Saturday

After going to Christina’s house for the day and messing around, I go back home and get to sleep. In the middle of the night, I get a call.

It’s Christina. Is it happening tonight, too?

“Hey Simon…” Her voice is shaky. Or maybe it’s just the call, “I think I’m having another panic attack.”

“Don’t worry, I’m here for you. Concentrate on your breathing.”

“It- It’s just that- I’m so scared. Luke died,” I hate hearing that. It makes me sick.

“Yeah. I know. But, don’t worry. I’m here. I’ll heal you no matter what happens.”

She goes on for a while. I might not get much sleep tonight. She does this a lot.

Christina has some bad mental health. She always gets anxiety attacks and is mildly depressed. She never says a word of it to anyone but me. I’m glad I can help her, that I can be there for her.

People who are weak, like Christina, I need to help them. I’ll do anything I can for them. I can’t stand seeing them in pain. I’ll do anything in my power so that I never have to see them suffer.

Eventually, she talks less and less on the call, until she falls asleep.

“Goodnight,” I whisper into my phone.

I wake up in the morning and play it out like usual. Too bad there’s no school today.

Bored, I pull out my phone and text Christina like always.

“Want to come over soon? I’m really bored.”

“Sure! Want to go bowling? I can drive.”

“That sounds fun!”

“Great. I’ll pick you up in a few hours.”

Yay!

I walk downstairs to eat some breakfast.

“Hello mom!”

“Hello Simon. I’m making pancakes, want any?”

“I’d love some.”

Smells delicious!

I sit down at the table and get on my phone while I wait. My hands are pretty shaky right now. I must be stressed. This happens a lot.

When the pancakes finish, I eat up my portion and head back to my room.

“Love you mom!”

“Love you too!”

My stomach hurts. I wonder if it was the pancakes? I hope this isn’t the stress too.

Knock Knock Knock

She’s a half hour earlier than I thought she’d be.

“That’s Christina! I’ll get it!” I shout to my mom from my room.

Quickly putting on my socks and shoes, I run to answer the door.

“Heya!” Christina greets with a smile.

Heya?

“Hey!”

“Sorry I came over so suddenly.”

“No problem. Being early is fine with me. I was bored anyway.” She said ‘suddenly’ instead of ‘early’. That’s weird. It makes sense, but you’d expect someone to say early.

“A-ah.”

“What’s that?”

“Nothing. Are you ready to go?”

“Of course!”

I walk out of my door and wave to my mom.

“Follow me, I parked back here.”

I walk behind Christina as she leads me to her car. We walk down the street and her car is parked in another driveway at the corner of the road.

Weird.

Actually, on closer inspection, this isn’t her car.

“Did you get a new car?”

“Yeah. Like it?” She asks cheerfully.

“It’s nice.”

This feels so strange. It feels wrong. All of these minor discrepancies are feeling much more weighty.

“Hey…”

“Yeah?”

“About last night…”

“Yeah, what about it?”

“You know how you said that you loved me?”

She stops and thinks for a moment, “I really do.”

Who is she?

This is bad. My heart skips a beat. I don’t think I can keep the discomfort off of my face.

My stomach ache gets worse.

No, my face is definitely pale. I’ll use this as an excuse to escape. I can’t just turn her down, I don’t know what she’ll do. I’ll try one more test.

“Yeah, I don’t think we can eat out at that restaurant today. My stomach hurts. Want to go to the movies instead?”

“Sure! Restaurants are overrated anyway.”

Who is this!? We were going bowling.

“I’ll be right back, wait here for me. I need to use the bathroom.”

“Alright.”

I turn my back and start walking away, but she follows me.

This is bad.

We both enter my house.

“Back so soon?”

“Don’t worry, we’re on our way out.”

“Alright, sweety.”

I walk to my room and stop at the door.

“I’ll be right out Christina.”

I open the door so that she can’t see the inside. She still thinks it’s the bathroom. This really isn’t her. She’s been to my house a thousand times.

I lock the door behind me and pace.

Where can I go? I can’t stay here forever.

The window!

I open my window, but an insect screen stops me from leaving.

How do you take one of these off!?

“You ok in there?” ‘Christina’ asks.

The noises of me opening the window must be strange.

“Yeah,” I grunt, so it sounds like I’m… you know.

I spy my pocket knife on my wardrobe. Thank god I used to be a boy scout.

I flip open the blade and cut open the insect screen. I leave the knife in my pocket, just in case.

I put my first leg out and look down.

My vision starts to wave as I look at the bushes from the second floor. That’s a long fall.

The door knob begins to shake. She must not be buying it. The knob starts to shake.

