Once Upon An Altered Time by Pete Bertino - HTML preview

She stood on a corner, near a bus stop bench where an old woman sat, surrounded by bags filled

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with random things. She was dressed in old rags and wore a pair of black mens dress shoes that had white sneaker laces in its holes. Her eyes were closed and was either sleeping or waiting for the next bus.

Her back was to Nancy which made staring at her easier, all she could see was the womans shoulders and back. After a moment, a light halo of blue smoke began to show, it looked soft and airy like cotton candy, it expanded lightly turning a shade darker with each breath she took. Then a picture appeared in her mind, a young woman wearing a black dress from a long time ago.

Nancy could tell it was long ago because of the car she stood by, they were rounded and bubble shaped like when her parent were kids. The car was black like her dress, she had a white hanky in her hand and her eyes were red from crying. Wisps of purple came out of the picture.

The next picture was her at a graveyard holding an American flag folded into a triangle. A young boy stood next to her, he was only five or six, holding the womans hand crying as well, this picture had wisps of blue smoke tinged with purple. The last picture looked more alive and detailed and wrung her heart.

The woman was older now, past middle age, she stood at the door of a row home where a soldier stood holding a telegram. She was looking at a mantle with the picture of the boy still a child, beside that one was him grown and dressed as a soldier. The woman wanted to die at that very second, to take the pistol from the soldier telling her of her only sons death in a jungle far far away and blowing her brains out.

Nancy saw with perfect clarity as the picture became a movie and the woman simply walked out of her home one morning not long after the news and didn’t return. This woman had been on the streets for over twenty years because she wanted to punish her self for not stopping her boy from joining up, much like she hadn’t stopped his father the movie was tinged with deep violet smoke.

Nancy broke off the the mind movie feeling like an intruder, the woman was apparently sleeping, she snored loudly and startled Nancy into running away quickly, afraid the woman would know she was in her head.

She ran until she was out of sight of the bus stop and tried to walk without thinking of the homeless woman.

As the sky turned from purple to blue, Nancy was approaching Broad street, her mind still reeling from all that had happened. She was changed now, though she didn’t know why, only how. It was the medicine, it had transformed her. She didn’t know what to do, though she was cured by it, it had done more than cure her.

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She wasn’t just cured she was, improved now. She could barely walk and was now high leaping over buildings and running so fast it felt more like floating. Liberty Pharmaceutical was known to try experimental medicines, it was how they cured so many sick people and improved people who were not in the same shape as a twenty year old but still wanted to be twenty.

She was beyond improved, she was dying (are you sure you didn’t die, maybe die and come back?) and the pill she had been given had reversed it, reversed it to the extreme. She turned south and walked down Broad street towards Washington avenue. She was in a confused state and wanted to know what happened to her, she walked to the LP

plaza determined to get answers.

The sky was brightening into day as Nancy reached the lobby door, thinking it would be locked but it wasn’t. The lobby was empty its lights were off, the only light was behind an admissions desk were the nurse that had admitted her was sitting there now looking down on a sheath of papers with a pen gripped tightly in her fingers. Nancy was right in front of her when she finally looked up.

of her when she finally looked up.

The nurse took a sharp breath, inhaling as if she were about to sneeze.

The nurse saw the splashes of blood on her hoody and the eerily glowing green eyes set in her face which seemed to flash. Her hand went immediately to the panic button below her desk..

Nancy caught the thought a moment too late and caught the nurses arm with a bang and held it tight. Sudden movement caught her eye as an armed security guard raced out of the bathroom to her left his belt was partly buckled, he held a pistol aiming it at Nancy. The man circled around them as he adjusted his belt quickly, Nancy’s other bang extended and whipped at the chair behind her sending it at the guard.

He fired a shot as the large chair crushed his skull, the air of the bullet whined loudly as it passed just by her. The nurse made a sound like Jello being sucked through a straw, Nancy let go of her as she looked like she was strangling herself. Blood seeped through her fingers in dribbles.

Her face was as white as her uniform once was, she gurgled a word before collapsing to the floor. Nancy caught her dying thoughts which was a picture of butterflies at sunset and her chasing them as a toddler.

Nancy felt a rage build inside her as she felt she had been robbed of a chance to find out more, she grinded her teeth as she began to leave.

“FREEZE!” said another armed guard.

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He had come from the other side of her and looked only at the dark hooded figure in front of him. Nancy stared at the man and saw black smoke with blue wisps floating from it like a silk web caught in an up draft. The man held his fire arm steady on her head as she entered his mind.

She saw him in a house that was not his own, in a bedroom that was his sisters. A young woman that was mentally challenged and could not speak. He was touching her, forcing her to do things, things that wanted to make her scream. Nancy could hear the mans hurried breathing as he put himself roughly inside her.

He did it rarely but hadn’t stopped doing it since he was little more than adolescent. Nancy dug up the act which excited and repulsed him so much. He was so repulsed he always prayed to God for forgiveness afterwards but had never been able to stop out right.

The memory rose to his mind like a volcano, the gun he held began to shake noticeably as those green eyes shone brighter. Like lasers burning a hole right into his brain revealing the dark secret behind his skull.

Nancy began to see herself through his own eyes hearing the idea he had given himself to take his own life if he didn’t stop touching his poor sister.

Nancy decided to help him with his decision, the bore of the pistol turned from her head and went to the guards own. His eyes were filled with tears as the pistol shook violently until it was pressed firmly to his temple. He wailed once before pulling the trigger and ending his life, in the distance sirens were screaming through the neighborhood.

Nancy left quickly and was blocks away before the first police car arrived.

The streets were still deserted thankfully as she had no desire to jump roof tops in the coming daylight. As the sun touched the sky she had reached her apartment and locked the door behind her.

