Chapter Text
I felt weirdly at home being upside-down.
It was more than a little worrying that I immediately began to feel comfortable and safe once I was hanging by my feet. It was probably a sign of a massive, much deeper problem that I had quite literally fallen into a new batty instinct, and wholly embraced it.
I wasn’t sure what the normal instinctual response to your roommate pushing you out of an open window should be, but it definitely wasn't this. And yet, I found myself largely unable to worry about it. I should have been panicking, racking my brain to think about what a normal human would do in my situation, lest I forget everything that I was supposed to be. Instead, the coolness of the late Summer air welcomed my wrinkly skin and reflected a strange state of zen which I tried my hardest to hold onto.
Perhaps this was happening because I finally had the relief of one problem getting solved; one major source of anxiety eradicated in a single motion.
I was initially confused when Santi tried to push me out the window. I slotted my wings against the open frame and protested at first; exposing myself to the outdoors didn’t seem like a great idea when I was trying to hide this form from as many people as possible. But then I heard that doorknob start to turn, and suddenly, fresh air sounded like the best idea in the world.
I squeezed myself out of the tight window with surprising speed, probably helped by Santi pushing my backside as I did so. I glanced behind myself just enough to watch Santi struggling to close the unfamiliar blinds, and I had an intense moment of realization that Kevin might still spot me standing out on the narrow ledge if he couldn't get the blinds down in time.
Then, a moment later, I was upside-down.
I glanced down towards the sky, straining my eyes hard enough to confirm that my clawed feet were clamped onto the stone windowsill. Of course, although I was thankful my glasses were staying on my face, I didn’t really need my eyes to figure that out. They were my own feet, after all, and I could feel what they were doing. Even so, something about seeing my clawed extremities latched onto the stone slab made everything seem more real. Or at least, as believable as possible despite the insane situation I found myself in.
The realness of the situation almost instantly made me feel sick, so I averted my gaze and stared outward. The world probably looked pretty unique from this vantage point, but all I could see were a few dimly lit silhouettes of buildings protruding from up above. Most of my view was obscured by the tree outside our room, whose thick trunk grew from above like a boa constrictor before spreading out into a dense collection of branches above and below me. A blessing in disguise, given that it decreased the likelihood of anyone outside spotting me.
Of course, I also needed to hope that none of the neighbors heard the commotion and were leaning out their windows. I turned my neck around to look at the historic red bricks flanked by stately gargoyle statues at the corners of the building. The planned fanciness of Curio Hall's exterior and the ornate stone windows of each bedroom clashed sharply with the occasional sports team logo or jokey flag hanging visibly from inside. It was like a small collection of oxymorons; the college's desperate need to look professional, squarely at odds with the unserious nature of the students who inhabited it.
My point was proven as I felt my ears swivel around, picking up the sounds of each conversation happening in every room. To my pleasant surprise, nobody seemed to be talking about any noises they heard. Just planned classes, hobbies, bedtime schedules. All the day-one stuff that I was missing out on.
Inside my own dorm, I could hear the conversation taking place between Kevin and Santi.
"Yeah, you just missed them. They got a call from their Mom; Grandpa's dying. Had to go to the hospital right away to say goodbye."
"Oh, really? That's such a shame. Maybe we should arrange something for them."
"Nah, I'm sure they don't think it's a big deal. And, uh... there's no need to dig through their drawers either."
"Sorry, bud. University policy, regardless of the circ*mstances. I'll only do a quick check."
"Fine...do what you gotta do. Just know that you're not gonna find any vodka. They confiscated it at the airport!"
"Haha...funny guy, eh? You're lucky I don't have any evidence you said that. Oh, and no daisy-chaining, right?"
"Noooo daisy-chaining. Thanks for stopping by!"
The door slammed, and I started to breathe a little better. A moment later, I glanced back down (or should I be saying up?) to see a face looking at me from the window.
It was Santi, with his shoulder-length black hair tied up in a low-hanging ponytail. When my visage met his deep black eyes, he leaned further out the window to get a full view of everything I was doing. "Hey, I didn’t know you could do this!" he exclaimed. "That's badass."
He smirked, and seeing that smarmy look made my blood boil. I felt my voice rise to the surface.
"THAT was your idea?" I hissed.
Santi's smile turned into a grimace. "Hey, I didn’t hear YOU come up with anything!"
