I Ran So Far Away

They finally saw one dim lamp, illuminating a door with no sign. "This is the place!" Stefan said. "Open all night."

Sure enough, the door opened easily, and Stefan led them into a dimly lit room that looked like it was older than the city itself. The timbers of the walls were ancient and black, the tables looked like they'd been carved by stone tools (and Monica should know, she thought giddily, she was the expert) and the lighting was practically non-existent. All in all, it looked like the kind of bar that attracted suicide victims. Possibly after they committed suicide.

Still, it was open, and the waitstaff seemed happy to serve them. They sat them down at a couple of tables, brought out drinks, and even seemed to get a bit flirtatious. They were probably just bored to tears, Monica thought. There were so many of them that they outnumbered the customers at this time of night.

Stefan brought her another drink. "Here you go," he said. "I think you've almost had enough."

The room seemed to spin gently on its axis as she downed it, not even sure really what it was but not caring. "You kidding?" she said. "The night is still young." She looked down at her watch, but it felt like way too much effort to read the numbers.

Stefan chuckled. "That's not quite what I meant. You know, I envy you, Monica. All my life, I wished nothing more than to be like you, but..." He frowned, handing her another drink. "I must serve."

Monica drank it down without even thinking about it. "What, you mean, like..." Suddenly, thinking about anything seemed to be an effort. "Like the army?"

Stefan smiled, but there seemed to be a sadness to it. "No. A family obligation." He gestured around him.

Monica tried to follow the gesture, but her head went all swimmy whenever she tried to move it too fast. Instead, she just took the drink he handed her and downed it obediently. "I...no, that's cool. My mom wanted me to be an accountant."

"And instead," Stefan said, "you have a glorious destiny." He placed something in her mouth, and Monica chewed on it absently. It had the texture of a root, or a piece of bark, but the taste was more like the hangover cure, like the taste that had been so heavy in the last few drinks she'd had, like the taste she absently realized had been in her drinks to some degree all night long. She smiled dizzily. It was a good taste.

Her eyelids fluttered a bit. Maybe the drink was starting to get to her. She didn't mind. It felt so good, now. She wondered if everyone else felt the same way. She thought about looking over at them, but she felt too placid to summon up the energy to do things on her own. She barely had the energy to follow one of the waitresses with her eyes as she walked past with another mug of liquid for one of the others. "Hey," Monica said in muted surprise, her words slightly muffled by the root in her mouth and slurred by drink, "she's got a necklace like yours!"

Stefan nodded. "We all do, those who serve," he said, dipping his fingers into a mug and smearing her face with sticky liquid. Monica moaned as she felt a fierce tingling wherever it touched her, and she found herself slumping back into her chair. Stefan was undoing her blouse now, daubing her breasts with that same liquid, and it felt even better there. It felt like...not even arousal, it felt like she was actually being fucked, right there in the chair, the dreamy, warm pleasure of a cock pounding into her without even being touched. It felt like a song of bliss, strumming not into her ears but directly into her mind, and Monica found her moans and sighs falling into the rhythm of the song.

"You are ready," Stefan said. "You hear the call, now." He took her hand, and she felt like she was floating to her feet as he guided her along. She fell into step with him, and she saw in front of her that Cillian and Laura were both being led in the same way. She could hear William, Dixie, David and Bryan behind her...no, not hear, not exactly. She could hear the song, and they were a part of it. Not completely, not yet, but they were all beginning to become a part of the song. It was wonderful.

Stefan and the others led them through a door to a flight of steps, now, and each step they descended made the song that much louder, that much more beautiful, that much more enticing. Monica knew now that they were heading down into the source of the song, and she wanted nothing more than to join that, now and forever. She imagined sinking into the song like a pool of warm water, joining it purely and perfectly, without the bonds of crude matter interfering. She could see the soft, gentle glow as they approached it, and she almost wished she had enough will left to quicken her pace.

The steps didn't end, she realized. They kept descending in a spiral, deeper down the same way she felt like she was sinking into the song. She didn't know how long they'd been walking, time ceased to have meaning now that she had the song to hold and comfort her. All she knew was that she could see it, the pool of gently glowing water, and the steps just continued down into it. Cillian's guide stopped at the edge, but Cillian kept right on walking, and his sighs of rapture as he sank into the water were glorious to her ears.

It was thick, she realized. Not quite buoyant, but thick like gelatin, and Cillian sank slowly and easily into it. She could see others within it, singing the same wonderful song, and she sighed out in pure joy to know that soon she would no longer just listen to the song, she would sing it herself. Nothing could be more wonderful.

Laura's guide released her hand, and Laura walked past her guide, past Cillian's guide, and sank slowly into the pool and into the song. She would join with it for eternity, communing with the others, joining their thoughts together into wonderful, endless bliss, spending all time with her friends in the same joyous dream...

Then she broke a heel.

She stumbled against Stefan, and her head brushed the medallion he wore against his neck. It felt like someone had dumped cold water into her mind. The root in her mouth tasted bitter all of a sudden, like wormwood. She looked around in a sudden panic of confusion, the song gone from her mind...

And she recoiled against the wall at what she saw. The glowing gelatinous substance just a few feet below her had so very many people floating in it, suspended in its depths, but...oh, god, they weren't all there anymore. The gel was almost completely transparent, and the deeper Monica looked into its endless fathoms, the worse it got. She could see their flesh dissolving--not at any rate visible to the naked eye, but further below Cillian and Laura, she saw clothes melted away, then below that skin, then below that flesh, then below that all that was left were mere skeletons with nerve fibers intertwined around them, and below that...

Nothing but brains. Brains and nervous systems suspended in a goo that ate everything else away, leaving them with nothing but the gelatinous liquid to sustain them. And it fed, she realized, it fed on the bodies of the newest victims, eating and growing and singing and living and calling out, endlessly, for fresh meat to feed its endless hunger. And Cillian and Laura, she realized, they had already joined the song, they were a part of it now...

Monica turned and ran. She would remember that moment in shame for the rest of her life, realizing that she didn't even try to help the others, forever hearing that sickening glutinous splash as Dixie lost her balance when Monica shoved past her. But she was so scared, terrified that whatever effect touching the medallion had would fade soon, leaving her to hear the song, making her want to follow the call, making her want to join the group mind...

So she ran. She ran back up through the bar, her progress unimpeded by guards--they relied on the drug to keep their victims subdued, didn't they? She ran through a maze of dark alleys, tripping over garbage and slamming into walls, bursting into tears of frustration and panic as she fled. She ran out into the streets at last, she ran because she couldn't let herself stop. She ran and she didn't stop until New York was a distant memory, she ran so far that she couldn't hear the call in her waking mind anymore. She ran as far as she could.

*****

And now, her eyes open again, and she sees that it wasn't far enough. They found her. She wonders now if she'd ever managed to lose them at all, or if they'd just waited, patiently, allowing her brain to season with extra memories so that she would be a better addition to the group mind. She can't bring herself to care anymore. This close, the call is too strong to even think about resisting.

She can hear her friends, their voices raised above all the others in the song, so happy to know that their reunion is at hand. She walks down the steps in a daze. Fritz doesn't need to hold her hand. She can't do anything but keep heading down, now.

There are fewer steps than there were, but still too many to count. The group mind has grown, over the years. Idly, she wonders just how far down it goes, how deep the shaft leads into the earth. She wonders how long the others have served it. She wonders how much longer she'll be able to wonder.

Then she takes one final step, and Monica joins the song forever.

THE END