She went to the living room window and looked through the curtain on the street below. The work day was beginning and a few people walked

street below. The work day was beginning and a few people walked below, a milk delivery truck drove slowly down the street to the corner mini market. Nancy put the curtain back and peeked again when she heard a siren approaching, but sighed with relief when she saw it was an ambulance heading some place else.

The ambulance is probably because of you, she though suddenly. Her heart was beating loudly as she replayed what she had done and had seen. She no longer felt the darkness and shuddered when she realized she had killed at least three people tonight. But I didn’t mean to, she argued with herself.

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She went to the bathroom and suddenly saw why the nurse had hit the panic button. Blood had been smeared onto her mothers hoody and few drops had splashed her face and if her eyes had been blazing like green spotlights it was no wonder the old bag freaked, she probably looked like the devil to her. She dampened a wash cloth and wiped the spots of blood from her face as she looked in the mirror.

“Mirror, mirror on the wall. Who’s the fairest of them all?” she asked but got no response.

She hadn’t meant to kill the old bag, she wanted to...what exactly.

Answers, but that lady wouldn’t have had them. Besides could they really help her? But that old bag had to freak out. Her eyes flared brightly for a moment when she thought about that, she ground her teeth trying to hold herself together feeling like she could explode.

“Lousy pigs.” she whispered darkly.

She thought of the blond with the pock mark face again and how he had screamed. She wanted to feel bad about killing but paying that pig back had given her a satisfying chill. He should have suffered longer. She

had given her a satisfying chill. He should have suffered longer. She wished he could have died slowly from his impalement, to spend the last hours of his life feeling violated.

She felt a rage build again, thinking of the weak little girl she had been.

Powerless to fight back, or to get away. A white noise grew inside her head as she thought about his dirty clammy hands grabbing at her.

The bulbs above the mirror flickered as her eyes started to shine their preternatural green light. She clutched her hands into fists wishing she had gone after his friend and perhaps crush him with her luxurious bangs. But no the piggy ran away, she felt her body shake with rage and wished she could have made him suffer as well.

The tooth brush that sat in a glass on the sink began to rattle around as a pair of antibacterial soap bottles sitting on the tubs corner fell over and the lid from the toilet flipped open smacking the tank with a dramatic thwack. Nancy ignored the sickening rattle of her tooth brush and other noises as her rage neared a boiling point and a succession of pops and flashes sent the bathroom into darkness.

With the curtain drawn in the bathroom, the only light was the bright green of her eyes. She

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knew killing was bad, but what that pig had done was worse, and it felt oh so good to be so bad. She was being drawn in by the darkness, the dark pleasure of retribution. She looked into the mirror scanning its darkly reflection, seeing the liquidity of her eyes and feeling, magical.

She tittered at the thought and left the bathroom. She walked to the pile of books laying on the floor from her fall. She rummaged through the pile and found The Fellowship Of The Ring. She opened it from were she had last read, it was the scene were Frodo offers Galadriel the One Ring. It

last read, it was the scene were Frodo offers Galadriel the One Ring. It was rare you could read about a woman being so forceful and beautiful, so powerful.

She put the book back down and walked to the window again, drawing the curtain for peek at the awakening neighborhood. She saw many dark halos of smoke as the morning commuters made there way about. Nancy couldn’t see their thoughts but could sense them, their sliminess, their piggishness.

She wanted to hurt them, she wanted to enchant them. They will see her as fair and as lovely as snow, then she would enter their minds and find her as dreadful as the storm and the lightning. For her loss of love, all shall despair. Pig hunting season, was on.

She gathered up her old clothes and set them to burn in a barrel in the back yard of the apartment. She stayed to watch them burn until there was only ashes. Nancy...

“Nancy died last night, I am Galadriel.”

Galadriel smiled a grim smile at her self christening, her lips curled as the dark joy of vengeance filled her. She went back inside and went to bed.

With no pain she was able to fall into a slumber that was deep and easy.

She had only one dream, right before she woke up that evening. She couldn’t remember seeing anything but she heard a song playing. She could still make out the sound of the song, it was sad and happy at the same time. It wasn’t familiar to her and she could only catch a few lyrics.

‘you sweet thing

tell me you’re name

I’m dying here’

The song was so clear for a moment that she woke up immediately thinking the radio was

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playing. She sometimes slept with it on, but hadn’t turned it on when she went to bed. It was still on the kitchen counter turned off, she turned it on to see if the song might be playing but got an ad for RC cola.

She turned it back off feeling a little sad the song had only been a dream it sounded lovely. No matter, there would be more peaceful nights of sleep. For now the dark was here and it was time for the witch to play.

“You dopey bitch.” he said with a swift back hand.

Lacey cowered in the passenger seat of his bottle green Lincoln, she wore a white halter top and a very short denim skirt. Cracker Jones, wearing an avocado colored wing lapel suit and matching fedora, sat beside her holding up his other hand that held a clump of bills mostly fives and tens with a few ones.

“And what the fuck is dis?” he said plucking out a dollar bill from the clump.

“A motha fuckin dolla?! What the fuck am I suppose to do wit a motha fuckin dolla, huh bitch? I couldn’t park my dick in the handicap slot for this. You been suckin that glass dick, huh? Don’t lie to daddy now.” he said grabbing Lacey by her short blond hair.

“An what the fuck I tell you bout wearin a wig, you look like a fuckin boy.”

“An what the fuck I tell you bout wearin a wig, you look like a fuckin boy.”

he said shaking her by her hair.

She wailed and cried.

“Answer me, bitch. Where’s my fuckin money?”

He gripped her hair harder and twisted, she screamed out a word but couldn’t understand her.