I bit my lip with one long fang. I couldn't deny that part. "Yes, but I'm still exposed out here! The whole point of this was to avoid being seen!"
Santi gestured towards the large tree blocking most of me from view. "And has that happened?"
"Not YET," I replied. I reached my winged arms downward-slash-upward, eager to get back inside my dorm. I made it part of the way there, but as I craned my torso into itself, I became aware of an achy pain beginning to form in my abdomen.
As I felt my lower body trembling and straining, my wings started to flail uselessly in the air. I tried to remember the last time I had done a squat in high school gym class, but nothing came to mind. Clearly, that lack of training had taken its toll. Even in this stronger state, I still had no chance of pulling myself back to safety.
Defeated, I let my body drop and hang again. "Can you help me up...?" I asked, barely audible.
"Huh?"
"I said can you help me up?" I asked louder, swallowing what little pride I had left. I held my winged arms toward him, reminded of how a toddler might ask an adult to lift them onto their shoulders.
"You need to do more squats next time," Santi laughed, as if he wasn't telling me what I already knew. Regardless, he reached down and took my clawed hands in his own.
It was slightly easier to lift myself up now that I had Santi helping, but the force of gravity remained as strong as ever. This time, I made it about halfway up, but as I drew closer to the stone ledge, I had to face the next challenge of finding the right angle to pull myself up the rest of the way.
I uncurled my fingers from one of Santi's hands, and began to reach out to grab the ledge. Santi tightened his grip in response.
"I gotcha, Rowan," he said in a strained voice. "I'll pull from here."
I did as I was told, almost letting my body go slack as I let Santi take the lead in pulling me onto the ledge. A few more strained grunts escaped from his lips as he did so, and it dawned on me that maybe his muscles were already tired from helping me unpack.
A moment later, there was a sharp pain in my toes. My face contorted as I barely managed to hold in a yelp in response.
"Hold on!" Santi insisted, spotting my expression but not understanding the reason for it. "You're almost there!"
He leaned forward as he spoke, and the pain on my already exhausted toes only increased as his elbow dug into them.
If I had more time to think about it, I could have voiced my concerns properly. I could have said "Santi, your elbow is on my foot. Please move it, that really hurts." Unfortunately, at that moment, the only sound I could muster was a shrill, batty yelp punctuated with–for some reason–tongue clicks.
Santi and I both reacted at the same time. I finally managed to yank my foot free as he moved his elbow away. Regrettably, as it turned out, the reason why he moved his elbow away was because he was letting go of me completely.
For a second, I felt myself hanging upside-down once again. In that second, I began to wonder if the weight of my body could be supported by just one foot instead of two.
And then I was falling.
I flapped my arm-wings on the way down, reaching out to grab any branches I saw speeding towards me. My claws managed to dig into one or two, which slowed my descent somewhat, but each grasp only lasted for a second before my weight caught up with me and I was forced to let go.
In a few seconds, I hit the well-maintained shrubs at the base of the building. I groaned, rubbing my body all over as pain shot through it. Whoever said that shrubbery made for a soft landing forgot about all the branches that lined the inside.
"Did you see that!?"
I looked around frantically to find the source of the voice, simultaneously realizing how exposed I was. I dug my way further into the foliage, trying my best to camouflage.
"What, that noise outside?"
I was originally looking outside toward the campus pathways to find the voice, but as my hearing came more into focus, I deduced that the two female voices were coming from the first-floor room right above me.
"Yeah, something just fell right outside the window!"
The first voice was deep, but full of vigor. Bad news for me. I could already hear her fiddling with the window latch to investigate. Frantically, I buried myself even deeper into the thickest part of the shrubs.
"There! See!? Something's moving!" I froze as she continued talking. "It was the size of a person, but it had like... wings or something!"
The second girl, based on the tone of her voice, was completely uninterested in what was happening outside. "Mollie, it's probably just a duck or something. Or maybe you're just getting first-day anxiety, and it's making you see things.”
"No! Look, look! It has to be out here! It was huge! And didn't you hear the noises it was–?"
The second girl interrupted. "Whatever it was, it's flown away by now. Now stop trying to open the window. You’re gonna let in bugs.”
"I'm telling you, I know what I–!"
I barely heard the sound of the second girl's bed creaking as she hopped into it, as if she was announcing she wasn’t interested in any more chatter about the topic.