I grab the edge of the window and hang myself down. I need to shorten the falling distance as best as I can. There’s a bush under me, maybe that will cushion the fall? After that, I’ll sprint towards the woods!

I hear the sound of the door being unlocked. How’d she do that?! I immediately drop down.

Thud.

Ouchhhhh. That hurts so bad. My legs aren’t fine. I’m sure they can still run though! They have to. Not to mention, my clothes are torn a bit and the bushes scratched me up.

I stand as fast as I can and sprint into the forest.

I can’t look back, but by now, she has to have walked to the window and seen me running.

There aren’t any sounds of footsteps following me. She must be far gone. No doubt that she’ll walk downstairs and out the door. I doubt she’d jump too.

I left her with my mom, but I’m sure that this thing is after my gem.

Who knows what else that creature can look like? I can’t talk to anyone, or let them see me.

My next course of action needs to be hiding close to the house. Christina, the real one, is still going to stop at my house in around twenty five minutes. My little game of hide and seek needs to last only that long. Actually, I can message her to speed up.

I receive a message from Christina on my phone.

“I’m at your house. Sorry for being early.”

Well that saved me!

I don’t even need to message her.

I sneak around and look at the front of my house. Christina is standing there.

Her car still isn’t, though. That’s the fake!? How’d she text from a different number?

I feel like I’ve heard something like that on the news. A method for scammers to imitate someone else’s phone number. It’s scary to see in action. This creature must be pretty smart.

I’ll hide around the side of a house two houses down. That’ll let me have a good idea of when the real Christina arrives, and hide me well.

Sadly, it looks like texting her won’t do anything. Somehow, her number can be used by the imitation.

I wait for what feels like hours, but only a couple minutes pass, based on my phone’s clock.

The fake with Christina’s face begins to walk around. She’s searching. She must be checking the street because she won’t even have a chance if I ran through the forest.

I would go with the forest plan, but then I can’t be saved. I’d be in constant fear that whoever I talk to is a fake. I’d never be able to tell. My only safe option is to stay right on this street for Christina to save me. Her power isn’t amazing, but it’ll be enough to defeat a fake!

Ten minutes remain and it walks up the street towards me.

Where do I go? If I walk behind the houses I’d have to make a break for it through the gap between the yards. If it happens to see me, it’s all over. No doubt it’d outrun me. My legs still hurt and they’re all scratched up.

I could also move farther from my own house without being seen, but that’s probably what it wants!

I just had a great idea! I’ll head straight backwards, to the forest. Then, from the woods, I’ll move to behind my own house. She can’t see me that way, and I can keep an eye on her.

If I run back to the woods before it’s directly in front of the house, it’ll be able to see me. This is going to be close. I’ll use the faint sound of footsteps to try and locate the perfect moment to start moving.

I sneak along the wall behind the house, sticking my back to it.

I count off the very faint footsteps from the side walk. The birds chirping and the occasional car going by drown out the sound. Even the wind can overpower the sound of it’s footsteps.

One step.

Wind.

Two steps.

Bird.

Three steps.

Four steps.

Car.

Five steps.

I continue counting off the steps until they sound like they’re behind the house.

Now’s my chance.

I run as quietly as possible to the woods.

As soon as I take cover in the trees, I look back to see if I was spotted.

I don’t see it. It must be in front of the house.

I walk through the woods and take cover behind my house.

I sit down behind the house and take a deep breath.

My hands shake and my stomach begs me to puke.

Not now.

I’m scared. This is awful, but I think I won. Only two minutes until Christina is here.

As soon as I calm down, fear washes over me in a second burst.

I hear footsteps close by. They move fast.

It found me!

Shit!

I get up and sprint diagonally towards the woods.

It’s close behind me, and it’s super fast.

I can’t help but peak at what’s chasing me.

That thing is horribly misshapen. It’s face is still Christina’s but it’s legs are shaped like a horse’s. It still has the skin of a human, but the bone structure looks awful. Despite how hideous it is, no human can compete with a horse in terms of speed.

It’s arms are significantly longer than a human’s and seem to have no bones. They move like a snake and grow out towards me.

It’s fingernails grow out like knives and fly towards my head.

I’m a dead man!

It’s best to give up. I’ve always liked to consider myself someone who could cope with dying. Besides, I’ve had enough with this fear. This is the most awful feeling I’ve ever felt. I’m terrified. If I struggle to live, who knows how painful it’d be? My life’s been great, but lately I’ve been really stressed. Maybe this is a relief?

I relax all of my muscles and allow myself to die painlessly.

No! I can’t! I’m scared!