“Speak up, bitch.”

“...baby...my baby needed formula...” she said trying not to scream from the pain.

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“Baby? Baby? Bitch I don’t...”

He stopped mid sentence and looked through the windshield of his car.

He had backed into an alley on tenth street where there was only a feeble light above a dumpster for the Chinese food place out front about ten feet from his car. The light was weak but he could make out the shape of the legs and was pretty sure it was a woman, he could only see a pale outline of the face behind the hood over her head.

He felt a stir of unease at the person standing there. He held on to Lacey with one hand and rolled down his window with the other and stuck his head out pulling Lacey along as he did so.

“Bitch, unless you wanna suck my dick, take a walk.”

The woman didn’t move, she stood impassively as if she were a statue.

He wanted her to leave, so he could focus on this bitch that was skimming him. He sat with his head still out the window trying to look annoyed.

“Any time, bitch!”

He wanted her to get moving but she stood still, the only movement was the hem over her hoody swaying in a soft breeze.

“Can we go, I’m scared?”

“Bitch you need to be scared if I don’t get my money.” he said looking back at her. “An I fuckin tole you sell the fucking kid to your sister, now look were da fuck we at.”

He looked back and the figure was gone, he felt a sigh escape him. Now he could...

“What the fuck?” he said looking in his rear view mirror.

The hooded figure was now directly behind the car standing as if she had been there the whole time. Lacey gasped and cried a little.

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“OK, this bitch wanna get fresh wit Cracker Jones?”

He took a blackjack from his glove box and got out of the car and

He took a blackjack from his glove box and got out of the car and slammed the door shut. He held up his baton like a starter pistol. He walked briskly to the figure about to go upside her head when he began to choke.

Lacey watched him approach the figure through the back window and began to scream when something went around his neck and a pair of ghostly green eyes blazed from the face behind the hood. Jones tried to turn and run, he was able to turn away but whatever held him by his neck held tight. His hands pulled at what was around his neck his knuckles and fingers were white from the struggle. She stopped screaming and sat in mute horror as his face turned a blazing red and then like a magic trick his head popped off his body like a champagne cork.

She screamed again when she heard the air escape from his new hole followed by a short burst of blood erupting out like a volcano. When the body collapsed to the ground and those alien green eyes gazed upon her she got out of the car and ran.

He sat in his car, well past midnight watching the petite brunette standing on the corner wearing a short red vinyl jacket with matching red lipstick.

Her legs were long and were covered in a tight red nylon stocking and red pumps. She smacked loudly on a wad of gum as she waited for a customer.

“Dirty girl,” he said to himself in a low whisper.

He fingered his rosary beads to fight off the erection that filled his chinos.

He sat just down the block in his car unobserved. He had sat watching her for a few hours, though she had gone twice into random cars she had returned both times to that corner afterwards.

He sat gripping his rosary in one hand and a leather strap that had once been a belt in the other. He doubled his grip on the rosary when she bent over to fix her red nylon. He felt the plastic crucifix of his rosary snap as she pulled up on her hosiery smacking loudly on her gum.

He felt impotent rage when a car drove by and gave a honk, seeing that dirty girl smile made him bite down savagely on his lip until he tasted blood. The car pulled over in an open space and the hooker jumped into the passenger side. They didn’t leave, the sale was being performed right there.

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He held the rosary in his fist feeling the plastic shards dig into his hand drawing blood. The dirty girl didn’t have the decency to go to the alley down the street. He felt his erection try to rip through his pants as he let go of the rosary and stretched the leather strap, feeling giddy with excitement and righteousness as the leather creaked in his hands.

The woman got out of the car after ten minutes and went back to the corner she had been standing at pulling at her nylons. He felt his blood boil and his insides cook every time he watched her do it, his mother said only dirty girls pull at their stockings, though he recalled his own mother doing it as well. He waited for the person in the car to drive away, when it did he double tapped his horn.

The woman in red looked over towards him looking surprised but not worried. She could see the man who honked, he looked anxious but smiled warmly as he waved to her. She pulled absently at her nylons again not noticing him grimace as she approached and spit out a wad of gum.

She was pretty sure she had a run in her stockings but it had been a busy night and she had had worse wardrobe malfunctions than that. The window rolled smoothly down, she leaned in letting her girls give the John

window rolled smoothly down, she leaned in letting her girls give the John a nice eyeful. She smiled sweetly at him, and lightly parted her lips.

“Hey handsome, you lookin for love?”

“Uh, yeah.” he said with a strained smile.

Her smile faltered slightly when she saw he had a TL armband. He noticed her seeing it and gave a bigger smile.

“It’s OK. Really see, I, I have money, cash.”

He pulled out a sheath of twenties from his pocket, they were crisp and green. Her smile returned and she leaned through the door to get a closer look at him. She had John’s that were part of the TL before, they were as horny as the rest of them, but you had to be careful of those loony Christers just the same.

He had a push broom mustache and a chiseled face and broad shoulder and thick arms. He had a man’s face but looked childishly excited as he held up the bills. She wondered if the rest of him would be as big as she got in the car.

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She pulled at her nylons again, and said: “You wanna fuck or you want me suck? Fifty for both.”

She rubbed at he inner thigh and pulled again at her stockings noticing the sneer he made when she did it.

“What’s the matter, honey?”

His eyes were fixated on her leg, his face lost the look of childish excitement and had become a mask of disapproval as his lips went down into a deep scowl. She felt a finger tip of fear touch her at that face.

“Mommy said you were bad.” he said still looking at her nylon leg.

“What?” she asked in an awkward tone.

“Mommy said women who pull on their stockings are dirty.” he said this and looked into her eyes on the word dirty.