There was a long pause as only the sound of crickets breached the still air. Then, after what was presumably one final scan of the outdoors, the dorm window stayed shut and the blinds came down.
I let out a breath that I didn’t know I was holding. I had no idea how many more close calls I could take at this point. The one silver lining was that the second girl clearly was not going to discuss the situation with her roommate tomorrow morning, or ever for that matter. If the first girl cared even a little about her reputation, she'd keep her mouth shut about what she saw, unless she was keen to be known as the hallucinating girl.
I stepped out of the shrubbery, as quietly as possible so that the girl wouldn't be alerted to any rustling outside. Glancing back toward Curio Hall, it seemed like all of the first floor blinds had been closed by now. That was probably to prevent light from the nearby streetlamps from streaming into the rooms while the inhabitants were asleep.
The yellowed light from those lamps also bathed my body as I emerged, adding a bright tint to my dirty yellow wings and my blonde mane of fur. My clothes and glasses, amazingly, seemed to show no signs of the fall I had just taken. The aches all over my body were also subsiding faster than I expected. Apparently, my fall wasn't as bad as it felt at first.
All I had to do now was go back inside, and I would only have one witness to this entire ordeal.
I stepped off of the landscaping and let my animalistic claws tread on the brick path skirting around the building's exterior. It was admittedly a bold move, and I did so only after listening carefully to the darkness to make sure no one was coming.
As I turned on the path and began walking towards the entrance to the dorm building, I wondered what had possessed me to step out into the open like this. After all, I had just spent so much time up until this point panicking about the idea of being spotted. Now, here I was, walking under the light in full view. Even given how late it was, this was still a huge risk, especially with the close calls I just had.
I continued to stare down at my feet, checking to make sure I wasn't leaving behind any claw marks. Perhaps this decision was meant to return a sense of normalcy to my psyche. A way of convincing myself that, even now, I was still fundamentally human. Walking was a far more human activity than clinging onto the side of a building with your feet, after all. Maybe if I continued this type of behavior, I could return to the way things were. Maybe, with the power of a little belief and a lot of denial, I could know that I wasn't a monster.
Those theories didn't have much time to take shape before I reached the entryway at the corner of the building. I'd already verified when I first arrived that there didn't appear to be any security cameras there. Checks like that had become a part of everyday life for me by this point. Even if this was my first time being outside, it was nonetheless a preoccupation that weighed constantly on my mind.
I thought about what I would do once I got inside. I could see from the first floor blinds that most people were tucking in for the night, so there was a lower risk of getting spotted roaming the halls. Plus, if there were any stragglers in the hallway, I might be able to use my hearing to avoid them.
Ironically, my planning was interrupted as I heard the entrance door getting pushed open. I jumped off the pathway on instinct, hiding behind a tree as I listened to who was there. The mystery visitor tread on the footpath for a few moments before I heard the softness of their shoes stepping onto the grass. I knew that there was probably only one person who had a reason to do that.
Sure enough, I saw Santi step into view. His bright red jacket made him easy to spot amidst the streetlamp light that filtered through. Initially, he scanned the shrubbery for any signs of life, but he noticed me waving and happily jogged over to where I had been hiding.
"You almost stuck the landing there," Santi chaffed. "You should bend your knees more next time."
I folded my winged arms. "No, Santi, I'm not hurt," I said sarcastically. "Thank you for asking though, it's good to know you care."
Santi rolled his eyes. "Obviously I was checking if you were alright! Why else do you think I came down here once I didn't see you fly back up?"
I raised a hairy eyebrow in response. "You thought I was going to FLY up there?"
"I mean, why else do you have wings right now? You know how to hang upside-down like a bat. Are you saying you can't fly as well?"
"Well, um... I never really had a reason to try," I replied. I averted my gaze, suddenly feeling self-conscious that I somehow hadn't lived up to Santi's expectations of my abilities.
"That reason's just arrived, Rowan! No time like the present to start flying lessons!"
I eyed Santi curiously, wondering why he was so keen on seeing me fly. Maybe this form of mine was little more than a circus act to him; a trained animal able to perform stunts at will for his entertainment.
"Why can't I just walk in the door? I can just wait until there's no one in the hall, then get back to the room."
I began to step past Santi, but he grabbed my arm to hold me back. "The RA," he replied.
"Who? Kevin?"
He shook his head. "It's not just Kevin we have to deal with. There's another RA at the desk by the entrance. And I already asked; he'll be there the whole night."
