing brainfreeze.

write the first one-third of the story! yay!!

go back and re-read it and plunge into an abyss of self-doubt wondering if it's a complete and total piece of crap.

re-do the plot and then wonder if that's total crap.

somehow manage to get another section of the story written, because even if it is a piece of crap, I'm too OCD to let it be an unfinished piece of crap.

am forced to go do some stuff with some people in the real world... it's all a blur.

near-disaster as my computer freezes and several hours work is nearly lost, but I manage to get my idiot computer to emerge from its catatonic state, thereby averting Digital Armageddon for my story.

convinced I have only a limited amount of time before my computer crashes just out of spite over having been outwitted the last time, I write a quickie ending and post the story.

convinced it now is a total piece of crap, I blame my mother.

Six-Finger Discount

Cole was suddenly, inexplicably awake, white light streaming into his unwilling eyes. He'd been dreaming again. He closed his eyes, his mind trailing after the last fading threads of the dream. He felt like he'd been asleep for a lifetime...

***

He was back at the School. It was his first year - he was only twelve. Subdued voices echoed sedately off the high, arching ceilings, the usual inane banter that took place before a recital. The girls were tugging nervously at their velvet dresses, and the collar of his tux was itching almost unbearably. He was the only one who fidgeted. The other boys took themselves much too seriously for that.

The guests would be making their way to their seats soon - parents of his classmates who had paid handsomely to see to their child's entrance into the prestigious academy. Some had paid even more. Cole interlaced his fingers, flipping over his hands and stretching his arms to crack his knuckles in preparation for his piano solo. There was an extra pop for each hand. No one even noticed anymore. He flexed his fingers - twelve digits in all. It was a genetic modification that had all but ensured his acceptance to the School. Any music academy would compete strenuously to get one like him. He was still close enough to unique to be sought-after.

Unique, he thought bitterly, as he watched the eagerness in his friends' eyes, the dedication in their posture. When they took the stage, it would be the culmination of months of practice, the reward for sleepless nights, the justification for obsession. They would play each and every note as if the instrument were a living, feeling part of them. When he played, the piano remained just what it technically was - an unfeeling, soulless, dead thing at his fingertips. There was no genetic modification that could engineer passion or love or ambition into him. His friends' music lifted them to the airy rafters above them. His spun him a prison. The others chose to be here. His parents had engineered him to come here. He could play pieces no one with only five fingers could. He looked down at his six-fingered hands for probably the hundredth time - the unique feature that took away his choices.

He tousled his straw-colored hair down over his forehead while the instructor wasn't looking, casting his turquoise eyes into shadows. My parents have decided everything about my life for me, he thought, and even calling it his life seemed like a cruel joke. At least I'll have my hair the way I want it. He smiled darkly at the small defiance.

Cole made his way out into the crowd after the recital, where he was expected to politely greet and thank the guests. He chatted blandly with a rather plain-looking man in a suit that didn't look expensive enough to have gotten him past the velvet ropes crossing the doors, when the man said something about having a daughter about his age and gestured toward the entrance hall. Cole followed him dutifully toward the large, round, echoing space. He gazed along the line of the man's outstretched hand, and suddenly, it was as if the man wasn't even there anymore. The girl was standing at the foot of one of the colossal scarlet curtains, her dress shining white against the crimson. Her straight black hair was pulled up into a cherry blossom clip, the same delicate pink as the blush of her cheeks. For a reason he didn't understand yet, Cole felt dizzy. The man he had forgotten beckoned, and the girl laughed and hurried over to her father. Cole thought he might faint. He was remotely aware of the man's voice introducing the girl as Mitsuko, and saying she was going to be a student at the School. She smiled at him shyly, and he suddenly realized he was staring and looked down quickly, blushing from ear to ear. She laughed gently, and Cole was wondering if there was any way he could get up the nerve to say anything to her, when he felt an all-too-familiar ripple in the crowd.

Gritting his teeth, he turned to face the inevitable. His mother swept up to him, all but engulfing him in the folds of her massive (and obscenely expensive) dress. He supressed a cough at the sickening smell of her perfume. She gave the man the once-over and dismissed him as if he had not even been worth that much. Then she reached immediately for Cole's hair. "Dear, what an embarassment, did you look in the mirror before you went onstage?" She brushed his hair back into place. Not lovingly. Like she was adjusting the drapes. He pulled away with the slightest shadow of a scowl. Her eyes flashed, and he knew it was only the watching crowd that saved him from a slap. Beyond the balooning form of the ridiculous dress, he saw Mitsuko wince in horrified recognition. His mother's eyes shifted deliberately. Yes, not here, you ungrateful little layabout, that cool, poisonous gaze said. He knew there'd be plenty of time for that in the summer. He let the numbness seep into his heart as the old, familiar lecture started. The dead feeling advanced until he could feel nothing as his mother told him what a worthless disappointment he was.

***

He was dreaming again, the dazzling white light still hovering just beyond his eyelids. The dream shifted. He was still at the School, but he was sixteen now, and it was his first week back. He moved rather slowly through the courtyard - his bruises were still healing from the "farewell" his mother had given him before he left. He'd had some difficulty keeping the marks hidden from the other boys, especially in the locker room. But the air was crisp and smelled of newly fallen leaves as he made his way to his first class of the day. He'd learned to take life minute by minute, and if nothing terrible was happening to him in the present moment, to be happy.