“Look,” she said with a shaky smile. “my daddy don’t like me sittin around...”

She went for the door handle and was suddenly grabbed by the back of her head and slammed face first into the dashboard. Bright stars exploded in her head as a geyser of blood flowed from her nose. He held her head down and started the car with his free hand, which barked immediately to life.

She began to wail in bloody gasps until he started to push her head into the dashboard, crushing her bruised and bloodied nose, she wanted to push away with her arms but they were numb with terror and her face felt like it was roasting over an oven.

“Be quiet, mommy says you’re giving her a headache.” he said as they drove.

After a short drive the car stopped. He turned off the ignition and locked all the doors still

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holding the dirty girl with his free hand. This had been routine for him for a while now and he felt the familiar excitement as he took the leather strap out and then his bible from the back seat.

He parked close to a wall on her side so she couldn’t get out though she tried to open it anyway, he immediately brought the good book down upon her swollen face.

“Dirty girl, dirty girl, dirty girl.”

He accentuated each dirty girl with a downward strike of his bible. She yelped loudly with each hard smack. He was used to this as well, the unwillingness to be clean, to know the Lord Christ as he should be known, through rivers of blood.

He would save their souls before he killed them, that way he wouldn’t go to hell. He was saving their souls and sending them to their heavenly father, clean and unblemished. He would make them pray for forgiveness before he sent them home to glory.

“Will you ask for forgiveness?”

She looked at him, scared and wounded, looking childlike her self now.

Her eyes were as red as her torn jacket, a bare cone shaped breast poked through. She noticed it and quickly became modest and covered herself. He had the sudden urge to laugh.

herself. He had the sudden urge to laugh.

“Will you ask for forgiveness?”

The length of her life would be decided by the answers she might give.

He was a big man, six foot even and one hundred and seventy five pounds of God given muscle. He exercised as constantly as he worshiped, just as mommy said all good Christian boys did. Boxing, weight lifting and running, the Holy Trinity of strengthening the body. He could break a walnut in his hand and thanked God every morning for his strength.

“For what?” she asked looking honestly confused.

He held up the bible to her face she looked at it and suddenly his other hand came around, balled into a hard fist and shattered her cheek bone.

She let out a deathly moan that hurt his ears. They sat behind a shopping plaza that had gone under during the eighties, its hey day had been in the

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fifties when there was an arcade and an RC themed restaurant that had a hundred varieties of root beer floats.

Now the restaurants and arcades where gone and all the windows looked into empty rooms filled with shadows and scurrying creatures, all that remained of the plazas glory years was the large dumpster the car sat behind, its once bright color had faded to an indeterminate shade of filth, the flap of the hard black plastic lid was gone, the dumpster was half filled with ancient refuse.

He would come here first to judge how much they would fight and if he could properly train her he would take her back to his home for a more extensive conversion.

extensive conversion.

“Will you ask for forgiveness?” he said calmly as he wound the strap across his hand.

Her face was broken, her eyes had gone beady as her nose began to swell. She let out a cry that sounded like a tea kettle coming to a boil.

She pushed herself to the door looking down at herself.

“Will you...”

“Yes, yes.”

She had interrupted him but that was OK, dirty girls were known to be desperate.

“Do you accept Jesus as your savior?” he asked as the spicy aroma of leather hit her nose making it itch painfully.

She nodded and sobbed.

“Speak!” he said smacked her again with his bible.

“Yes,” she wailed and said in a barely audible nasal tone. “please forgive me.”

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“Do you accept that I am his instrument to save you?” he asked as the leather creaked loudly in her ears.

She nodded still looking down at her legs.

“Look at me when you speak.”

She did look up, and he had expected her to recoil in fear of God’s instrument. But her look was beyond recoil, it was a look of confused terror. Her eyes despite swelling shut opened wide and looked over his shoulder. He turned and looked out his window and saw a pair of bright green eyes staring at him, into him.

He looked into those eyes and was thrown back to his childhood, when it was just he and his mother. She warned him about dirty girls and would spank him for looking at a dirty girl. Though to his mother all girls were dirty.

‘Is this what you like, dirty boy?’ She asked him holding the womens brassiere catalog she found under his mattress in one hand,while spanking him with the other hand or a thick wire brush until he bled.

Afterwards she would sometimes bathe with him and did unmotherly things to him to soothe his cries. He once again felt the painful degrading sodomy his mother preformed on him so often and began to cry.

The woman in red watched as they stared at each other, and began to cry when the man began to wail and started saying: no mommy in a terrifyingly childish sob. She was crying weakly and suddenly screamed in horror as the window on his side broke in a million shards and the man was suddenly pulled through it like a sack of laundry, his legs kicked the instrument panel turning on the blinkers.

instrument panel turning on the blinkers.

The woman in red sobbed and gasped as his hands appeared on the door ignoring the shards cutting his fingers. His face appeared briefly as a band of something black tightened around his neck, his eyes began to protrude out of their sockets his face turning purple while his tongue sticking out between his pale blue lips wagged and lengthened.

His face was gone again, there was a sound of gurgling then what sounded like tree branch breaking and then nothing else. The woman in red sat unmoved for a few minutes waiting for the green eyes to appear but they did not, her face was nothing but a broken mess, her nose felt like

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it was filled with hot coals. She wept quietly as she slowly slid over to the driver side and looked out the broken window.

On the ground next to the car he stared up at her, his head did anyway.

The light of the cars blinkers reflected into his marbleized eyes. Although it was dark, she could see the sticky gobs of blood caught in his hair and marking his left cheek. His body was on it’s back, the hole where his head had once sat was oozing out blood in a ghastly spreading pool, she saw that the body had an erection and began to scream.

“What you mean you ain’t ever suck his dick?” Palumbo asked.