I pulled my ears backwards and wiggled my nose. "Well then, couldn't I...?" I glanced up at the rows of trees above me, and my voice trailed off as I realized my next idea wouldn't work either. I was going to suggest climbing the tree near our dorm window, but I already knew there weren't any branches hanging close enough to allow me to reach the ledge without jumping. If I fell down a second time, there was always the risk that I wouldn't walk away unscathed again.
"The tree's not gonna work either," Santi replied, reading my mind. "You've gotta fly at some point if you're looking to get back inside tonight."
I bit my lip, showing another long fang in response to Santi's insistence. "It's not something I can just do!" I hissed. "I'm not a wild animal, I'm not just... born with that instinct!"
Santi put a finger on his chin, eyeing me head to toe in a manner that reminded me of getting picked out of a lineup in gym class.
"Are you SURE you're not?" he asked. He was getting that smirk again.
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The Yardley Ave Bridge was a hidden gem of Virgil’s Pine. Originally built sometime in the late 1800s, it had since gone through a few expansions as cars got bigger and roads got wider. In spite of that, every expansion always made sure to keep the original façade intact; a gorgeous set of stone arches gracefully stretching across the Trebelick River. Each arch had an intricately designed pattern of concentric red and gray bricks at its edges, a solely aesthetic decision that gave the bridge some extra character. It probably took a tremendous effort given that each archway spanned a 30-foot drop, but no one dared to destroy those little art pieces when expansions took place. They’d face the wrath of the locals who grew up crossing over them if they did.
To compensate, there was a raised slab of concrete sitting on top of the structure where the newly expanded Yardley Ave roadway sat and slowly deteriorated in the elements. The footpath lining the south side of the bridge was not raised in line with its neighbor, maintaining its original shape for over a century.
I was surprised Santi knew this walkway existed, given that I hadn’t seen anyone use it once in all my years of living here. I had almost forgotten about its existence too. Maybe now that the raised road was nearby, the sidewalk was simply out of sight and out of mind. At only two lanes, the car part of the bridge would be heavily clogged at rush hour every day, but at this time of night it was as empty as it could reasonably get. More importantly, even if someone did drive by, they wouldn’t be able to crane their neck far enough to see what was going on at the footpath.
Logically, it was good that there was a decreased risk of anyone spotting me here. On the other hand, staring down into the water below made me wish some passerby might stop to save me. Only a limited amount of streetlamp light made it all the way down to the river, which gave it a black and murky quality that made it seem more like an ocean from this vantage point, able to uncaringly swallow up anything that fell into its depths.
“You’re just making it worse by hesitating!” Santi startled me out of my stupor with his assertive voice, almost causing me to lose my balance. Sitting on the handrail was unnervingly precarious, just as I knew it would be. How had I let him talk me into this!?
It was, truthfully, a silly question. I knew exactly how; because there was nothing better I could do tonight. Santi had already explained his theory to me on our walk over to the bridge. Or, well, it was a walk for him. He had the ability to traverse sidewalks out in the open with no risk involved. I, on the other hand, had abandoned my prior bravery near the dorm building and was back to my usual hiding. I spent most of the walk to the bridge trotting just outside the reach of any ambient light from buildings or streetlamps. Repeatedly, I had to ask Santi to slow down while I snuck behind trees, or to go down a side street where there was less risk of someone passing us.
I knew which areas of Virgil’s Pine would always be busy, so the town center and main roads were easy to avoid. Mostly, we stuck close to the train tracks, since I knew there would be no commuter trains at this time of night. Of course, every time a train or car did pass us by in spite of my careful route planning, I would have to duck wherever was available until the headlights were safely beyond us. This constant stopping gave Santi plenty of time to discuss his theory with me.
*************************************************************************************************************
“So… I’m still not used to your whole….” Santi gestured in my general direction. “Y’know. But you can hang upside-down like a bat, right? Did anyone teach you how to do that? Like, any other were-bats in your family or around town?”
“No,” I responded, tracing the veins on my wing with one finger. “There aren’t any others besides me.”
“How can you be sure?” Santi replied. “Have you actually looked?”
I let out an annoyed huff. “Yes! As a matter of fact, that’s the first thing I did. I surfed the Internet for days at a time looking for any information about my condition, but all I found was a bunch of made-up nonsense on every so-called expert’s blog. So no, I don’t have anyone to give me pointers about being… this. I didn’t even know I could hang upside-down like that before tonight. I just got worried about Kevin seeing me, and it kinda… happened. I don’t even remember how I did it.”
