WnW 1.a – Apathy

It would be inefficient to let him live any longer. The authorities will be searching for him. We’ll need to move quickly. The vehicle is unusable. That will make this more difficult.

I stared down at Nick, lying helpless on the ground. I’d had my fun. I supposed it was time to listen to the voice of logic in my head.

“Any last words?” I asked, before jerking the blade across his throat.

A deep cut, stab then pull. Sever the carotid artery, render the victim unconscious in seconds. Now we should take steps to procure a new vehicle.

I ignored that last suggestion, looking down at Nick’s last few seconds of life. During the wedding his hair had been pulled back in a ponytail but it had come undone in the crash and now the hair was draped over his face. Blood pumped out of his neck.

Exsanguination imminent.

The thoughts proved true. Nick stopped moving mere seconds after his throat was cut. He lay next to the corpse of the deer, his finger touching the remaining intact antler. A companion to the afterlife.

Cervus canadensis. Killed by impact within the hour. This road is likely only used by locals. I sighed and wiped my knife on my shirt. Will result in hostility and fear from most social groups. I had done it anyway. Things weren’t fun without a little spice thrown in. Recently, it seemed that my more impulsive decisions were the only way to keep things interesting.

Nick was malleable, but held back by firm convictions. Too much effort would be required to change that. Better to find someone more suggestible.

These thoughts moved constantly in the background of my mind, like every thought I had was a stone thrown into water, rippling and expanding past a point I could consciously perceive.

Lights appeared in the distance, getting closer. A small truck, judging by the headlight spacing and suspension movement. Likely local, they’re speeding, they know the cops don’t patrol these roads. Not intoxicated, steering corrections are negligible.

I slipped my knife up my shirt sleeve and stepped out of the ditch, standing in the path of the approaching vehicle. The truck’s brights were switched to low as the driver noticed me. The truck slowed and pulled over to the shoulder right next to our wrecked vehicle. The headlights prevented me from seeing through the windshield. 

I waved, trying to look like I was in pain. I was, technically, but pain was all in the mind and at the moment, my mind was vast.

The driver side door opened and a man stepped out. He wore thick soled work boots, jeans dusty from a long day’s work, and a plaid flannel shirt. Local farmer, no doubt. He was also holding a shotgun, which he leveled at me. Winchester 1912. Up to six shots. Pump action. Well maintained. His stance is on par with military personnel, he knows how to use it.

I raised my hands high. “Woah there. Don’t shoot,” I injected panic into my voice.

The farmer approached slowly, keeping the barrel trained on me. He had short gray hair and a well-kept beard, brown with streaks of white. He gave me a scowl that was likely his default expression, he seemed like the type. 

“Been drinkin’?” He asked gruffly.

I shook my head. “Hit a deer.” I gestured behind me but didn’t move. I was blocking his view of Nick’s body. My thoughts were getting slower, less efficient. I was “sobering up” after using my power. The pain started to take up more of my headspace.

“You sure ‘bout that? You look like ya came from a party.”

“A wedding in Cerf Morne.” I winced from the pain. It was getting worse.

“Are you the one?”

Odd phrasing. I started to smile but caught myself and went for mournful instead. “There were two of us, my friend was with me. He got thrown from the car when it rolled. I tried to staunch the wounds but…”

“Where is he?”

I stepped to the side ever so slightly. The farmer leaned over, squinting. My knife slipped back into my hand. I lunged forward.

The farmer swiveled, far too ready, gun dropping, hand catching my wrist while the other struck me in the face. He swept my leg bringing me to the ground in a practiced motion. I was blinking back stars as I realized that this was no ordinary farmer.

Once he had his knee pressed against my back, he pried my knife out of my hand.

I heard him muttering to himself. “Know a butcher’s cut when I see one.”

How interesting. I lay still, pretending to be unconscious. I wasn’t concerned, I could make him stop at any point, but I wanted to see where this would go.

“You better be the one I was told about,” he said to me. “Because if you killed him and you aren’t, I’m going to lose my-” he stopped.

I chanced a peek. Nick’s glassy eyes stared back at me.

“He ain’t dead?” the man muttered to himself. The knee left my back and the man picked up his gun and approached Nick.

Perhaps the body had twitched, it wasn’t unheard of.

The man crouched and placed a hand on Nick’s neck. Then he cried out, taking a step back.

What?

I couldn’t understand what I was witnessing. Nick’s body, it was moving. His limbs spasmed, fingers clenching. Something wet slithered along his fingers.

I used my power. A cold weight settled over my mind, like my head had been dunked in ice cold water and I gasped as I was assaulted with information.

Deer body tissue is moving. A thick red trail of tissue moved. The deer’s skin shifted and deformed around the point where the tissue was moving, sliding along and up the deer’s antler. The tissue entered Nick’s hand, passing through the skin, melting into it as if it was passing through a sieve. The antler itself appeared to be slowly draining into Nick’s body. Assimilation. Muscle tissue, bone, blood, taken and converted into essential matter that was lost.

A vibration started deep within my chest. I started to laugh uncontrollably, a reflex, like shivering in the cold. Red bubbles frothed out of Nick’s wounds. Unnecessary material, converted into gas and released. I could see muscles re-attaching inside of the wounds. The deep fissures where I had cut Nick’s legs and arms were starting to close. Pulled together by an invisible force. Cells being created and purposed in fractions of a second. Controlled perfectly to perform movements they have never done before, something never written into their DNA.

Nick’s chest began to rise and fall. His cheeks regained a healthy tint. The deer continued to sink into Nick like it was made of melted butter.

“Regeneration,” I whispered in awe.

“God has answered,” the man said, turning to aim the gun at me. I hit him with the full extent of my power, making him lower the gun, his expression turning dull. Nothing should interrupt this moment. When? When had Nick gained a Shape?

Unless it wasn’t him.

My eyes were drawn upwards, pulled by something I could not name. For a moment that seemed to stretch into infinity, I saw something. Two orbs hung in the sky. Not stars, not the sun or the moon. The gray one was distant and dark, but the red one crowded out the sky, shedding red light in all directions. It pulsed, compressing and expanding, like a planet-sized heart. 

The pulses slammed into me and I felt something alien touch my mind. Each pulse seemed to expand the sky, stretching it with each immense quiver of its mass. The stars were pushed aside by the ripples of power. Eventually the sky was entirely black, devoid of all light except the red glow. The glow that came from deep within the center of the sphere.

I laughed until I couldn’t breathe.