“Yo dat fucked up. You sucked me, you know you did. I ate that snatch like chicken chow mein.” exclaimed Duke sounding honestly hurt.

“No I didn’t!” Sarah said in near hysterical tones to her boyfriend, Palumbo.

Palumbo.

“Fuck yeah you did,” Sal interjected quickly. “you took him behind the dumpster gobblin dick like it was goin on sale.”

They stood on a deserted corner on the steps of a mini market between Christian and Federal. A street light shone bright on the four of them.

Sarah stood between them feeling boxed in and angry. She had just wanted to chill with her man but Sal and Duke had tagged along and were drunker than fuck.

The three men shared an illegal bottle of rye as they regaled her with stories of sexual encounters that sounded like bull shit to her. Palumbo had turned on her when she called his boys out on their stories.

“Damn bitch, you wont suck me but you suck this dopey fuck?” asked Palumbo.

He wore a black baseball cap backwards on his head and took it off quickly and pushed back his hair before placing back on. She used to think it looked sexy, now it made her mad. He swigged quickly from the bottle before handing it off.

“Yo why you bein so greedy wit that pussy?” Palumbo asked sounding calm.

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“Yeah, you weren’t greedy last night.” Duke said with a harsh guffaw.

“Fagot I never touched your pencil dick!” she said turning on Duke loudly.

Palumbo’s hand went to her face in a deafening smack that sent her sprawling off the mini market steps where she crashed into a parked car, she let out a breath as she fell. The three of them laughed at her.

Palumbo went to her and gripped her up by the arm.

“You don’t be talkin shit to my boys. You fuckin dirty slut, you suckin off every dick in the neighborhood but leave me to play pocket pool.” he said looking down into her upturned face that was damp with tears.

“I didn’t suck nobody off, and I’ll bite yours off if you don’t let off me.” she tried to sound tough and pull herself free from his grip.

They laughed their troll laugh as Palumbo tossed her to Duke. He grabbed her by the waste and took a handful of her breast and squeezed as he honked out a laugh.

“Oh, yeah, my man. I miss the feel of these titties.”

Sarah stepped on his foot and pushed herself away from him and his hands.

“You fuckin lying dog, you ain’t never had me.”

Duke walked over and punched her in the stomach with a fierce grin and stormy eyes. She went down to her knees holding her stomach trying to catch her breath.

“You the lying dog, ho. You runnin around on my homey and call me a

“You the lying dog, ho. You runnin around on my homey and call me a dog. Yo that’s fucked up.”

Duke reached for her but she crawled backwards towards Sal the fat one of the group who smelled like a day old hoagie. His porky hand touched her midriff, his fingers felt cold and

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greasy, she had the sudden urge to vomit. She looked up at his pudgy face and saw he was sweating from the excitement and had a crazy smile that made his face look like a rubber mask.

“Don’t touch me you fuckin porker!” she yelled.

The fat crazy smile disappeared as Palumbo and Duke laughed at her rebuttal. The smile was replaced with an ugly frown as he picked up Sarah with both of his hands and threw her against the parked car.

“Ugh.” she moaned as she hit the cars door handle with her spine and collapsed to the ground to the laughs of the trolls.

She thought she was broken in half, when she tried to rise her legs turned to water and she fell to the ground. Her face grazed the hard rubber of the tire streaking it with grime. She tried again to rise but one of them pushed her back down with their foot.

“Let’s take this icy cunt and warmer up. She got a pussy as tight as your kid sister.” Duke said which got more laughs.

“I never fuck, none of y’all.” she said in a gasp as Palumbo began to pull her up.

“Yeah, well, we all gonna fuck now.” Palumbo said.

They walked around the block on Christian street towards the a rec center where it would be quieter, dragging Sarah who fought ferociously.

The walked along a chain link fence through a park they frequented, it was far from houses and cops never drove inside and since it was a daytime park there were no lights. Sal held her close breathing heavily into her ear the smell of his sour mouth made her gag, she lunged but was still caught in his greasy cold hands.

She managed somehow to take a swing at him and sliced open his cheek with a broken nail. He let her go but held on to her with one hand as the other explored his bleeding face. The cut was ragged and only bled in a little, but it set him off.

“You fucking cunt!” he screamed and grabbed her with both hands and threw her down on the walkway.

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Her vision exploded with white light as her head hit the concrete path and a bell echoed loudly in her skull as his face appeared from the whiteness.

He slobbered on her cheek as his mustard breath hung over her face like a cloud of awful, his eyes filled with a deadly light. She felt him pry her legs open with his sweaty hands and felt his penis poked roughly at her denim clad thigh.

She looked away quickly trying not to see him or hear the others cheering him on. She looked and saw a mini sunflower swaying gently in the wind near a swing set. She tried to see the sunflower and wonder how it ever survived the constant tide of children. She tried to see herself walking over to it and smelling it, wondering if it would smell like the sun flower seeds they sold at stores. She tried but Sal grabbed her face and made

seeds they sold at stores. She tried but Sal grabbed her face and made her look at him.

His tongue stuck out the slightest bit as he pulled at her pants. His tongue came out a little further as his face edged closer to hers, she closed her mouth tight in fear he would try and kiss her. Her vision doubled with tears as he pulled himself out of his pants and saw it against her leg like a volatile flesh colored snake.

When she looked up again everything started to go wrong for them. She was looking at the back of his head though he still laid on top of her ready to take her. The sight confused her more than scared her even as his body was pulled off her easily.

Duke and Palumbo were looking at who ever was standing behind Sal.

Sarah saw a dark figure standing next to the body as what ever had twisted his head let go of him and began to retreat to the dark figure.