Santi pointed at me, excitement growing in his body language. “And that’s exactly my point! You didn’t NEED to remember how to do it. You just did it!”
I tapped my claws together anxiously. “So, you’re saying that it was a bat instinct? Like, I have an animal brain where all that knowledge exists subconsciously?”
“Something like that. At least, the neurons are there. And if you already have bat instincts for hanging upside-down…”
“...I should be able to fly as well?” I finished Santi’s sentence, not fully convinced of his idea. “I don’t know. I get the concept, but all I really had to do to hang upside-down was grip my toes. Flying requires actual knowledge. You know, like creating thrust and lift that’s stronger than the drag and gravity? I have to learn how to flap my wi– my arms to maintain momentum, speed, direction, spatial awareness… you really think something that complex can be done just on instinct?”
Santi shrugged. “Bats in the wild can do it, and their brain is the size of a peanut.”
Somehow, I felt offended by that comment. Santi continued before I had a chance to dwell on it.
“Look, my point is, if you want to get back into our room tonight, your only option is learning how to fly. And even if it doesn’t work, you’ve got nothing to lose by at least trying to learn, right?”
“If you don’t count my dignity,” I quipped, ducking behind another tree as headlights passed us.
Santi rolled his eyes in response. “Hey, if you’d rather hide in the bushes for 6 more hours, be my guest.”
“I might just do that!” I shot back. “Depends on whatever reason you came up with to make us go to the river.”
We turned the next corner, and at last the long bridge entered our line of sight. Santi beamed.
“It’s your launch pad.”
*************************************************************************************************************
Now here I was, several minutes later, learning exactly how serious he was. I couldn’t help but notice that my legs were starting to tremble as I watched the calm yet somehow threatening river flowing far below them. My sensitive hearing was dulled slightly by the rapid pounding of my heart pumping blood through my body. My hands gripped the handrail so tightly that I was almost certainly going to leave behind claw marks, and for once I didn’t care.
“Santi, this was a bad idea!” I pleaded. “I WOULD rather just hide in the bushes for 6 hours!”
I leaned backwards to start pulling myself back to the other side of the railing, where my sweatshirt and pants sat in a neat pile. Even if I was too hairy for people to see any of… “me” in this form, I hated feeling this naked. At least I still had the glasses, which left me with some semblance of my human side. I had originally wanted to take them off, but Santi insisted that I needed to be able to see where I was flying, which was admittedly a good point. Plus, in the worst-case-scenario where I’d have to swim back to safety, it was imperative that I be able to see the shore as clear as possible. Of course, all of that was beginning to matter less to me, as I faced the prospect of that actually happening and realized that I wanted nothing to do with it.
Santi gripped my shoulders in an effort to stop me before I could cross back to the safe side of the railing. “Come on, Rowan… you’re a were-bat! The only one in the whole world, according to you! You’ve got the power of bats inside you, a gift of instinct in your subconscious mind! And you’re not even a little curious about what you can do?”
“Not especially!” I shot back, my voice becoming even shakier every second. “I never wanted this form! I don’t WANT to experiment with it! The only thing I want is to get rid of it!”
A car passing over the bridge served as a warning of how loud my voice was becoming. I instinctively ducked my head and ears, even though there was no way the driver could see us from that vantage point.
Santi, unconcerned with what was happening nearby, just scoffed in response. “Aren’t you going to college for science? You’re supposed to have an inquisitive mind! Are you really saying that because you’re not interested in learning anything, or just because you’re too scared of jumping?”
I tried to keep my voice more hushed despite my mounting fear. “Am I not supposed to be scared? If I do have bat instincts, would that not include SURVIVAL instincts too!?”
“You WILL survive, puss*!” Santi responded dismissively. “Either you’ll fly, or you’ll land in the water and swim back to shore so we can try again.”
I gulped at the night of torture that had just been so nonchalantly laid out before me. I opened my mouth to respond, but I felt Santi’s grip on my shoulders tightening before I could say anything.
“Here. I’ll help you out. Otherwise you’ll just keep hesitating and freaking yourself out.”
My eyes shot wide open. “Wait! Santi! You’re not gonna–?”
