My Monster

Inderlude 1: LANDON

Interlude 1: LANDON

"Why can't you just die like the rest?"

Landon gasps, doubling over as his running classmates pass him. A light breeze rustles the grass of the playing field. Mrs. Keon, the PE teacher, walks towards him. "You alright, Pearce?" she asks.

He shakes his head. There's too much noise, a relentless buzzing in his ears. He could hear every one of his classmates, could make out every single word they say to each other as they run around the playing field at a leisurely pace, and beyond that, he could hear everyone inside the school building. The teachers drawling on, whispers between students, scraping of chairs, thumbs tapping on phone screens while texting in class, the scratching of pens on paper.

He covers his ears with his hands, but the noise won't stop.

"Pearce?" Mrs. Keon stands next to him now, her voice booming over the noise. "Would you like to see the nurse?"

And even louder than that, he can hear Revenna's voice in his memory, "Next time, I'll make it last. I'll kill you so slowly, you'll wish never to be born again."

He bites down a gasp, causing the breath to catch in his throat. His chest shudders. No, no, no, no, no, no. He's remembering. He's remembering again, which means...

Which means she's coming for him.

He looks up at Mrs. Keon; his classmates have stopped running and are crowding near, staring at him. "What's..." he says, his voice strangely hoarse and faraway. "What's that smell?"

"What smell?" asks his teacher.

He shakes his head, again, trying to clear it.

And then the realisation falls on him like mallets made of ice. His parents, they'd both be home today celebrating mum's birthday. Revenna always starts with his parents.

He can't stop shaking when he says, "It smells like blood." And then he turns and bolts, ignoring Mrs. Keon's cries.

***

Landon runs. He runs without feeling the burn in his lungs or any strain in his legs. All he knows is sinking despair. Every moment that passes, he remembers more.

He's Landon Pearce, seventeen years old, in Melbourne, Australia. But he's only Landon this time. Last time he was Ashura Mwangi, in Kenya and had lived only sixteen years, and before that he had been Qadan Dorj, living in Ulaanbaatar and he'd almost reached his seventeenth year, and before that... before...

He's running, but then he stops, standing on the familiar cracked concrete drive where both dad's Ford and mum's Toyota are parked. For a long moment, he just looks at the gaping doorway where the front door should have been. He could hear life in every direction, but there's a bubble of silence over his house. It's as silent as a tomb.

This... this is how it happened before. He walks inside knowing what he would find. Broken glass from the hallway mirror crunches under his trainers. He looks towards the living room and the kitchen, but heads for the stairs. Something had slashed the carpet all the way up and splinted the wooden railing. On the upstairs landing, the carpeting and wallpaper are completely ravaged, torn in long jagged strips.

The stretch from his parents' bedroom is unbearable, like rotting meat and charred plastic. With a trembling hand, he pushes open the door. The blinds are shut, but he can see even in the dark. Like all those other times, there's nothing but a mess of broken bodies. The remains of the families that were cursed with him.

Every time, he has to witness their deaths. He can't run from Revenna, no matter what he'd tried, she always finds him.

He sinks to his knees, clutching his stomach.

The floor creaks behind him.

He freezes, and then slowly turns his head. He's tired of this, so tired. A part of him just wants this to be the end. The final stroke of darkness, the last death he'll ever have.

But as more and more past lives light up in his memory, he can't shake the sticky hope that if he could remember his name—the one name that unites all his past lives, all his power—he could finally defeat her.

The monster is larger than the landing. Most of its body sprawled on the stairs. Its feathers are rusty brown, and its curved beak scythes through the air as it turns its head to look at Landon. An eagle's upper half, complete with gigantic, metallic talons tapers down to the body of a lion. Everything about her is malice and ill-intent. She's here to end him and as he is now, there's nothing he can do.

But...if he could only remember his name.

"And so, here we are again, Little One," she says before she lunges.