Duke watched his face drained of color and emotion, looking as pale as milk.

He hooked both thumbs and began to gauge at his own eyes screaming hysterically as blood and eye juice began to cover his face. Palumbo watched and muttered at the horror and reached out to him, when he touched his friend, Duke screamed again and ran, tripping on a slide in dull thump, he got up and ran straight into a steel trash can bolted into the cement, he hit it and they all heard something crack in his body as he fell to the ground. Despite whatever had broken, he was up again arms swinging out wildly as he ran with a considerable limp in his left leg away from them and into the neighborhood beyond, his screams and wails dwindling into horrific echoes.

Palumbo didn’t know what had happened and though he was scared he didn’t run. He stuck his hand down the back of his pants and pulled out a revolver aimed at the dark figure and began to shoot. The hooded figure

revolver aimed at the dark figure and began to shoot. The hooded figure jerked as one of the bullets hit just above the chest.

The shirt sparked and burned a little and exposed the hole made by the bullet. Palumbo felt a

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relief that turned to disbelief followed by a wave of terror as he watched the figure stick their finger in the hole and pluck out the slug. The bullet should have exited through the body with a big bloody exit hole, but it had barely gone through.

On top of the horror of the figure removing the shell so deftly was the fact that wound looked like it was shrinking and healing slowly. He realized the hole in the shirt was all that would remain as the figure tossed the slug absently away.

He tried to shoot again when suddenly both of his legs were pulled out from under him in a dancers split. He screamed as two black bands gripped each ankle and continued to pull him by the legs in opposite directions. He felt the muscles rip and tendons snap like high tension wire.

He felt a red pain cover his body as the bones of his legs snapped off his pelvis leaving nothing but gushing stumps of tattered meat for legs. He went to his death silent as the gallons of blood exited him and flowed into a sewer grate near by gurgling into it like a thirsty mouth. Sarah watched the whole exchange silent and as white as Duke had turned before blinding himself.

She saw the dark figure was a woman from the shape of her body and face that was the color of fresh cream, her eyes so green and illustrious Sarah immediately thought of the Emerald City of Oz lore. Then her terror stricken mind ceased on the idea of the Wicked Witch come to life. But

stricken mind ceased on the idea of the Wicked Witch come to life. But she was not ugly and old like the witch in the movie, she was beautiful but still very terrible and very angry.

Her eyes were an other worldly beauty that could burn you if she wanted.

She was sure those eyes would burn her alive in green flames and it would hurt until she took her last breath, she closed her eyes tight as she heard the woman approach her with slow methodical steps.

“Please,” she sobbed out as quietly as she could so as not to anger the woman. “I never...I never sucked him off. None of them...please don’t hurt me...I’m sorry.” she apologized though she didn’t know why.

She could feel the womans eyes regarding her though she wouldn’t dare look upon them again, she could feel them on her, the green light cutting through her mind like butter. The way her eyes had moved during the attack was like watching a liquid green fire rise higher and higher into a boil. The steps came closer to her, so close she could feel the breeze the woman created from her walking.

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She cringed waiting for something to happen, but the footsteps continued on passing her and into the darkness behind her without another sound.

Galadriel sat in front of her thin screen with her flip phone in her hand.

The phone was disassembled and no longer made calls. She used it now as a mini keyboard to surf the Intranet. One night when her blood was cool she stayed home and had gone through the books Paul had purchased for her, many books were of fiction and fantasy, which he had purchased legitimately.

A few were purchased from a Broad street bootlegger, some regarded as unchristian and therefore against the law as seditious or communistic, usually anything political or technical. One of those books with the familiar red stamp announcing it was against federal law to own the book, was called the Techno Cook Book written by someone with the initials HRB. It was a thick tome that explained how to pirate intranet signals, reprogram cellulars or movie players and such.

She had spent many hours taking apart her cellular for its keypad, the falling apart radio player for its wireless router and the thin screen for a monitor. She couldn’t solder though so she used staples to connect the right wires and what the chapter called ‘the poor mans PC’ and was able to access the intranet.

She had even gotten on the deep intranet, which was not like the ordinary intranet with its government news and social sites that were plagued with ads from RC cola to Viagra. The deep net as the cook book called it was unfiltered information that made claims such as the moon being made of rocks and not cheese or that cigarettes made you sick.

She had found a site on the deep net called mytube which was nothing but video clips. She was listening to music on the site when she came across clips of Yellow Jacket games and clips for other local teams and wondered briefly what other video clips of local sports there might be.

She typed in her fathers name on the search bar at the head of the sites page and hit the OK button on her keypad.

She didn’t expect to get results since her father had never gone pro, so she sucked in a quick breath when she saw his face appear in a little box besides some of the video clips listed on the page. She clicked on the video which had a view counter that was around ten thousand and was titled ‘Sledgehammers greatest fight ever’ the title had a double exclamation point and colon with a parenthesis beside it making it look like a smiling face.

like a smiling face.

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It was just seven minutes long and was highlights of his fight against a man called The Tank. The fight had been broadcast on TV apparently as the clips were voice with color commentary by two men.

[Commentator 1: The Tank is favored in this match he has a longer reach he’s got eighty pounds on him and more power behind his left than Darrows’ legendary right. I think The Sledgehammer is gonna fall before the fifth round if The Tank doesn’t get tired.]

“Shut up, pig.” Galadriel said to the commentator.

[Commentator 2: We’ll have to see, Steve. They both are undefeated but the one thing going for The Tank is that he’s never been knocked down.

And The Sledgehammer isn’t tall enough to reach a knock out button if this guy’s got one.]

The first half of the clip was her fiery eyed father going toe to toe with a man who looked ten feet taller and a hundred pounds bigger than her dad. The fight started slowly at first then the clip jumped the second round to a high light of her father taking a left hook making him fall to one knee.