“Threeeeeee….” Santi dragged out the word, almost tauntingly.
“Wait! Wait wait wait! This won’t–!”
“Twoooooo…..”
I stared down at the black hole sitting beneath me. My tether to safety was nearly broken, and then I’d be fending for myself in the vast expanse. I gulped.
“One!”
I squeezed my eyes shut and braced myself for the push to come against my back.
No push came. Just a split second of silence hanging in the air.
I jumped.
I had no clue why I did it. Maybe, in that split second of heightened adrenaline, I thought that it would be pointless to just let all of it go to waste. I didn’t really have much time to think about why it happened as I was busy plunging into the expanse.
Surprisingly, I didn’t scream while I plummeted. All of my body’s energy was channeled into trying to flap my wings as hard as I could. I waved them rapidly, as fast as I could muster, desperately anticipating the moment I could finally catch the wind.
That moment, of course, never came.
*********************************************************************************************************
I was surprised at how new the sensation of being underwater felt in this form.
The water rushing into my ears limited my sensitive hearing, snuffing out the world surrounding me as the sound of blood pumping inside my body was heightened to the point where it pounded in my head. The water and bubbles rushing next to me also felt extra strange, running through my fur where it almost seemed to get snagged on my body, making my whole self somehow denser. Waving my arms back and forth to swim and maintain my position also was met with unexpected resistance, which I noted was because of my wings acting like a sail pushing back against the current.
I opened my eyes, squinting at first as the murky water assaulted and burned them. It took a couple of blinks and a readjustment of my glasses before they became fully used to the sensation of swimming around. Of course, given how late it was, I knew there wasn’t much to see regardless. All around me was nothing but misty blackness, as not even the edges of the river were visible from this vantage point. There was only a single source of white light, far downstream.
…Wait. What WAS that light?
I turned and stared at it for a while, waiting for my eyes adjust but still not getting enough clarity to make out what it was. Just a single spot of bright light, far downstream in the otherwise dark water. It certainly couldn’t have been light from a streetlamp; it shined far too bright for that. Even so, I didn’t remember seeing it when I was looking out at the river from above.
My theorizing was cut short rather quickly as a dull burning began to pierce my lungs. I folded my arms against my sides to prevent my wings from causing any more drag, and kicked my legs to propel my body upwards toward the surface.
I gasped for air as I broke through the water’s edge, once again allowing the noises of the airy world to assault my ears and face. The sounds of crickets and cars in the distance, muffled for a short time by the river, were now a full cacophony once again. As I blinked the liquid away from my eyes, I could see that I was facing downstream. Like before, no light from underwater was visible up here. Just the same stillness I’d always known, reflecting the starry night sky that hung up above. Further in the distance, the Axcelerate headquarters stood thin and tall at the river’s edge like it always had, imposingly standing off against the rest of the night-lit town.
I twisted my body around to face upstream. I had drifted quite a ways from the Yardley Ave bridge already, the current of the Trebelick evidently being stronger than anticipated. Barely visible against the brick backdrop, I saw a speck of Santi standing at the center of the bridge. He was waving his arms, and as I tuned my ears in his direction I could hear him telling me to come back so I could try again.
Instead, I turned away from him and faced downstream again. As my heart began to beat faster, I realized that thinking about the light beneath the surface was somehow frightening. A deep, true fright that reached down to my core and rattled me from the inside. It’s not because I didn’t know what it was, either; it was as if the simple act of that light existing was what scared me so deeply.
Yet despite that, I found myself simultaneously unable to let go of it.
So, against some of my judgment, I took a deeper breath and dove back under again.
I approached the source of the light unexpectedly quickly, partly due to the current of the river and partly because I figured out how to use my wings to my advantage. By alternating between stretching them out and folding them in, swimming with extra force became surprisingly natural in a short amount of time.
As the white light came closer into view, I finally became able to discern more of its shape. It wasn’t like one of the stars that shone above; as I grew closer, I could tell that it was actually a ring. I would have thought that maybe a filmmaker had dropped one of their ring lights in the water if it wasn’t for the size of it. It continued to grow and grow as I approached, and I finally contended that it was probably the same size as my entire body. If I looked really closely, I could even make out….
I shot my head above the water, taking in another deep breath. I wasn’t sure if I had really seen what I just had, but if I did, then I certainly needed a breather before I went back under.