I throw my body to the side and fall to the floor. That could’ve killed me… but I lived.

That’s when it hits. The pain.

My shoulder bleeds profusely and my vision struggles to focus. It hurts so bad! I grasp at my left shoulder with my hand.

I force my head to check how bad it is. That’s when I see it. My left arm lies on the red, blood soaked grass in front of me, completely detached from my body.

I let out an involuntary scream in pain.

The thing stops moving but it’s arms slowly get into position to cut off my head.

Suddenly, both of the snake-like arms fall to the ground. They crash so hard that it smashes a small hole in the dirt around them.

It’s Christina. If she was even a second later… I can’t even bring myself to imagine.

“Don’t worry, I’m here! Are you alright!?”

She was running from the street. She must have seen me as she passed by in her car and heard the scream. Thank god I had the sense to run diagonally. If I ran straight, the house would have blocked her vision of me. She might not have been able to tell where I was. If I gave up and let it kill me instead of dodging, she wouldn’t have heard my scream either. I bet the creature would’ve killed her by shifting into me next.

Stumbling up, I change directions and begin running toward the road, to Christina. I can’t balance with my missing arm and fall on the floor once again. She meets me in the middle and makes a wall between me and it.

“What is that??” Christina asks in horror.

“I have no clue! It’s hardly human,” I manage to say in between breaths. The pain makes it hard to speak. I desperately squeeze my shoulder to stop the bleeding. If only I could heal myself… but, it’s not about me right now! Christina needs to make it out alive too!

The thing retracts it’s arms and reshapes it’s legs into a person’s.

Two Christina’s face each other.

“This sure is unsettling! Can you put on your real face?”

The fake scoffs and it slowly mutates itself again.

It shifts slowly almost as if it wants to be theatrical. I saw it shoot it’s nails out. It can obviously mutate faster.

It retains a female’s body but gets shorter. It’s around average height with brown hair and blue eyes.

“Rachel?!” I can’t believe it. I didn’t know her well, but we were friends!

The monstrous woman looks at both of us, “Who’d you expect?”

“A shape shifter,” I gasp for air to inform Christina, “We can’t know for sure… that it’s really Rachel, either… That thing can take any form it desires. It’ll… be a tough opponent. We can’t even run…. It would outpace anything.”

“I’m up for it,” Christina says, “I’m sure that I’ll be able to protect you. Heal me if I get injured. We’ll make a good duo.”

“Yeah,” I don’t know how well I’ll be able to help with one arm, but I’ll do whatever I can.

The creature speaks, “I really am Rachel. Although, I didn’t want to fight you both at the same time. I figured that the easiest target I knew of was Simon… No matter, I doubt I can lose.”

“Why are you fighting us?” I plead, “Killing isn’t the answer!”

“Oh, but it is. I have only one wish and I need it to come true. I already have three gems. If I have both of yours, I’ll be unstoppable. Of course, I would’ve preferred having four gems before taking on a real fight.”

“W-Who’s gems did you take? Who’d you kill!?” The words taste awful in my mouth.

“I took Luke’s after he already died and I ‘took care’ of Sarah. Don’t worry, she isn’t dead. Killing is wrong, after all. However, even though as a human being I am opposed to murder, if it is necessary, I have to allow it. I’m not a bad person, I just need to do this.”

But does she really? “Why? What’s your goal here? We can help you!”

Rachel only grins.

“Stop, Simon. It’s too late. She’s off the deep end.”

“Off the deep end? How dare you! I am perfectly normal!”

“Nah, I’m pretty sure you aren’t.” Christina laughs.

“Well I’d never! This battle is fated and I have nothing to do with it. When I kill you here, it will only be because I had no choice.”

“Who’s making you?” I try to reason.

“Me. My circumstances require this much.”

“But what is it that you want from all of this?”

“… You’d never understand.”

She really is crazy! She can’t even explain what she wants. This is the most afraid I have ever felt. It’s true fear. She will really kill us! I don’t ever want to feel pain like this again. In the back of my head, I’m considering just giving up.

“Well, we can no longer talk, so Rachel, back down now or face our wrath!” Christina threatens.

“Time to test my new power!”

We’re a decent distance apart. It’d take even Rachel a couple of seconds to close the distance.

Rachel’s arms extend again like snakes. Her finger nails grow out like razor blades.

Christina puts out her hands and points them at the flying snake-arms, “I’ve got this!”

The arms suddenly get slammed into the ground again.

Christina’s Delusion, I know it all too well. She can’t take care of herself so she puts her weight on others. Thus, she can add additional gravity to objects around her. Kyle sure is a genius. I would’ve never understood why she had that Delusion.

