Page 76 of Unruly
I feel my knees give and I sink to the floor. Farnsworth appears above me, a look of concern on his face. I see his lips moving, but I can’t hear anything.
“You—” I try to talk to him, try to reach for him, but my arms are heavy, my voice gone.
It’s almost as if I’m having an out-of-body experience. I try once more to call his name, concentrating as hard as I can, but if I’m speaking, I can’t hear my own voice.
I see his concerned expression, but it fades. The entire room around me disappears until I’m standing in pitch blackness, far away from my house, far away from Farnsworth.
I look around, my heart racing. Where am I, and how did I get here?
“Farnsworth should have warned you.”
I spin around at the sound of the male voice behind me. It’s the same man who was just in my living room.
“What did—how did this happen?”
“Oh, I took over your body. Hope you don’t mind. It’s really far more convenient for me, and the only way for Farnsworth to kill me is to kill you. So, I think I’m going to stick around for a little while.”
“You possessed me?”
The Horror chuckles. “We can call it that. Think of it more like borrowing.”
“You let me go. Now.”
“Why would I do that? It’s advantageous for me not to. Now, if Farnsworth had just minded his own business and left me to my own devices, none of this would be happening.”
“You know the rules. You don’t belong up here with the living. You died a long time ago.”
“Yes, well, you died too, and you’re here.”
“That’s different.”
“No, it’s not.” His voice turns cold. “It’s only different because they want the rules to be different for them. But why not for me? Maybe I wasn’t finished living yet, either. Have you ever thought about that?”
“That’s not the point. You did bad things, you have to pay for that. I have a job to do, and I’m going to do it.”
“Pray tell, how will you do that? I assume you didn’t read in the handbook about what to do in the event that a Horror takes over. By the way, doing anything hasty is an excellent way to get yourself caught in the Below, so think carefully before you act.”
Shit, shit, shit.
I strain to remember everything I read, and after a minute, I do recall that this was one of the situations where banishment could lead to my own death. It happened so fast I didn’t even have time to react to it.
“He really should have warned you,” the Horror continues. “He was too distracted paying attention to me to even notice what I was doing to you. But you know, he was distracted the first time he came across me too. That’s how I was able to get past him.”
“What do you mean? You didn’t get past him? He banished you.”
“Is that so? Then how is it that we’re all here in the Above having a nice chat?”
I blow out a frustrated breath. “Could you just be clear and stop talking in circles?”
Suddenly the thing is before me, gripping the collar of my shirt, leaning close to my face.
It has no scent, no smell of sulfur, nothing at all to indicate what it is, which is not like what I read, but I realize it might have something to do with the fact that he’s basically taken over my body.
“Listen to me. I made a plan years before my death to ensure my immortality and my bond to this place. I made sure I would return. All I needed was somebody to wake me up, and they did. Now that I’m awake, I’m not going back to sleep. I’m going to live in your body and do all the things I missed out on thanks to my untimely demise.”
“Yeah, no, that’s not gonna happen.”
“There’s really nothing you can do about it.”