He entered the classroom, settling his books gratefully onto the nearest desk. Mitsuko's eyes were dark pools of sympathy. She knew, of course. She came over immediately, easing her arms around him. She knew just how to do it to avoid the bruises. He kissed her, inhaling her soft perfume. She was wearing the pink sweater he had given her last year. He had something else for her, something in a small box that he had carried in his pocket since he had left for the School a week ago.

She lingered with him, but then he began to notice the rest of the room. Everyone else was huddled at the front of the classroom around the internet monitor. He looked at Mitsuko questioningly. She sighed and said, "You should see this," and led him to the screen. He shared a quick nod with his friend Jonas as he edged gingerly in next to him. On the screen was a solemn-faced reporter. Cole immediately knew someone had died. Reporters never looked that way unless something terrible had happened. He listened to the story.

"...shooting overnight at Holly Academy of Music. A male student was found dead in the campus dormitory this morning. Preliminary reports indicate that no one saw or heard anything. Campus surveillance discs are being reviewed in hopes of catching a glimpse of the killer..." Cole looked away in disgust as bloody crime scene photos were shown, the boy's face blurred out. He thought of what a nasty surprise that boy's roommate must've gotten that morning. He was probably wondering why the killer chose the other boy and not him. Cole knew that's what he would be thinking. He edged a glance over at Jonas, and caught him doing the same. Both of them looked away quickly.

The rest of the day revolved around where the next internet monitor was so they could keep up with the story. The School was a converted gothic cathedral, so not all the classrooms were equipped with internet access. It had been explained once - something about keeping the building historically accurate and maitaining the ambiance. None of it mattered in the slightest - the only concern was finding out who the killer was. There was a rumor it was one of the Holly students who had murdered one of their own. Most of Cole's friends found that notion sickening. Violent crime was rare enough, let alone murder. It had been decades since the yearly murder rate nationwide had risen above ten. The world had come too far, had become too civilized to believe that a teenage boy or girl could be capable of commiting such a terrible crime. Mitsuko wondered aloud about the mental state of anyone who could seriously suspect another student. Cole shook his head and allowed her her innocence. He thought of his mother and knew the darkness that still existed in the world.

Weeks passed, and no one was caught. The killer had not even shown up on surveillance. There was not a scrap of evidence to tell anyone who it was. Aside from a dead body, there was no indication anyone sinister had been in the dorm that night.

Cole and Mitsuko sat in the cavernous library, going over each other's notes from their math class. There were whispers all around them, students not studying, but gossiping about the Holly Academy Killer. The latest rumor was that it was a ghost. Cole looked away dismissively from the huddled group nearest them and got back to work studying Mitsuko's neat geometry notes. In the margins, she had drawn a pattern of interlocking hearts for him. He smiled. Time with her was time stolen from the world.

Another week went by. Things were starting to get back to normal at the School. The students were so busy preparing for the Halloween recital that few of them had time to wonder about the Holly Killer. It was as if their morbid fascination was forced to give way to the extended practice sessions on the class schedule, and the mountains of homework so that they wouldn't fall behind. They re-dedicated themselves to the world of the School, and let the one outside its walls spin as it would.

Until the morning that the news broke. Cole walked into class just as he had every other day. Just as he had that first week back, he realized as he noticed there was already a small knot of students around the internet monitor. Mitsuko greeted him with a hurried kiss, and they both made their way into the tight group. Maybe the killer has been caught? Cole wondered hopefully, but that kind of news didn't create such silence in a room. His heart dropped. There was another solemn reporter, and more blood-spattered images. Mitsuko looked away in horror. Cole held her, shielding her from the gruesome pictures on the monitor, the shock of the news that it had happened again. It was a boy at Towers School For Music and the Arts this time. He had been found shot to death in the showers in the locker room, his lifeblood streaming down the drain. Cole realized with an odd tingling chill up his spine that he knew where Towers School was. He had been past it on the Skyway one summer years ago when he had gone to visit his father near the ocean. He had seen the ancient towers through the window of the hovercar as they had sped by. It was one of the last times he had seen his father. His parents rarely spoke since the separation. Cole shook the thought of his father more from his heart than from his head. It was actually less painful to think about the dead boy lying somewhere behind the two stone towers on the campus between here and the sea. At least it's someone else's problem, he thought remotely, then felt a pang of guilt. He knew some of the students had siblings at Towers. His pulse quickened as he hoped it wasn't one of them who had been killed.

It took until that afternoon to find out the mixed news - no one's brother had been killed, but the victim had been one of the most popular boys at the school, and the campus was staggering under the weight of the blow.
Walking through the dorm that evening, Cole lost count of how many quiet, forlorn phone conversations he heard coming from the rooms as his friends tried to offer what little comfort they could to a sibling or friend on the other end of the line from Towers. There wasn't much anyone could do. Evil had chosen them as its targets. They didn't have the means to purify the world of it. It had even somehow taken away their power to see it coming or see where it had been. It left bodies, blood, broken hearts, shattered innocence. But not evidence. Not a single fingerprint or footprint. Not a hair from its head or a shred of fabric from its clothing. Nothing had been found. It struck with such brutal violence, but left nothing of itself behind but a suffocating terror.