“Shit,”

She filled with a short burst of anger and the image on the monitor scrambled, Galadriel realized a few days before she was some how interfering with electronics when ever she got angry. The music from the radio player would go fuzzy before going mute, the image on the thin screen would become distorted and turn into a jumbled puzzle of

screen would become distorted and turn into a jumbled puzzle of squares. She had calmed down and the image returned.

[Commentator 1: That was close, The Sledgehammer almost went down I still stay he won’t get past five rounds.]

Galadriel ignored the comment this time. The fourth round was next on the clip, both fighters in their corners, her father had a small shiner brewing just above his left eye and a slight bruise on the left side of his jaw but the fire never left his eyes. The Tank’s nose was pouring blood and stained his white trunks a gory pink. The round started and they went right to the center for each other as if it were the opening round.

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Her father quickly worked The Tanks body moving away from the behemoth’s punches but still taking a few anyway. Her father worked slowly around The Tank taking a few blows but throwing his own but quickly. In the last twenty seconds of the round The Tank caught her father with another left hook to the face and he dropped to his knee again.

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[Commentator 1: This could be it!]

The crowd gasped as his knee hit the canvas a second time that fight the ref rushed to him and began to count, he was up before two. She could hear the ref badgering her father about something as he stood watching his opponent, then she heard her father clearly say: I’m fine let’s fuckin rock! The crowd heard him as well and a cheer went up along the people sitting ring side.

Before they could meet again the bell rang ending the round. Galadriel

Before they could meet again the bell rang ending the round. Galadriel was a bundle of nerves, she didn’t know of this match though she had heard a few stories about other fights as a child. He’d have to win she reasoned with herself, why else would it be titled The Sledgehammers greatest fight ever. She took a breath and watched the video’s conclusion.

[Commentator 1: I still think this’ll be the round, The Sledgehammer is too light to bring him down and at this point it could be a split decision if they go the distance and The Tank is ahead on points already.]

They met at the center and her father began to pummel The Tanks mid section in a fast barrage, ducking a left hook and delivering a right of his own before working his way around the body. He ducked another missile this one from the left, and he began working the other side pummeling faster.

[Commentator 2: Look! Look, Steve! He’s pounding The Tank like a mad man, I’ve never seen anyone punch so fast and move that quickly unless the fighters fresh. It’s like the first four rounds never happened for Darrow.]

[Commentator 1: You are right, Joel. Look at his leg position he holds for sure footing when punching and then he bounces like a rabbit to getting under The Tanks throws but never losing balance. This is boxing at its finest!]

Her dad punched, then moved, and punched, then would move again.

For nearly two minutes he unleashed a quick pounding fury that looked almost supernatural with speed. The Tank who’s 175 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

face had been a statue was now showing signs of weariness and pain.

The crowd began to shout and chant Sledgehammer as his rain of blows continued and the look on his opponents face was that of a man who was

continued and the look on his opponents face was that of a man who was suffering greatly. The crowd was chanting still as he ducked another right hook and moved.

He unleashed another fury of punches to The Tanks ribs so fast it was scrambling on the screen. The crowd let out a big oh as The Tank suddenly brought both hands to his mighty stomach with a noticeable grimace and fell to the canvas. The crowd already on its feet cheering exploded in a

roar as the ref counted and The Tank shook his head and stayed down holding his stomach which had gone the color of boiled lobster red.

[Commentator 1: I can not believe it! That was probably the best boxing short of professional fighting you will ever see!]

The crowd rushed up to the ring as the ref held up her fathers arm in victory where the clip ended. It was a nice break from searching music lyrics, she had had another dream with the unfamiliar music. She had woken up a short while ago with the tattered fragments of her dream lyrics bouncing away.

‘me don’t get no rougher

rub it up, baby girl, torture me like no other’

The lyrics were different this time but they had the same sense of happiness and sadness in them, like a poem by a heartsick lover. There was never any results on any site, apparently she made music in her dreams now. She was trying to recall more of the dream when there was a knock on the door.

Her heart froze in her chest, as her stomach was a lump of hard clay.

She crept quietly to the door as another knock came. She looked through the peep hole and gave a sigh of relief. Mrs F stood at the door holding a

the peep hole and gave a sigh of relief. Mrs F stood at the door holding a steaming plate of spaghetti and meatballs.

Galadriel wanted to open the door and show her what had happened, but the urge died away quickly. She was always sweet to Galadriel, she would visit with her and they would play cards some times or she would tell stories of growing up in Northern Italy. But she couldn’t bring herself to open the door.

Nancy was dead, now. She couldn’t expose Mrs F to what she had become, to what she was doing. She slowly and quietly retreated from the door and went to bed. Hours later she heard the 176 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

song again in another dream, no lyrics though, just the acoustic sounds of the guitar twanging its sad and sweet sound. The dream ended suddenly when she heard someone thinking loudly: Need fuckin cash or jewels are good, old ladies always got jewels and cash laying around!

Wish I could just steal a car, fuckin pig cop fuckers, can’t chop no where any fuckin way in this fuckin neighborhood.

Galadriel rose from her bed and went to her front door, the same thoughts reverberated in her mind like house music. She opened the door and heard with her ears someone slowly walking up the steps. He was going to break into Mrs F apartment, he nervously adjusted a large knife on his belt, he would use to slit the old lady’s throat and then put as much as he could into his back

pack before daylight and use it to pay back what he owed. Unless this old grease ball was rolling in it maybe he could just split town.

