The In Between

Chapter 35

Justin

I am lying beside my own body, or what's left of it. A human stain of blood and bones that's smeared on the floor of my cell. I would vomit but I can't. My eyes focus on a pair of glistening black patent leather boots, but I can't connect what I see to any coherent thoughts in my brain. It's like I've forgotten what boots are. Nothing makes sense to me.

I hear a dull metallic creaking.

I look up, too weak to move, and watch as the cell door grinds gradually open. 

My eyelids flutter shut and when I open them again, the snakes are gone.

"Your time is up, Justin."

I tilt my head a quarter-inch, all I can manage.

Malthus is back. He crouches down beside me, his lips forming an unreadable line.

"You are done," he tells me in his rich, velvety voice, with an unplaceable accent.  "For now. Just a little taste of things to come."

I don't have the strength to move.

Malthus sighs. "It is so often the case. At first you cannot wait to get out of your cell, and then when you are granted freedom, you are too weak to avail yourself of it." He puts his hands under my shoulders to help me up, but his own left leg is weak and limp. I barely budge.

Malthus lets me go. I have a flash of panic that he will give up on me, leave me here to rot in Hell for all eternity. Instead, he pulls a tiny vial of deep purple liquid from his pocket and hands it to me. 

"Here, drink this."

The stuff in the vial looks like blood.

"I'm not a vampire," I quip, choking on air that I can't breathe.

"Your sense of humor is still there. A good sign. A valiant fight."

"What is it?" I ask skeptically.

Malthus smirks. "Just a little something to help you regain your strength. Unless you want to stay in here longer?"

I take the vial from him and pour the elixir down my throat. Even as the thick syrup is still sliding down, I feel myself grow impossibly sleepy. I try to keep my eyes open but my lids are too heavy.

* * *

When I come to, I'm staring out at the endless low-hanging gray fog of the In Between, dense as cotton balls soaked in ash. I try to stir, but my arms and legs are strapped in place with great steel buckles. I turn my head to the left and to the right: I'm being carried on a metal stretcher by four black-clad Operators.

 "Ah, he awakes," Malthus says, his hand resting on the stretcher as we make our way down a narrow gravel road. The journey has transformed him—his limp is gone and the weariness has been washed from his face.  His chestnut hair seems more luxuriant than ever. Even his black almond eyes, which had seemed old as a millennium, are somehow more alive. "Feeling better, Mr. Westcroft?"

I nod weakly. The pain is gone but there seems to be so little of me left.

"Of course you are," Malthus observes. "After all, there is no feeling at all here." He shakes his head. "Hard to believe some people prefer it that way. I suppose everyone has their own opinion on the pros and cons. Though I must admit, there are things I do quite like," he adds as he does a little hop, testing his leg, finding it sturdy. He glances around, anxiously peering down streets and around the corners of buildings. "I was only here once before, a brief visit in another time long, long ago. But nothing has changed. Nothing at all."