Cole lay in bed that night, listening to the familiar cricket song outside the antique glass of the latched window. He had checked that lock at least five times. The world sounded right, but nothing felt right anymore.

Autumn turned to winter, and the last of the leaves released their dying grip on the dark trees as the storms started to blow. The students learned many things at the School. One of them was that they were never safe. The bullet from the Towers killing had been matched to the one from the Holly murder. The Holly Academy Killer was now known as the Music Academy Serial Killer. Students everywhere knew him (it?) simply as MASK.

Cole was awakened with a start on a bitterly cold November morning. A phone was ringing in the room across the hall. He heard a sleepy voice answer it. A weary boy say, "Yeah mom, everything's fine." Then, "What?" Sharply. Cole knew that tone could mean only one thing. He kicked at the covers, clawing them off of him with the extra fingernail on his hand. He beat Jonas to the door. They piled through the frame and met other boys who were also suddenly wide awake and streaming into the hallway. One of them knocked on the door of the boy with the phone call, and he let them in distractedly. He was standing there in his shorts and undershirt, just barely a trace of the peaceful sleep he had just been woken from on his face. One hand gripped the phone white-knuckled, while the other waved in front of him as if he was trying to reconstruct the world.

"Wait, wait," he said shakily. "It happened where?"

There was silence in the dorm except for more boys trying to wedge themselves into the room to get within earshot of their half of the conversation. The boy dropped onto the edge of the bed. Everyone held their breath.

"Wells," he whispered in horror. Then, turning to look at the hushed crowd in his room he said, "There's been another murder. It was at Wells."

A cold shockwave reverberated through the group. Wells Music School was just two towns over. Half the boys in the room had siblings there, and the other half had friends. Suddenly, all the careful jostling and maneuvering that had been done to get into the room was being done in reverse as nearly everyone disentangled themselves and headed back to their rooms to make urgent phone calls of their own. Soon, the sound of phones ringing would shatter the first frozen light of that terrible November morning.

The worst part of it for Cole was, he had to be the one to tell Mitsuko. He knew her heart broke a little more every time the world was not as her gentle nature told her it should be. He thought of the look in her eyes and his strength nearly failed him. He could just wait for her to hear it from someone else... The news was spreading like wildfire now. He didn't have to be the one to tell her... No! he thought, shaking his head violently. Don't be a coward.

He had his hand on the doorknob when a sudden realization flooded his heart. Now was the time. He had kept the small box hidden since before the school year had started. His mother didn't allow him much spending money (out of her millions), but he had saved what little he had and had stolen away to a shop across town, where she wouldn't see him. He opened the chest of drawers, and there, nestled safely behind the clean undershirts, was the box. He checked instictively to make sure no one was looking, but then he smiled to himself. It would only be Jonas if someone was. Not his mother, who would snatch the box and mock its contents and demand some concession he could not agree to for its return. Of course, he had not told his mother about Mitsuko. He thanked whatever power might still care that she hadn't noticed Mitsuko that night after the recital when they were both twelve. He had known then. I was as confused as I'd ever been, he thought wryly, almost whispering the words to the box, but I knew in my heart. He opened the box, and the first rays of light from the window danced over the surface of the object within. It was not what he had hoped to buy. He hadn't had nearly enough money for that, thanks to the grip his mother kept at his throat even when she wasn't touching him. It was, instead, a glass rose, crimson petals intricately spiraling above a delicate stem, suspended on a black ribbon. It would have to be enough until he could buy a diamond.

Two more weeks passed. Cole wandered down the corridoors of the dormitory. He heard a few conversations here and there, but it was much quieter than it had been. After the murder at Wells, many of the students had been pulled out of school by anxious parents. He had gone home too, but only for Thanksgiving. He cradled his left arm in his other hand as he was passing several empty rooms. He pulled his sweater sleeve self-conciously down over the black and blue hand-print that wrapped around his wrist. He winced even at the friction of the soft fabric over the deep bruise. Some part of him felt lucky to have escaped with only bruises again. When his mother had siezed him at the top of the staircase, wrenching him closer to the edge of the top step, spitting poisonous words at him with every cruel twist of his arm, he had wondered if this was finally going to be the time, if it would be his bloodied body everyone would be seeing on the news. He had thought at his mother, Why didn't you just fall off the bluffs above the beach house? And for a few, remorseless moments, he had wondered what his life would have been like without her, if she had just died when he was young. He had imagined her in one of those awful dresses, the puffed fabric billowing out as she fell, the end of the last vacation he would spend crying under the bed in that beach house, the last time she would hit him, the last time she would make him feel worthless. With his foot slipping off the step, he had nearly laughed at her. Then, for some reason, she had let go of him, flinging his arm out of her grasp in contempt so that his wrist had slammed into the banister with an audible crack. He had had to bite his lips until they bled to keep from crying out. His fantasy was gone, replaced only with pain that screamed up and down his arm and drowned out his thoughts.

The pain was still there, though it had subsided to a deep, raw ache. Cole conciously let his injured arm drop to his side as he was about to pass open, occupied rooms. If anyone asked questions, he'd say his muscles cramped up during his solo. He'd been well-trained to lie. He didn't even know how he had made it through his piano solo during the Thanksgiving recital earlier that evening. The pain had been like fire. He should've told the director he couldn't play. He should have told him why. His wrist throbbed, and he wondered, How much more of this can I take? Why don't I fight back? Why don't I tell someone? He didn't know where he would begin. Somehow, no matter how hard it got, it always seemed harder to walk into a teacher or counselor's office and try to get the words out.

