Epilogue

Epilogue 0.01

     This time I careen and wriggle and lunge and spin, just to shake things up. At first, when I see the silhouette I think that it's Comma, back from nowhere else. But it's not Comma—it's a glowdark. Imagine a shape that has no form. Imagine a shadow that twinkles like so many stars. Imagine a silent scream, an odourless smell, a tasteless mouthful of rot.

     That's a glowdark.

     I shift and flounder and writhe and toss.

     I lean and plunge and swivel and tilt.

     The glowdark is closing in on me.

     In a last ditch effort, I push and thrust and vault and leap.

     I float away from the glowdark, picking up speed as I go. The nothing responds to my every movement: the more I push, the more it slackens; the more I thrust, the more it gives; the more I vault, the more it looses. And when I leap, I fly.

     Speeding through the nothing, I barrel right into Comma, who topples over. The impact brings us to a standstill (or rather a float-still), but we're far enough away now that I can no longer sense the glowdark.

     "Thanks for the bruise," says Comma, rubbing the back of her head.

     "Thanks for leaving me for dead."

     "Touché."

     "So," I say, dusting myself off, not because I've accumulated any dust, but simply out of habit. "That was a glowdark. Lovely. Can I look forward to running into them often?"

     "Only if you're slow."

     "What happens if they catch you?"

     "I dunno," she says, rolling her eyes. "I'm not slow."

     "No kidding. You ran pretty fast when that glowdark showed up."

     "All right already. When are you going to let that go?"

     I shrug. "Seeing as time no longer exists... probably never." I'm starting to get the hang of, well, hanging. Once you train your body to accept that it's floating in a literal nothing, the whole thing is actually pretty nifty. Comfortable, even. "So, any idea why we're the only ones here?"

     Comma looks at me funny. "Huh?"

     "It's just that everyone else around me was peeling through too. Where'd they all go?" Funny, the thought hadn't crossed my mind until now. There's a lot that hasn't crossed my mind, come to think of it. But before I can pose Comma even a single question, she snaps her head around like a startled deer.

     "You hear that?"

     "Hear what?"

     "Someone else just ripped through."

     "Personally, I prefer peeled. Ripped sounds a little, you know, violent."

     "Shut up and follow me."

     This time, there isn't as much squirming and wriggling before I launch into a steady glide. We coast through the nothing, Comma leading the way. And then suddenly another boy comes into view. Emphasis on the suddenly. When you're somewhere, objects start off tiny and gradually get bigger as you draw near. When you're nowhere, they just materialize out of thin non-air.

     "Well what do we have here?" Comma mutters to herself.

     "New friend. Maybe his name's Apostrophe."

     Comma jabs me in the ribs and preps herself for gliding over to him. But she stops. Starts glancing around. Then she swears. I look around. Dots, everywhere. Glowing black dots.

     Glowdarks. A whole flock of them.

     We're surrounded.

     "Hey!" The boy, a freckled red-head with a little peach fuzz, starts waving at us. What an idiot! Doesn't he see the glowdarks? I open my mouth to try and warn him, but it's too late; one of the shadows swoops down and crams itself down his throat. The boy goes blue in the face.

     And then we find out what glowdarks do when they catch you.

     The boy starts choking. He looks like he's about to heave. Then he does. Heave. But it's not just vomit. It's everything that he is. He throws himself up. Some of it in chunks. The rest in tiny little chewed up pieces, mixed with globs of glowing black sludge and a number of unspeakable horrors. He throws himself up until there's nothing left.

     Comma shouts every expletive in the English language. Then she makes up a few of her own, as if there weren't enough to express what she's feeling. The glowdarks descend on us. But then I feel something. Like I'm being watched. No, that's not quite right. More like when you're alone in a room, but you'd swear there was someone else in there with you.

     "Over there!" I shout over the cacophony of screeching glowdarks.

     Comma's face goes pale. "Are you insane?" Five glowdarks swoop down right where I'm pointing, nibbling on the crumbs of the boy.

     "We're about to find out." I grab her by the hand and launch us towards the bloodthirsty pack of blurred shadows. Comma scratches my arm, but I don't let go. I dig my nails into her skin. She'll thank me later. I hope.

     The feasting glowdarks abandon their meal, their non-existent mouths probably drooling at the sight of us. We're headed straight for them, on a collision course. Comma kicks me in the back of the head, and I almost feel like letting her get eaten. Almost.

     The glowdarks bubble together like a huge wave, ready to come crashing down on us. Just as we're about to crash into them, I grab for the spot where I'd been sensing something.

     My hand latches on. I pull and rip and tear and peel. A hole opens up in the nothing, and we fall through just as the glowdarks descend on us.

     We land on solid ground. I suffer a couple bruises from the fall, but it's nothing compared to what the glowdarks would've done to me.

     "We made it!" I jump for joy, and never before in my life have I been so happy to be subjected to the forces of gravity. "I told you!"

     Comma makes a choking sound.

     Slowly, I turn around.

     Comma's blue in the face.

     One of the glowdarks has slipped inside her.

Author's Note:

Poor Comma! And I was just starting to like her. So, what would you do if you woundup in the Nothing?

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