Not wanting to waste any time, my head dipped below the surface again. By this point, the ring of light was almost directly below me. I approached it cautiously this time, curling my body into a ball as I let myself sink into the depths. The white glow almost seemed to grow imperceptibly brighter as I drew closer, like it was expecting me. But even through the rays, I could make out what really caught my attention.
The ring of light was not just a simple circle. It was an intricate pattern lining the rocky floor of the river. And the more I looked at this pattern, the more certain I was that I had seen it before. In fact, the knowledge of exactly where I had seen it before made my hair stand on end. I almost wanted to rip my whole self in two; half of me desperately wanted to swim away as fast as my wings could carry me, while the other half wanted to continue creeping towards it.
With those two sides locked in battle, the latter was winning by default as the weight of my body continued to allow it to sink downwards, within inches of the intricately patterned ring. I could make out the concentric circles, the spirals, the criss-crossing lines… everything I had seen before. Most importantly, though, I saw the bats. Repeated symbols of bats, with pointy wings in different positions but always recognizable, punctuated the ring at even spaces all around it. Seeing it brought me back to that day one month ago… the day that never left my mind no matter how much I wished that it could.
I shook my head, trying my hardest to push those thoughts away. There was no use getting caught up in that entanglement now. Not when I was unexpectedly close to answers for what was going on.
I stared down at the ring for what I knew was seconds but nonetheless felt like hours, as questions about what it was and where it came from echoed in my head. I had never gone back to that first ring I encountered, but this one… I seemed to be cursed to always stumble upon them, no matter how much I didn’t want to. Perhaps, as much as I hated to admit it, this was my destiny.
With that thought putting a pit in my stomach, I hesitantly reached out toward the ring with my foot. For reasons unknown, despite what happened the last time I touched one, I just couldn’t stop myself from giving it another go.
As gently as I could possibly manage underwater, I tapped the glowing ring with my toe.
In an instant, something shot out from the dark and snatched onto my leg.
I tried to let out a scream, but I only succeeded in choking myself as I felt my mouth flood with water, squeezing my insides which weren’t ready to handle it. My singular yelp quickly devolved into a series of increasingly panicked gurgles as my body instinctively searched for any signs of oxygen that wasn’t there. My next natural instinct was to claw my way to the surface, but that too was rendered helpless by whatever force was anchoring my leg to the depths.
I shook my leg desperately in every direction, but each effort was met with an even greater resistance. As I readjusted my glasses, knocked askew by my jostles for survival, my eyes were able to come into focus on what exactly was holding me down there. It was emerging from the dark center of the white ring, somehow looking extra shadowy when paired next to the still-glowing light source. And it was… dark green.
That really was all I could make of it. It wasn’t quite a vine, nor was it a tentacle, though a mixture of the two was the closest I could get to describing what it looked like. All I knew was that it was a dark green thing. A living thing, as evidenced by the fact that it was coiling itself further up my leg, almost covering the entire calf by this point. It had a slimy texture, exacerbated by the wetness of the river, which made my whole body shudder with each slither that it made.
My face puckered in both pain and fear as I glanced upward, the surface of the water suddenly seeming a mile away, hopelessly out of reach. I raised my wings up to the heavens anyway, only managing to get my fingertips to breach the surface before I was pulled even further down by the vine-tentacle-thing, whose only purpose seemed to be keeping me as close as possible to my rocky grave.
I squeezed my eyes shut, covering my ears with my wings as if that could help somehow. All that ended up doing was augmenting every sensation in my body. The sliminess curling around my leg. The water pushing down on my fur like a full-body weight. The blood in my heart, pumping rapidly for what may be the final time. My ears, usually hyper-sensitive to the thousands of crickets singing above the surface, now starved as only the dull resounding silence of flowing liquid filled them. My lungs, burning like fire, spasming and contorting inside my ribcage as they wished for a final gasp of air that would never come.
Why, why, WHY did I let this happen…? I knew something like this was going to happen! I KNEW it! Every time I saw one of these damn rings, it spelled nothing but disaster for me. And despite the obviousness of that fact, I just couldn’t stop myself from getting closer. This must have been another one of those bat instincts. Just like when I let myself hang from the window, I must have been letting my mind get overtaken by the instincts of this creature, this mysterious screwed-up THING that inhabited my body like a plague.