December came with a malicious splintering of hail against the windows of the School. This winter had been unnaturally cold and stormy. Cole gathered his heaviest coat around him in a numb fist as he made his way across the courtyard to the library, and arrived there chilled and shaking anyway. Mitsuko had been waiting for him in the shelter just inside the doorway, and took his soaked, freezing coat for him. She came back with a large mug of hot chocolate. In view of the weather, the rules against eating and drinking in the library and in classrooms had been relaxed to allow hot drinks. He sipped the cocoa gratefully, forgetting the cold long enough to playfully give Mitsuko a chocolate-flavored kiss. She laughed, but didn't push him away.
She caught his hand and led him to the seats she had saved at one of the long tables. The wooden tabletops were covered with plastic because this afternoon, they were painting paper masks for the Christmas Masquerade Ball. All around them, there were already animated conversations underway about which colors looked best together, and which patterns. Some of the students worked for a while, then exchanged masks, and their friends added more paint, or a pattern of sequins. Mitsuko thought for a moment, then carefully unclasped the ribbon that held the glass rose at her neck. Cole watched curiously as she laid it carefully on the table. She picked up a brush, dipped it in crimson paint, and began to trace the delicate outlines of the bloom just below the left eye of the mask.

It must've been at least an hour later when Cole began to notice an unusual sound whenever the conversation quieted enough, a constant, heavy pounding on the roof. He looked out the massive, arching stained-glass window at the end of the library, and saw nothing beyond it but a gray curtain of rain. The wind began to pick up, billowing the translucent curtain toward the window until it slapped against the glass and dissolved into rivulets. Class was dismissed not more than five minutes later. The teacher decided it was better to have the students safe in their dorms when the storm broke in earnest. Mitsuko looked up in surprise at the announcement - her rose painting had taken longer that she expected. Most of the other students had finished and had hung their masks to dry on wires that had been stretched across the ends of the bookcases above their heads. She was about to snatch hers up and go to hang it, but the teacher, from across the echoing room, instructed that all masks that were still on the table should be left there until the morning. With a last regretful glance backward, she started over to her friends who had been sitting at the opposite end of the table. They had been carefully passing her glass rose between them so they could sketch it for embellishments for their own masks. There was a hurried checking of pockets, but the other girls failed to come up with it, and a tide of students was pushing Mitsuko toward the door.

"We'll bring it!" one of her friends called.

Mitsuko found herself in the doorway, Cole handing her her pink, fur-lined coat and casting a disappointed look in the direction of the girls who were still trying to figure out who had the rose. Then there was no more time to think about anything else, because they were outside running through the driving rain in opposite directions toward the boys' and girls' dormitories. Cole realized belatedly that he hadn't kissed Mitsuko goodbye. The wind tried to tear the hood of the coat off his head, and he thought, It's too late now. With the thick clouds and heavy rain, a premature darkness was settling over the courtyard.

Cole lay on the bed in his room, listening to the relentlessly pounding rain. He was alone. Jonas had stayed in the student lounge downstairs to get some studying done. A thin splinter of lightning turned the sky outside the window to silver. Cole got up, looking out through the pane at the deep velvet of the night sky. Thunder growled, far away yet, and suddenly, something caught his eye. In the lights of the entryway of the girl's dorm, a figure stood. He recognized its pink coat. Mitsuko! he thought. He unlocked the window and hinged it open, letting in an icy barrage of rain, and peered out. She was standing at the edge of the pool of yellow light cast by the lamps in the doorway. He watched her put her hood up, fix her eyes determinedly on the library, and dash out across the courtyard in the unforgiving rain. The rose, he thought. They must not have been able to find it. He felt a surge of anger. One of her foolish friends had misplaced it, and now she had to go running out into the rain to try to find it. He slammed his fist down on the windowsill, but halfheartedly, the anger already starting to subside. It's not as if they had meant to lose it. He sighed.

Mitsuko had made it to the library and had gotten safely inside, closing the towering carved wooden door behind her with a solid thump. He saw the lights go up behind the stained-glass window, projecting the image of its interlacing vines and roses onto the sheets of rain. Through that phantom pane, he watched her walk over to the table where they had been sitting, turn over one of the masks that had been left, and pick up the rose from where it had been hidden safely underneath it. Cole breathed a sigh of relief as Mitsuko fastened the glass rose around her neck again. Then he noticed another, male figure walking toward her holding a book, waving a greeting. So someone else lost something, he thought wryly. Wondering briefly why the lights had been off, he realized the boy must not have wanted to get caught out after hours. He watched the two chatting, then Mitsuko moved off along the line of the table, pausing to pick up what Cole realized must be her mask. She headed to the wire to hang it like she had wanted to do before they had left earlier. The boy politely waited to walk her to the door.

Thunder rumbled again, much closer this time, and suddenly, Cole saw another figure behind the two drenched, mirroring panes of stained glass. This one stayed in the shadows of the bookcases on the outskirts of the room, watching. Then it started walking slowly, deliberately, never pausing, just pacing forward smoothly. It was in no hurry to show itself. Cole felt a chill that reached his soul. There was something wrong with it. Something in the cold way it moved.

