Immortali: The Rising

Chapter 20: The Resurrected

Iris drifted deeper and deeper into the dark abyss of death.

So... this is death... she wondered. I thought it would be scarier... I thought there'd be a grim reaper with a scythe, or just cold nothingness, but this... this is like a warm sleep...

She embraced death. She didn't mind this. Here, wherever she was, it was warm and comfortable. Much better than the streets.

She thought back on how she'd died. Someone, back in the land of the living, was going to find the body of 14-year-old girl. The police would be called, her murder would be investigated, but... honestly, she didn't really mind if they caught Jimmy or not. That life was behind her.

She'd lived through too many hardships. She didn't know who her Dad was, her mother had abandoned her when she was three, she'd run away from foster homes, eventually finding that a life on the streets was a life without comfort, but also a life with boundless freedom. And she liked freedom.

Yep, that's my life... she thought, feeling herself frown. Not much too it, is there? Not now that I think about it.

But, again, she didn't mind. Things happen. She'd done her best, and what more could she do? At least she could say that she'd gone down fighting.

But, just as she'd settled herself in the embrace of death, as warm as a blanket, she felt something—almost like a physical cord—tug her towards someplace cold.

She resisted and struggled against the pull. She didn't want to go anywhere near the coldness.

She looked up at the place where the cord was pulling her, only to be blinded by light.

She struggled some more. "No! No! I don't want to go back there! No!"

She pulled and pulled, but the cord was stronger.

Eventually, she tired. She couldn't keep going. She couldn't—

It was in that brief moment of respite that the invisible cord used to slingshot her back into life.

***

Iris's eyes flickered open. She gasped, swallowing the smog-ridden air of the city as though it were the clean air of the country.

At first, the light of day was blinding, but as her eyes adjusted, she noted that she was lying on the ground, staring at the sky.

Shock coursed through her system, so strong she couldn't move. Couldn't think. Couldn't do anything, just stare at the blue that peeped through from between the rooftops of the towering buildings.

I died... didn't I? I was shot. Shouldn't I... feel something?

But, so far as she knew, she couldn't feel anything strange. Her body was as it had always been. Finally, she worked up the courage to pull herself up.

Something squelched, and the sound made her uncomfortable.

Please don't be dog poo...

And it wasn't. It was something worse.

Iris found herself staring at a puddle of blood. Cold, sticky, half-dried blood.

She felt bile at the back of her throat.

It hadn't been a dream...

Frantically she looked down at her overalls. Sure enough, there was a bloody hole in her clothes, but, beneath the hole, there was nothing but her unblemished caramel skin.

She felt herself hyperventilating. It wasn't possible.

There's just no way...

Something brightly coloured caught her attention in the corner of her eye. She turned to look at it, but it wasn't behind her, it was on her shoulder.

She almost cried out in surprise at the blue... thing that cascaded down from her head.

Tentatively, she tugged it, feeling a slight pull on her hair. That was impossible, unless...

Unless the blue stuff was her hair.

Her hair was blue.

Now she really was hyperventilating.

There she sat, in a puddle of her own blood, with bullet holes in her clothes, but not a scratch on her body and blue hair.

She felt herself begin to cry, to sob. She felt so scared and lost and confused and just so... what was going on? What's happening to me?

Quietly, she hunched up into a ball and cried.

She'd died, but then she hadn't. She vividly recalled the pain of the bullet piercing her back and her chest. She even vaguely remembered falling to the ground, and Jimmy looking at her with his awful smile.

Shaking her head, Iris didn't quite know what to believe. She didn't know whether she even truly trusted the world around her, or any of the sensations that it brought. Was she hallucinating? Was this the afterlife? Or... had she really just done the impossible? Died... and come back to life?

A growl from behind interrupted her confused thoughts.

Iris turned, startled.

There, emerging from behind a big green dumpster, was... was a...

Well, she didn't really know.

She'd never seen a creature like this before. It stood on all fours, like a dog, and It growled like a dog, but it didn't... it didn't quite look like a dog.

Because usually dogs aren't wandering around as hollowed out skeletons

The thing whatever it was, edged closer, baring the sharp, bony teeth that jutted from its ivory maw.

Iris shook her head. "Please... no... I don't... no... go away!"

But, if anything, she swore she heard it laugh.

Frozen by fear, as if unable to move, Iris, crawled away, smearing blood across the concrete.

From behind the first creature, she saw many more. How many? Five, six, eight, nine... and was that a tenth at the end of the alley? She didn't know. There were a lot of them, and they all leered at her triumphantly... like...

Like they've already won.

An anger crackled through Iris, like lightening. Like electricity. She felt it buzzing through her body. Perhaps this was the power that had resurrected her. And, maybe, just maybe, this power had also brought back her courage, because in that moment, Iris was scared, for sure, but she wasn't going to give in either.

Life returned to her limbs. She felt them. They were ready. Ready to move without protest at her slightest whim. She could do this. All she had to do was run. And she had a gun...

Immediately, like a bull at a gate, she turned and sprinted away.