Divine Retribution | Luke Castellan

Prologue

When her father, his face still concealed in the dream's fog, finally acquiesced to the girl's joyous insistence, Rin's heart dropped. She reached out to grab him once again, knowing the futility of her actions. 

She had tried everything, and the result was always the same. In all the times she'd had the dream, she had screamed at him, she had begged and pleaded, she had even tried to cajole her dream self for assistance, but nothing ever worked. She remained a bystander, and the tragedy unfolded as it always did. 

The dream continued in slow motion, a dance of blurry figures on the cusp of reality. Rin's father gestured for the dream-child to remain by the side of the street as he began to make his way across. The feeling of helpless doom intensified in Rin's stomach as the ice cream truck's melody grew louder, filling the air with a nauseating serenade, and when she saw the familiar blue convertible hurtle down the road she opened her mouth in tandem with the dream-child's. 

Then time came to a standstill, and for the first time, when Rin's father reached the midpoint of the road, he abruptly halted. When he turned around, his gaze penetrated the dream's haze, and his eyes locked onto Rin. Not dream Rin, but the real her, who stood just on the edge of reality, waiting for him. 

He opened his mouth, his voice resonating with both familiarity and an otherworldly quality.

"Rin," he called. "Were you looking for me?"

Rin, overcome with emotion, could only nod, tears welling in her eyes. 

"Why?" he asked. 

It would have made her laugh if her tears hadn't lodged themselves in her throat. 

Why?  What reason did one have to search for their father?

"I'm always looking for you," she managed in a choked whisper. "I'm... please, Dad, please don't go again."

A tender smile graced her father's face, but it didn't quite reach his eyes. Behind him, the blue convertible crept closer inch by agonizing inch, and yet he remained rooted in his spot. 

"Don't look for me anymore, Rin," he cleared his throat, trying to maintain some semblance of authority. "Look after Emiko instead."

"No!"

He clicked his tongue, "No? You don't want to look after your little sister? I'm disappointed in you Rin."

"That's not what I meant!"

"No?"

"No! I just...can't you come back, please. You can look after her too. You would do it better. You can look after all of us." 

Her father's gaze grew unfocused now, and he began to turn away from her. The tears streamed faster down Rin's face now as she took another step forward, although it brought her no closer. 

"Please, don't go," she sobbed. "Please, please, please, don't leave again."

The dream version of her watched with large unblinking eyes as Rin grew increasingly frantic, but neither of them moved a muscle. Rin's tearful plea seemed to dissipate into the dream's fabric, unheard and unanswered.

"You have to take care of Emiko and Ethan now."

That was the last thing he said, his voice a disembodied echo around her, before the world exploded in a flash of crimson and blue. Dream Rin collapsed to her knees and let out an earsplitting shriek while real Rin went back to being a silent spectator, numbed by the bloody display she had seen so many times that it had engraved itself inside her eyelids.  

Some days the blue convertible was just that, a car much too pretty to be capable of such carnage. On other days it morphed into all manner of beasts —a minotaur, a cyclops, a chimera. The result was always the same, whether it came to pass under a little blue car's wheels or in the jaws of some bloodthirsty creature that, up until a few days ago, Rin wouldn't have even believed to be real.