Mitsuko was standing on a stool now, reaching for the wire to hang her mask. The figure was almost within her sight now. He saw it reach into the folds of its coat for something, saw Mitsuko and the boy beyond her turn sharply. Then he saw her fall. And heard the thin, wordless scream that followed her down out of his sight, out of the frame of the window, to disappear into blackness.

Cole crossed the room in a single stride, tearing the door open and nearly colliding with a startled boy passing by on the other side of it. He tore down the hallway at a flat run and never stopped until he reached the great double doors of the library. They stood open, and all at once he slammed into someone hurtling outward through the doorway. The impact nearly knocked them both down, but he regained his footing and swung an enraged fist at the figure. It leapt back, and Cole saw it draw back its hand with the glint of a knife. Cole brought up his arm to try to deflect the blow, but the slash never came. He looked up shakily. Standing opposite him in the rain, the hand with the knife hanging limply at his side, was Jonas. His chest was heaving, and the horror of what he had nearly done was plain in his tear-filled eyes. He staggered, and dropped to his knees on the soaked cobblestones.

"I... I almost..." he whispered. Then, "Look, I tried to stop him. I cut him. It wasn't enough... I don't know where he went." And, the weight of his failure crushing him to the earth, he choked, "Mitsuko..."

Cole left him there and stumbled into the library. He was terrified of what he would find, but no mortal could stop him. He ran to the end of the bookshelf where he had last seen Mitsuko. As he came up on her, the scene seemed to unfold in slow motion, as if in some terrible nightmare. He saw her sprawled on her back, her hair billowing around her head like a black halo, the mask fallen beyond her outstretched hand, the glass rose shattered on the stone floor. And he saw the blood. There was so much blood. He fell to his knees at her side powerlessly, not knowing what to do. He caressed her cheek desperately. She felt so cold.

I didn't kiss her goodbye.

Something inside him broke. The tears which he had not allowed himself since he was a child, that he had kept locked away so his mother wouldn't see them, surged through his barriers and spilled down his cheeks. Everything dissolved into a blur of wrenching, blood-stained heartbreak. Nothing mattered. If Mitsuko didn't make it, it didn't matter what happened to him anymore. Nothing could hurt him after that.

He was vaguely aware of Jonas' voice in the background, on the librarian's phone, telling the 911 dispatcher to hurry. Of Jonas trying to help the boy that had been by the table with Mitsuko, but looking away blindly, realizing it was too late. Of Jonas coming over to him and Mitsuko, and awkwardly excusing himself so he could place a clean towel from their painting class over her wound, following instructions the 911 operator was feeding into his ear. Cole applied pressure to the towel when Jonas directed him to. Slowly, as he pressed down, blood started to seep through. Cole looked down at it. It was unbelievably warm. And slowly, the feeling started to come back to his numbed body. He had cried so much, he felt like he didn't have any tears left. What was there left to do? He shook his head, his thoughts starting to run in order again. The ambulance would be here soon. He could hear sirens wailing in the distance. He should go to the hospital with Mitsuko. And sit in a waiting room biting his nails for hours while she was in surgery and wouldn't even know he was there? No. He would not sit there uselessly while the killer was slipping further and further back into the impenetrable darkness from which he'd come. In all the other murders, the bodies had not been discovered until the next morning. This time, the killer had barely escaped. He hadn't counted on Mitsuko coming back to the library to get her rose. The boy had been his target. Jonas had grappled with the killer, and had actually injured him.

Cole looked up to see Jonas standing nearby, the phone still held loosely at his ear, looking at him strangely. "You're sure you didn't see where he went?" Cole asked calmly, and the voice didn't even sound like his own.

"No," Jonas replied, his voice still a little shaky, "but I found out how he got out of the building."

Jonas pointed to the side of the room. Cole squinted into the distance and noticed blood and what looked like water spattered on the cobblestones of the floor. Jonas pointed upwards. Cole followed the gesture and saw, high above them, an open window. A rope dangled a little ways out of it, trailing in the wind. So that's why he doesn't leave footprints, Cole thought. He wondered if the killer was still on the roof, bleeding down the eaves. It would be fitting if he was, Cole thought guiltlessly. He looked down again at Mitsuko, at how deathly pale she was, and thought that no punishment would be too severe for the monster who did this to her.

Ambulances arrived with a screaming of sirens and a rush of paramedics through the doors. Someone took over holding the towel for Cole, and suddenly he was free to go where he liked. He knew exactly where that was. He walked over under the open window, staring up at the dark portal to the sky. What would be the quickest way to get on and off a roof? he asked himself. Then the answer was clear. A hovercar. It would be completely overshadowed by the hulking form of the ancient stone building. But he couldn't come and go by the gate. Campus security was too tight. He could never get a gun in. But then how had Jonas gotten a knife in? He turned to find his friend standing right next to him. Cole asked his question in a low voice, aware of the many ears in the room.

Jonas looked back at him cunningly. "I thought with the killer, I couldn't be too careful... I hid it in the woods. Then I was able to go out and get it later."

Avoiding the front gates and the security checks, Cole thought.

