Thousand Year Switch

Chapter 32

My heart was beating again, my lungs filled with air. It was so different than the state of nothingness I'd just experienced. The ground felt hard beneath me, and there was a weight on my chest making it difficult to draw breathe. I opened my eyes to discover the night was a blur of silver and green. Off to the right a red blur moved, coming closer. Someone was calling my name in panic. A huge blurry face joined the red looming over me.

"Lucas!" someone cried, "oh dear lord, let him be alive."

"Mom?" My vision cleared enough to see Morgan and my mother standing over me.

"You're alive!" Mom gripped my arm tightly, "Why is there all this blood? Is it hers? Is she injured?"

"Aden!" I struggled to sit up, cradling Aden's upper torso. "No! Aden, wake up!"

She was limp. To my horror her head flopped on her neck like a broken doll.

"Oh my lord," Mom was saying to Morgan. "Call the police."

I glared at Morgan, blinking tears away. Why had she brought my mother here? "So that's why you left us?" I snarled, "to bring my mother here? Well thanks, that really helps, doesn't it?"

Mom narrowed her eyes at me. "You need to come home now. I don't know what sort of devilry you got mixed up in, but you just put that girl down and come with me now." She grabbed my arm again and I jerked away from her, cradling Aden's body protectively.

"No!" I turned to look at Morgan. "I don't want your damn switch, I don't want to be Benevolant, or become someone else and have everything taken away from me." I looked down at Aden, her face was turned up towards me, as if she were looking at me, but her eyes were blank. There was no life left in her. I choked on my next words, "All I want is Aden back."

"Not possible, I'm afraid."

I looked up at the familiar, cold-toned English accent. Abbadon at last. He came strolling through the vineyard as if he were in no hurry at all, a tall thin man in a black jacket whose bones looked too sharp under his skin, as if there hadn't been quite enough skin for all of him. He looked bored, and cross, like he'd just come to get something over with and wanted to get on with it.

"So now you show up," I said bitterly. "Very nice. Good job."

He looked at me with some amusement, but when he spotted Aden his expression grew dark.

"Ah, one of mine." He said. "Damn you, Sloan, you've been nothing but trouble."

There came the crunching of hurried footsteps and  Sloan burst into the clearing, his neat hair disheveled. When he spotted Abbadon he glared at him, and then his eyes fell on Aden, and his face twisted in angry disbelief. "She took your death? Unbelievable!" 

He raised the gun he was holding, and to my astonishment my mother moved in front of me."Don't you dare point that at my son!" she shrieked, hands planted on her hips.

Sloan's mouth dropped open, his eyes bulged and he sputtered. "You!"

My mother glared at him. "Put that gun down now!"

To my astonishment the gun wavered in his hand. "I told no one about you! How are you here?"

"Told no one about what?" I said angrily. "What has my Mom got to do with you?"

Sloan's men had gathered behind him, they hung back, looking confused and nervous. He whirled on them and screamed, "Who found out I chose her! Who?"

Realization hit me with the force of a Mac truck, "You chose my mother  for the replacement?"

Sloan grimaced. "No matter. This can still work out," he steadied the gun, trailing it firmly on me again. "The girl is dead already, so she can't save you twice."

Morgan finally spoke into the shocked silence, "Sloan, put the gun away. You had your chance and you screwed it up. It's been fun but now it's time to get down to business. It's time to get on with things." She looked down at her watch and a shadow crossed her face. "Neutrality is done with you."

"Neutrality?" Sloan scowled at her. "You expect me to believe that crap?" he laughed. "Let me guess, you're Neutrality." He grinned at Abbadon. " Pathetic hoax, my friend. I would have thought you were better than that."

Abbadon looked over at Morgan with minor interest. "I've actually no idea who she is. I thought she was one of your people."

Morgan sighed. She sounded tired. "I'm not Neutrality, only a sort of avatar. I merely serve as a vessel. She pops up from time to time."

I stared at her in disbelief. "You're not an Angel?"

She shrugged apologetically. "I never actually said I was, everyone just assumed."

"So the reason you don't...remember things, is because you switch personalities or something?" I stammered, anger growing in the pit of my stomach. "Like, you're not yourself half the time, Neutrality is just playing games?"

Morgan glanced down at the ground, and a caught a flash of shame before she looked up and her face blanked into someone else's again. "Something like that." She glanced back at Sloan, "How do you think the name got leaked? How do you think you even knew who your replacement was in the first place? Did you think you were that clever? Eternal life can get boring. I do enjoy a little entertainment from time to time."

My stomach clenched. I was so furious I couldn't get the words out. Aden had given up her life because of a game? Some stupid game Neutrality played because she was bored?

Sloan's face was nearly as red as mine, and he pointed the gun at Morgan. "This is bullshit, it's over. "

"Oh, I wouldn't." Abbadon chuckled.

For the second time that night my ears rang with the sound of a gunshot. My mother screamed and clamped her hands over her ears. Morgan stepped backwards with a surprised grunt, then she shot Sloan a look of pure irritation. She reached down and plucked the tiny silver bullet from her red sweater and said, "You've put a hole in my sweater, now I really am cross." 

She reached out and flicked her fingers at him, like you'd flick water at an annoying cat, and Sloan was flung backwards violently. He landed on his back several feet away, crashing down on one of the tall wooden slats holding up the vines. He lay still on top of the pile of broken wood.

"I did tell him not to," Addadon mused. "Stubborn sort of fellow, that one."

Morgan checked her watch again. "One minute," she said, "are you ready?"

"No," I gritted the word out through my teeth. "I don't want it. Just give me Aden back."

Morgan continued to stare at her watch. "That's against the rules. Thirty seconds."

I could hear Sloan screaming now, babbling that he wanted to come back as a human, wanted to live out his years, wanted to live, wanted to live....

"Sorry." Morgan didn't look up. "You broke the contract when you picked Lucas' mother out of spite and not to the best of your ability. Fifteen seconds."

"Give me Aden," I demanded.

"Rules are rules. Ten seconds."

"Rules can be broken, you said it yourself! I want Aden back." I could hear the pleading in my own voice. "Please, Morgan."

The girl in the red sweater glanced down at me then, and pity flashed across her face. "What happens will happen. Hold on to her and don't let go." Then the mask was back, and she said in a cheery flight attendant voice, "Five seconds."