It began innocently enough. I remember the school, and the houses, and children playing as two friends of mine taught the little girls gymnastics in the grass. It was warm, summertime, or early fall, and one could almost smell the charcoal fires. But night was soon over and I went inside when I heard my mother call. In here! she said, and told me my sister had something she wanted me to see. I followed the voices and came into the room my sister and I shared, the one with two beds and two dressers, and two windows in the same wall that looked out on our back yard through six small panes each.
"See! There." She said, and I looked and saw the moon. It was enormous and hanging low in the sky, barely clearing the tops of the black pines and shining white and silver against the purple sky. It wasn't a full moon, for there were pieces missing, as if the wisps of cloud had turned to acid and began to eat it away, but it was still the most beautiful thing I had seen all night. I gasped with pleasure and reached for my camera, desperate to capture the image. I snapped photo after photo as my sister urged me to hurry, for the sun was coming up right behind it. I watched through my lens in frustration as the sky grew paler and the misty clouds turned into flames, and still was not satisfied with the image. The trees would be in the way, or the panes in the windows, and I could not get a clear shot. Vaguely I was aware that my sister had gone, and my mother with her, and still I stood immobilized as the light rose over the horizon and the trees and the whole sky went white.
When I came to I was lying on the floor beneath the windows and felt the odd sensation of movement. I stood up, took note that three of my very good friends had come with me into the room and were now looking around in confusion. "Where are we?" one of them asked, and I went to the window to look. Sure enough, we were high above the ground, floating along at a brisk pace over a valley of rolling green hills. Springing up out of the grass were large boulders, spread out like bales of hay and covered in deep grooves that made strange designs. Beyond this, mountains rose tall, and though the place was very familiar, I was certain I had never been here before. Perhaps I had climbed the other side of those mountains, but I had never been to this valley.
I turned to my friends and, with a great sense of smugness that I should get to quote the phrase, said, "We're not in Kansas anymore." They chuckled at that along with me and came to look out the window for themselves, and then we all sat to wait the flight out. It ended soon enough without so much as a shudder, and one of the guys suggested we go find somebody with a phone. This was, of course, a good idea, and upon emerging from the house our steps quickened even further, for the house had landed not far from the northern slopes of the mountains and up on the side were buildings. But as we got closer I felt my feet slowing. The cluster of buildings on the hill was looking more and more like a ghost town than an actual settlement, and a sense of foreboding covered the whole place. The one road was gravel and mud, and the buildings were made of faded clapboard that was blackened in some places, as if it had been burned. The only two buildings that showed any life at all were an old fuel station with broken windows and what appeared to be a souvenir store. The boys went to the station and began questioning the attendant, a withered old man who's sole answer seemed to be to point down the road. Us girls went up some stairs and down the long porch to the door of the souvenir shop and went inside to find the owner. She turned out to be a middle aged woman who seemed as loathe to talk as the gas station attendant, but my friend was at least able to get her to start explaining why she didn't have a phone while I looked around at the various beach-themed clothing and trinkets. I was glad when we left.
We met the boys again and the four of us continued down the road, leaving the buildings behind and heading for a stand of trees that seemed to start the forest. Here we found more life, for there were many people roaming around, all men of the rough sort. They seemed to revolve around one taller man in the center. I don't remember exactly what he looked like, only that he had a significant beard and appeared to be some sort of modern-day pirate. The fact that we could not get past him was a silent knowledge between us all, and as he started toward us, I felt a crackle in my fingertips. I lifted my hands slowly and watched in fascination as the ball of energy formed between my palms. One slight twitch and I sent it soaring over to meet him, and sparks flew when it impacted. This made him visibly angry and also started the two boys into action. They advanced, but it only took a few more balls of energy before he fell, and as he fell, the rest of the men vanished with him. The boys lowered their weapons and turned to continue on down the road, but a cry from my other friend caused them to turn again.
What we saw was horrible. From the destruction of the angry man rose a creature. It was tall, very tall, and built like a badly formed lion, but it stood on its hind legs. Its arms were like a gorillas and hung low past its knees, and its face was so twisted that it might have been upside down one moment and right side up the next. The surface of it shifted, and I could not tell if it was skin or scales. The whole thing was pale and sickly, but it moved with strength and purpose. The boys called for the girl behind me to run; she was not a fighter. I stood routed to the spot as they lifted their weapons again and moved in on the thing, and I felt the crackle in my fingertips again. Again and again I poured the fire into the creature as they attacked it, but nothing seemed to slow it. Then it turned and its eyes fastened on me.
The boys watched it come at me, but they did not move, whether by choice or not I did not know. My heart leapt into my throat as it reached me and grabbed me, but I managed one more blow to it. It gurgled and fell to the ground, taking me with it in a vice-like grip. I did scream them, for it was crushing me. I could feel it encircling my torso and cracking each rib, slowly. I cried out in pain and panic, yelled my friend's names at the top of my lungs, begging them for help, but the circle only drew tighter and tighter. I could not understand why I was not dead. The pain in my side only grew, and as my screams brought no answers they eventually dissolved into tears.
For ten days I lay there, and the pain did not cease.
Then at last the grip was loosened, and I was able to pull myself out of the creature's grip. It was dead, and had been so for some time, but death had only made its grasp stronger until now. I struggled to my feet and looked around at the empty land. My friends were gone. I could feel that all the ribs on my right side were broken, and lifting my shirt a little I found an angry bruise running lengthwise. Clutching my side, I went slowly back to the buildings that stood up the hill. The attendant at the fuel station said that he had not heard anything, but that my friends had left me a note. I took it and read that they had gone back down into the valley and gone right, that there was a church or something down there that was safe and had a phone. Civilization, in other words. A chill went through me at this and the pain was like a knife, though far less than the pain in my side. I had tried to convince myself that they had gone on because they thought I was dead, but they would not have left a note if that had been the case. They knew I was alive, and they had left me. They had not even waited. But I had nothing to do but go on.
I staggered down the hill and back into the valley, following the faint track that we must have missed on the way up. I walked for hours, unsure how, and eventually the grass turned to mud and I found myself in a swamp. My feet could go no more and I fell, but looking up I thought I saw lights on the other side, pale in the evening air. With a small cry I gripped the mud in my fingers and began pulling myself along. In the back of my mind I wondered what this was doing to my already shattered ribs, and also thought that I was ruining the turquoise shirt I was wearing. As I struggled along I began to pass birds, tall cranes that stood in the shallow water and looked down on me with expressionless eyes. One might have cared more than the others, and as I looked up I thought that its silhouette against the orange sky where the sun was setting would be a beautiful photograph, but I had not the time, the will, or the energy. I continued on, pulling myself through the shallows and the mud. I became conscious of the camera in my hand, and concern for it filled me, because it was not waterproof and it was getting wet. I had to reach the lights and find something to dry it with.
At last the swamp turned to tile. Just as I knew it had to be the end, hands reached down and pulled me up and into a clean place. I gasped as the pain in my side shot through me, and there were my friends, in fresh clothes and safe, but I could not be glad to see them. Someone brought me a blanket and I carefully dried the camera off first, then wrapped the cloth around myself. I tried to tell them that my ribs were broken, but no one would listen; after the blanket there were no more signs of care. People milled around me and spoke softly, but all I was aware of after a while was the fading orange light and the searing pain in my side. I stumbled over to lean against a wall alone and look out the window at the fading valley.
Then, as the sun slipped down behind the mountains and all the world went dark, I woke up.
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