The woods were a vast, tangled wasteland that bordered the campus to the north. And a very good place to go if you didn't want to be followed or found. Cole walked deliberately outside, squeezing between the doorframe and the door of one of the ambulances that had backed right up to the building. The rain had let up, but the wind still tore at him. He hadn't had time to bring his coat. He looked searchingly in the direction of the woods. And despite the strobing lights of the ambulances, he thought he could just make out another light deep in the woods, flashing through the gnarled trees. He looked over at Jonas. He saw it too. Cole set his jaw and made up his mind. Jonas gave a long sigh and took off his coat, handing it to Cole.

"Since I can't stop you..." he said.

Cole took it, feeling a surge of gratitude. Then Jonas handed him something else, discreetly, while no one was looking. Cole's six fingers closed on the hard metal of the pocket knife.

"In case you need it," Jonas told him.

Cole nodded, thanking his best friend. Just then, the paramedics brought Mitsuko to the ambulance. She looked so small on the stretcher. Her midsection was swathed in bandages. Cole slipped in next to her and kissed her lips gently for what might've been the last time. Then he turned to Jonas and said quietly, "Take care of her."

Jonas blinked back tears and climbed into the ambulance, beginning his long vigil.

Cole watched the ambulance take Mitsuko away, to what fate, he didn't know. He watched until the lights had faded from view, to be replaced by another set of lights, police from the nearest station on the other side of town. Then he turned his attention to the woods, and whatever he might find there.

Cole skirted the edge of the library, creeping silently behind the drenched, brooding building. The woods loomed in front of him. Fog drifted out from among the twisted vines, lapping at his shoes like a ghoulish tide. He stepped off the stone pavement, and left everything safe behind.

He picked his way through the thick undergrowth, pausing when he came out on what looked to be a very narrow path. It was barely wide enough for him to put one foot directly in front of the other, and the forest already seemed to be closing in on it, reclaiming that ground. Branches reached out for him like gnarled hands, trying to grasp the trailing ends of his coat, and the wind moaned through the decaying trees, creating a thousand voices that seemed to whisper, No... Don't go that way.

Cole looked up at the ruined treetops shuddering in the wind. The whole forest seemed to be breathing around him like some hideous, undead thing. He shivered, gritted his teeth, and forced himself to walk faster. His hands, pressed inside the pockets of the coat his best friend had given him, were still stained with Mitsuko's blood. That was what kept him moving forward. The memory of her lying there, her vibrant life spilling out over the cold stones, the glass rose he had given her cruelly shattered next to her. He could still see the look in her eyes when he had given the rose to her. How her tears of betrayed innocence at hearing of the murder at Wells had been turned in an instant to tears of joy and love. A love that needed no words, that engulfed them and shone through them like so many brilliant rays of light, and seemed capable of purifying all the evil from the world in a single incandescent flash. That love changed in Cole's heart as he walked, re-forming itself into a blaze of courage.

Cole was definitely getting closer to the light he and Jonas had seen from outside the library. It seemed like hours ago. He walked for another ten minutes, then came up on it. He looked up to see a hovercar entangled in the treetops. The red hazard lights flashed a warning to no one as it hung there, bathing the black trees intermittently with a bloody light. Not all of the crimson faded completely, he noticed. The passenger-side door, the only one that wasn't wedged shut against the massive tree, gaped open. Cole saw that there was blood smeared on the side of the vehicle below the door, as if someone had lowered themselves through the opening and bled freely as they did. Cole felt a kind of dark hope. Apparently, Jonas had wounded the killer worse than he thought. Cole traced the blood from branch to branch, then began to follow it grimly as it led down the path.

All of Cole's senses were sharp as the edge of the knife in his pocket. He knew the killer had to be close by now. He took advantage of every ray of moonlight that penetrated the interlacing treetops overhead, scanning the brambles for any sign of movement. Suddenly, he saw something that was eerily out of place. He crouched a few feet from a clearing, letting the bushes screen him from view. On the other side of a bare patch of ground, was an abandoned house. The roof was gone, and half the front wall was caved in. It looked as if it was crumpling in on itself, and thick vines arched over it as if trying to drag it down into the earth.

Cole was filled with certainty that the killer was there, that he had been using this ruin as a hideout. He crept forward tensely, beginning to reach into his pocket for the knife, when there was a sharp, heartstopping click! behind him. He whirled around and faced the barrel of a gun, and beyond it, dark eyes that emanated cold fire. Cole leapt back, and a wild instinct told him to go for the knife, but what good would it do against a gun?

The killer lifted his chin toward the collapsing house, and ordered, "Go."

Cole stood rooted to the spot defiantly. All he could think of was, This is the monster who shot Mitsuko. He refused to move, his lip beginning to curl in a snarl.

Taking a purposeful step toward him and waving the gun at him, the killer thundered, "Go on!"

Images screamed through Cole's head - Mitsuko falling to the floor, her blood pooling between the stones, her cold skin at his fingertips, and something within him snapped.

"Do you know what you did?" he roared, and suddenly it was him who was advancing on the killer, his eyes that were ablaze with rage. "You shot her in cold blood you monster!"

Cole shoved a hand, covered in Mitsuko's innocent blood, in the killer's face. "She did nothing to you!"

The killer took a step back, regarding Cole, but not lowering the gun. The expression on his face shifted to something Cole could not read.

"Sacrifice," he whispered, almost hissed, then made his way around Cole through the brambles and walked slowly toward the dilapidated house, never taking the gun off him.

Cole stared at him in revulsion and hatred. "Wait, don't you walk away from me!" he yelled after him. "What do you mean?"