I knew I shouldn’t have listened to Santi. “Inquisitive mind” be damned, I shouldn’t have even been here right now! I was supposed to be in my bed, in my dorm room, celebrating my first semester at college, planning a fresh start with new friends, dreaming of everything that I would accomplish with my first real taste of adult independence. Instead I was here, falling down and disappearing into the abyss, probably to wash up onshore as some freakshow folklore tale to be told at campfire stories for generations. A warning of what happens to brash teenagers who go recklessly exploring in the woods to enjoy the hubris of youth.
And that fate would be exactly what I deserved.
I wanted to scream. I wanted to beg the world for another chance. I wanted to rant about how unfair it all was. I wanted to plead for someone to remember me when the sands of time smoothed away every wrinkle of my existence. But any noises that were capable of escaping my lungs would only serve to fill them with even more fluid, smothering out my final semblance of hope.
Even so, I felt like I had to make some kind of noise. So I growled. I wasn’t sure whether it was human or animal or something in between. In reality, it was neither; it was nothing more than the only thing I could do at that point. And admittedly, it felt nice. At least if no one else was able to hear my struggle, I could channel some catharsis through this voice.
I curled my clawed fingers into sharp fists, held tightly to my chest, as I felt every emotion beginning to echo in my increasingly hollow body. Shame. Guilt. Regret. Sadness. Desperation. Fear. Confusion. Anger. Hatred.
My growling grew in intensity, as my eyes focused even harder on the coils ensnaring my leg. In a fit of sudden rage, so sharp it practically overtook my very being, I uncurled the claws on my hand and slashed at it.
A small shard of dark green shavings floated lazily up to the surface, being pushed downstream by the water’s current as it did so.
Time almost seemed to stand still as I watched it float by. The slash I had made was only meant to be a venting of frustration, one final act of hopeless scorn before admitting defeat. Yet, in all of my struggling against the coils, I had never once considered that they might actually be… fragile.
I glanced back down at the dark green trap, instantly noting the vile sludge pouring out of one piece of it. My ticket out of here.
I let the growling fill up my lungs in the place of air as I squinted my eyes, laser-focused on the creature trying to drag me down to the depths. And finally, I found a way to fight back. I slashed with all my might using both of my clawed hands, even using the claws on my free foot for extra coverage. From the calf down to the ankle, I slashed as hard as I could muster. It was unbearably painful, as my lungs continuously screamed for me to stop, but I pushed through regardless. I slashed and slashed until the dark, inky sludge filled all the crevices of my vision. I tried my hardest not to inhale it as I began shaking my formerly-trapped leg again. The ability to move it with nothing holding it back was the greatest relief in the world at that moment. To prove my triumph, I used that leg to begin kicking my way upwards.
Rapidly, back and forth, I kicked both legs as fast as they could possibly carry me, as my lungs quivered with anticipation knowing what would happen next.
Finally, my face broke the surface of the water. I heaved the biggest breath I could muster, which was quickly snuffed out by a wet and guttural cough as my body hurled the excess water it had swallowed. The next few seconds, trapped under the moonlight in the middle of the Trebelick River, were spent in a sickening seesaw game as I inhaled the most revitalizing breaths of my life before I violently hacked it up along with the water still trapped in the corners of my organs.
Only a moment later, I remembered what sat directly below me, and I was spurred into action once again. Smacking my wings against the water, I paddled to shore as fast as limbs could carry me, fear overtaking me as I pictured the creature reaching out to snap at my ankles again just below the surface.
I thought I had felt relief when I first broke the surface of the water, but the truest relief came when I reached the rocky shore, and wearily walked back onto dry land. I collapsed onto my arms and legs, then onto my back as I heaved refreshingly painful breaths of air.
The moon looked so beautiful, I realized as I stared at the night sky. Once you’ve experienced the fear of never getting to see something mundane again, you truly begin to appreciate what you almost lost. The simple act of being able to look up into the sky and see the crescent of light smiling down on you. Seeing it surrounded by millions of stars so far away that the human mind literally cannot even comprehend the distance, but nonetheless the light still manages to reach our tiny dot in space by some miracle of probability. I thought about my ability to sleep in a cozy bed, to log onto a computer and play video games, to read a book and feel the pages, to taste French toast and scrambled eggs. I thought about the human condition to take things for granted, and how in doing so, we forget to desire everything already within our grasp.
Before I could continue any further with that line of thought, I was awoken from my musing by an unfamiliar voice.
“What are you doing on this side, little one?”