With her arms stuck, Rachel shifts her legs into a horse’s and runs straight towards me and Christina.

When she gets close enough, a large gravity is placed on her.

Now we have her! She shouldn’t have gotten so close, now she won’t be able to get up.

But Rachel never fell. She stood and kept walking. She couldn’t sprint, but she was making her way to us.

What is she? Is this the power of the gems?

Her muscles bulge. Muscle mass appears out of nowhere and she gains the build of a weight lifter.

If that isn’t over powered…

Christina runs towards the slowed Rachel, ready to punch.

“Wait! Don’t jump in like that!” I caution.

“Trust me, I just got a good idea.”

Rachel’s arms retract back onto her body. Her torso bubbles and expands. Her whole body begins to contort and grow. She’s now a huge over-six-foot tall body builder. The only problem for her now is that she’s being slowed down by gravity.

Rachel takes a boxing stance and gets ready to block Christina’s blow. I know Christina, and I think she may have just bit off more than she could chew. There’s no way her plan works.

Christina threw her whole body weight into a single punch.

Rachel’s face gleamed with confidence, despite being weighed down so much.

The smirk on her face was instantly wiped off when Christina’s little teenage-girl-punch sent her flying backwards. Rachel was able to block in time but it looked like the punch broke one of her arms. The massive muscular arm bent in half like a tooth pick.

“What was that?”

“It worked! It looks like if I add a large amount of weight to my own arm after it’s already in motion, it’ll keep the momentum. I just hit her with the force of a brick traveling as fast as my fist. Well, a whole lot heavier than a brick,” She paused for a moment, “That’ll only hold her for a second, she’ll stand up soon, but… I kinda broke my hand.”

She what!?

I run over to heal it. Her hand was in really bad shape. That punch deals some damage, but the human body can’t take the recoil.

I have to remove my right hand from my still bleeding shoulder to heal her. Just taking off my hand reignites the pain. It hurts so bad. I consider not healing Christina so that I can continue to ease my pain, but I power through.

“Are you alright now?”

“Yeah, thanks, but we have bigger problems.”

Rachel stands back up after flying back around twenty feet. That blow would’ve killed a human. The arm she blocked with is mangled.

The mangled arm starts to twist and morph.

She can self heal too? I guess that makes sense, shape shifting can modify the body in any way. But if that’s the case…

How do we win!?

It’s hopeless. We can only try to escape.

My legs begin to tremble. I’m going to die here.

Even with the extra gravity, Rachel runs faster than the average person. She’s even faster than me, weighed down!

“Run, Christina! Let’s escape!”

“No! I need to defeat her!”

“Are you stupid!? We can’t even hurt her! She’s invincible!”

Christina thinks for a second and replies, “If I get a solid shot on her head, there’s no way it can be repaired. It’s an instant kill.”

“I suppose, but-!”

I guess that also means she isn’t able to shape shift her own brain. If she did, how would she shift back?

That’s her core.

But, it’s no use. I’m afraid. I’m truly, truly afraid.

Christina looks at me and smiles, “I know… I know that I’ve been relying on you my entire life. I’ve relied on all of those around me. I know that we can’t outrun her. I also know this fight is unwinnable. But, Simon, run for me. You escape! I’ll hold her off. Notify Allen and the others. You can win together!”

Tears swell in my eyes. I’m terrified, “Thank you, Christina.”

I want to stay and help her… but what can I do? I’m so afraid. The fear is too much for me. I can’t handle the idea of death. If I die here… what about my mom and pa? What about my sister? What about me?

My shoulder constantly reminds me of the fear of death.

I don’t want to die!

I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die.

Without being able to think, my legs take off and I can’t stop running.

Thank you Christina.

I run in terribly poor form. My balance is completely thrown off without my arm. I can hardly even run, but the adrenaline forces me to keep going. Blood trickles from my shoulder despite me holding onto it. My legs fill with pain from my previous injuries but I keep going.

The tears that blurred my vision start to fall.

Christina died. She did. There’s no way she can fight that beast. Land a blow on her head? That’s entirely impossible. It’s laughable. My best friend has died. I’ve known her for so long… I loved her.

But I can hardly think about that.

That is an entirely secondary emotion right now.

No, it’s third.

I’m afraid. I can’t die here! I don’t want to! I don’t want to feel pain! I’m terrified.

But… number one…

Deep down in the truest depths of my heart I’m…

Through the tears, a smile appears on my face.

I run into the woods and don’t pay heed to wherever I’m going.

I’m glad that it wasn’t me.