But the killer had already disappeared into the ruined house. A chill went up Cole's spine at the thought of following him in there. But he certainly didn't want him to be pointing a gun at him from some unseen place. And what else was Cole going to do, stand here dumbly in the middle of the forest while the killer and all the answers he sought slipped out the back and were swallowed up by the shadows again? He gritted his teeth and went inside.

Stepping over the remains of the collapsed wall, it was clear that nothing was as it appeared from the outside of the building. Wedged within was the symmetrical rectangular shape of an emergency shelter. It had been set up within the shell of the rotting walls of the old house, perfectly shielded from view. Utility bins were stacked along the walls of the shelter. It was clear the killer could hold out here a long time if need be. But he hadn't planned on being wounded. As he turned on a halogen lantern, the severity of his injury became apparent. In the harsh, white light, Cole could see a long line of blood seeping through the thick bandage around his torso. Jonas had slashed him from chest to abdomen, and the bleeding still had not stopped. Cole wondered for a moment if the killer might just pass out eventually. It was then that he noticed how pale he was.

He leaned painfully against a stack of bins, the gun lying on its side on the lid of the topmost one, his hand on it, regarding Cole again with that unreadable look. Cole did nothing to hide his hostility. He was waiting for the answers the killer owed him.

He shook his head. "Why?" he asked, breaking the silence with the most basic, desperate question. "Or is there even an answer in that twisted mind of yours?"

"Our minds are two sides of the same coin," he replied quietly.

Cole recoiled in outrage. "I'm not like you - " he began, but the killer cut him off.

"Don't flatter yourself! We're all capable of more than we think we are. You think you would never kill someone. Then why did you follow me out here?"

Cole's eyes flickered uncertainly for a brief moment. Then he snarled, "If I killed you, it would be justice for what you did to Mitsuko."

The killer was moving toward him now. "Ah, so sometimes killing is acceptable. How do you decide? How do you decide which reasons are good enough and which ones aren't?"

"Why don't you tell me your reasons?" Cole cried in frustration.

"You already know them," the killer told him.

Cole stared at him in utter confusion, his patience slipping. "Would you just tell me!!" he yelled.

The killer said nothing, but reached into a pool of darkness on a shelf and turned on a small portable television. "Watch for yourself," he said.

The picture slowly gained resolution on the monitor, and Cole felt a wrenching tug at his heart as Mitsuko's photo appeared. The announcer was saying "... wounded girl is still in surgery at this hour. Returning to the investigation, unlike at the previous crime scenes, blood was discovered on the campus this time. Preliminary analysis has led to a startling conclusion: the Music Academy Serial Killer is in fact, the brother of one of the students. That boy, sixteen year old Cole Snow, cannot be located as of this broadcast, and there is a disturbing rumor making its way around campus that he went looking for the killer on his own."

Cole stared at the screen, suddenly unable to feel the ground beneath his feet. It couldn't be true. That abomination standing opposite him in this decaying, undead forest couldn't possibly be his flesh and blood. His father had told him once that he had had a brother, but that was the first and last time he had been mentioned. He wasn't talked about, as if he had died a gruesome, tragic death, and it wasn't the kind of thing polite people had conversations about. His father... Their father, Cole forced himself to think, if it was actually true, had told him his lost older brother's name. He shifted his eyes to the man who was still a stranger but in a different way, and asked for his name.

"Erik Jonathan Snow," he replied, echoing their father's voice in that conversation so long ago.

Cole shook his head, the numbness beginning to take over. "That still doesn't tell me why," he said bitterly.

"Doesn't it?" Erik asked. He stabbed a finger at the television. "Look again." Their mother was on the screen, making what was supposed to appear to be a desperate plea for Cole's safe return.

"You think she means any of it?" Erik sneered, looking away as if he couldn't stand the sight of the grossly insincere spectacle. Cole realized he had averted his eyes a split-second before his brother, the same look of revulsion on his face.

"She keeps up appearances for the neighbors and friends," Erik continued, "but when that door closes behind you, you wonder if it'll be for the last time. You wonder if you'll ever do something that's good enough for her. You wonder if you'll ever be able to be perfect enough to avoid the next beating. You wonder if she'll ever be proud enough of you to call you her son, if she'll ever think you're worthy of her love. Then you realize: I shouldn't have to earn it. That's when the anger starts. It'll take you over..." A madness was glinting in Erik's eyes now. "Those boys, they were just too... perfect. They never knew what it was like to try and try and try but still get knocked down. They had everything! They can't take it for granted any more..."

Cole stared at Erik brokenly. Everything he had said about their mother had made sense in a way that nothing else in his life ever had. No one had ever understood before. He felt his focus slipping. He was forgetting what he came here for, he realized in a panicky moment. He had never expected this.

"But... but what about Mitsuko?" Cole said, almost pleading. "What did you have against her?"

"Sacrifice," Erik said, repeating the first word he had said to him. "It's something I learned from our father. He knew full well what was happening. He saw the bruises. He saw the fear. And he looked the other way. Because he wanted a happy family, and it would disturb that if he were to start accusing his wife of things. And he wanted a successful business, and the clients would go with someone else if there was an unpleasant scandal surrounding his family. He turned his back on us. Both of us. He sacrificed us for his idea of the perfect life." He shrugged. "The girl was in the wrong place at the wrong time. She was sacrificed too."

Cole shuddered as he looked into Erik's eyes and realized his brother actually believed that what he was saying made sense.

Two sides of the same coin.

Erik's words circled in his head. His brother had been just like him once. He had fallen off the edge somewhere. Cole wondered where the edge was for him. He was almost at the end of his stregth to deal with the constant beatings. He had another summer of them to look forward to when he left school in a few months time. Could he take it? The question lay there like a stone.

Consumed in his thoughts, Cole didn't notice the sound until it was nearly on top of them. Erik had already grabbed the gun and started to head for cover in the tangle of brambles. Cole hadn't realized how weak his brother had gotten until he noticed how slowly he was moving over the uneven ground. He hurried after him, looking up to see the searchlights of a police helicopter piercing the trees nearby.

Erik saw them too. "You've led them right to us!" he yelled, above the concussion of the rotors.

"I... I..." Cole began. I didn't know you were my brother, he finished silently, and ran back into the emergency shelter. He scanned the shelves in the light of the lantern and came up with what he was looking for - a flashlight. He dashed back out, and, flicking the switch, turned it into a beacon, beaming it toward the helicopter.

From the side of the clearing, Erik stared at him in disbelief. "Traitor!" he screamed, "I thought you understood!"

Erik headed for him, bringing the gun up again, but the helicopter was circling back. There was no time. Cole saw the gun, but kept waving the flashlight desperately. He wanted out of this forest, away from this madman who reminded him too much of himself. Cole turned as Erik fled, crossing the clearing. Suddenly, Cole saw what looked like boards lying on the ground at the very edge of the forest. A well, he realized. In his blind rush, his brother was heading right for it. Cole knew the rotting boards would never hold his weight.

"No!" he cried out, but it was too late. There was a terrible splintering of wood and Erik started to fall from sight. In the split second before he was swallowed up, Cole saw him turn. The gun was still aimed directly at him. There was a shot. And Erik's eyes held a look of pure malice as he fell to his death.

The trees tilted dizzyingly, and Cole found himself on the cold ground. Pain seared through him, and he lifted his hand to find it was covered in fresh blood. Things were getting hazy. He knew he had to find the flashlight. He had to flag the helicopter. He heard it in the distance. It seemed like it was far away. Or was it him who was far away? He turned his head to search the black sky for the lights, but his eyes were already closed.

***

Cole was on the edge of the dream, bathed in the white light again. The dream had taken him full circle, back to the present. He chanced to open his eyes, the light blinding him. He kept them open this time. As his eyes slowly adjusted, he began to realize where he was. He saw a monitor first, its screen displaying his blood pressure and heart rate. Then he noticed an IV bag feeding some liquid into his vein. He tried to move, but shooting pain warned him against further attempts. He became aware of someone else in the room, an anxious face leaning over him. He blinked and recognized a very exhausted-looking Jonas. Cole managed a smile, and his best friend nearly fainted with relief.

"Mitsuko...?" Cole asked fearfully.

"She's right here," Jonas reassured him quickly.

Cole turned his head slowly. There, in the bed next to him lay Mitsuko. She was covered in a soft blue blanket, and he could see her chest rise and fall gently as she breathed. He had never seen anything so beautiful.

Cole and Mitsuko stayed at the hospital for many days. Beyond his recovery from the gunshot wound, the doctors had other concerns about Cole. They had discovered the bruises on his body, a tracery of shadows whispering disquieting things from the darkness. There came a day when he was well enough, and a social worker came and sat patiently in his hospital room. Cole found he had no more lies left.

***

The summer heat had come, and Cole and Jonas were content to stay in the coolness of the kitchen, gathering dishes from the cupboard and taking them to the counter. Mitsuko accepted them carefully. She helped Jonas' mother spoon dinner onto the plates and carry them to the table. Mitsuko's summer dress swayed around her knees lightly. Her hair was pulled up into the same cherry blossom clip she had been wearing when Cole had first met her. She was wearing something else. A diamond glinted brightly from her left hand. She and Cole hadn't set a date yet. They were, after all, only seventeen, but the ring bound her to him for the rest of their days.

Mitsuko spent nearly every evening here at Jonas' house. When Jonas' parents had offered to take him in more than a year ago, Cole had been overwhelmed with gratitude. He had never expected so much.

He still thought of his brother every once in a while. He knew he wouldn't share his brother's fate. And not because he had been taken out of the brutal hands of his mother. Because he had realized that he had a choice. No matter what dark impulses pushed him, his path was his own. He could make his decision, and steal a destiny that was not given to him.

~~~

OMG, I finished it!! yay!! that took long enough. :p I didn't think it'd be so long. but it's done now! I get to move on to something else. it'll probably be a while though... I'm tired. lol!

thanks for reading and for hanging in till the end! I know it's really long!

Molasses in January... er, February

I would like to get that werewolf story written and posted. I really would. however, there are now two other stories vying for my time and creative energy, both of which I intend to try to get published the old-fashioned way instead of posting them here. they just have a "book" feel to them, while the werewolf story has an internet feel. but the fact that the second book has now come back onto the radar is very good news. I worked out one of the major plot problems that had resulted in a very tedious delay. and this was shortly after I solved a big plot problem with the other book too. so, good news all around... except for you guys, waiting for my story on here. :p sorry I have to be sooo slow about it. I hope no ones's holding their breath...