Galadriel receded into her dark apartment leaving the door half open and dropped a few twenties to the floor. The thief crept up to the second floor down the carpeted hall passing below the yellow globe glass that lit the area pathetically. He wasn’t sure which door led to the old lady he’d seen at the Pathmark earlier with a bunch of fifties in her wallet while he waited

behind her to buy some milk for his indigestion.

He bought the milk and went out and saw her walking to the bus stop and waddled her fat ass on while he rode along until she got off and walked to this sad looking building with no lock on the front door. As he walked by his cellular vibrated in his pocket and flipped it open and saw the number and his stomach churned brightly with acid as fear took his heart.

It rang once, and it was then followed by a text stating: I want my money by tomorrow.

He texted back: no problem, getting cash oiut if ban no He back spaced and waited for the shakes to leave his hand.

no prob, getting cash out of bank now

No one texted him back, so he took off for a few hours until the hour was late and dark. He walked past a door on his left and stopped when he saw the door was open and a twenty lay on the floor just past the wedge of light from the hall globe. He felt an instant of worry thinking this was a trap of some sort, then he looked back down at that twenty and forgot his fears of loan sharks and worries of traps.

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He crept to the door and took the twenty and felt sure this was the old lady’s place. He figured the dumb quiff had old timers disease or dimension or what ever the fuck it was called. He thought that this was too good to be true but a little further inside was another twenty a little crumpled but definitely a Cleveland. The place was totally dark, he saw a shadow on the wall of a thin screen TV and the shape of a comfy looking couch and a tiny kitchen, he had the sensation he was being watched but

couch and a tiny kitchen, he had the sensation he was being watched but the fear was quickly dashed with the growing idea more twenties lay beyond these two.

He had bent over for the bill and as he rose he looked across the dark room and saw a woman in denim shorts sitting with her legs stretched out reclining on the couch wearing black boots one foot crossed over the other lackadaisically. She wore a hood and her face was only a pale outline, her eyes were just sockets filled with shadow.

When a pale green light shone he inhaled with bright glowing fear and turned to the door.

Before he reached it, the door slammed shut curtly and though the door wasn’t locked it would not open no matter how hard he pulled on the knob. He looked back and saw the couch was just a shape again, no green eyed woman laid upon it like a beautiful dangerous animal. He tried to laugh it off as an over active imagination from fear but the door closing he hadn’t imagined.

He tried to open the door but it still wouldn’t budge, the knob began to slip in his sweaty hands as he dared another look back to the still empty room. But something was approaching, he kept hearing the sounds of scraping, as if somebody was crawling on the floor.

He looked down but there was no sign of her or any thing crawling towards him as he kept pulling at the door, the sound of feet knees and hands slowly dragging her across like a snake.

...scrape....scrape...scrape...

He gave up on the door and turned to the empty floor when he understood the scraping sound hadn’t been her crawling on the floor

below but from the ceiling above. A face suddenly appeared close to his, kissing close, her smile was an upside down horror that was a frown from his perspective as she held herself with her feet on a narrow rafter like a bat with eyes that were bright green and could see deep inside his mind.

His neck was suddenly constricted by what felt like hair, he put up his hands to pull at it but his throat was suddenly being squeezed. The knife he carried was held by more hair and was tossed away with a quick flick.

The hairs surrounding his neck eased when he put his hands down but 178 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

her eyes remained on his looking into his mind and what it held, he could not hold back the fury and heat of the probing hyper green light.

“Please...” he muttered. “don’t...”

Her eyes brightened slightly as she saw his childhood fear of spiders. Her mouth opened and he saw a pair of hairy twig like legs protrude from her lips followed by another pair of hairy black legs. In the darkness of her mouth he could she the gleam of the spiders many eyes as it slowly crept out of her mouth.

“I’ll do what ever you want...” he said in a blubber finally able to close his eyes.

When he dared open them again her mouth was closed and there was no spider, only her simmering green eyes. Her mouth opened again but she spoke.

“I need a ride.”

They walked for a few blocks on the deserted streets, a bang securely around the thief’s neck as Galadriel looked for a specific vehicle.

“Please don’t....don’t kill me OK. I wasn’t...” he gasped as the hairs around his neck tightened.

“Be quite, pig.”

They walked to the end of a block nearing the corner when a car came to a stop sign, she pulled the thief into a dark corner between a row home and a narrow alley way with a recessed gate. Most residents did what was known as the slide at stop signs, this person however appeared to be taking no chances and made a complete stop before driving again.

They continued walking and turned down a street called Ellsworth, halfway down the block in front of a diner closed for the night there was a large white utility van.

It was old but looked like it was still in use, there was a recent copy of the Daily News on the dashboard. Its stickers were up to date as well. She pulled on the door but it was locked, smart driver.

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“If you do as I say, I won’t kill you. Open the door and hot wire it.”

“I can’t...”

He had barely spoke the words before she grabbed his face with a hot hand that slowly turned to an icy grip and hissed loudly as his brain began to ache and thump loudly.

“I can’t open the door with out the slim jim, I can hot wire but the door.”

he spoke in a moan that was tear filled and watery.

She ripped off the thief’s shirt and jacket and wrapped it around her fist in order to quiet the blow. She struck the glass quickly with a rabbit punch the glass broke but still sounded loud, she

was just grateful there was no car alarm. In the distance though she heard a dog bark and possibly a car starting closer by.

“If it takes you longer than thirty seconds to do it, I’ll peel your skin off.”

she said opening the passenger door for him.

Ninety seconds later they were heading north on Broad in the clear, towards the highway. The van was big in the back and had just a few tools and various Styrofoam and plastic containers from drive thru burger joints and sandwich shops.

“Where are we going?” the thief asked.

“Stay on until I say.”

Another site on the deep net she found was one called map raider, which was exactly what the name suggested. It collected maps of different cities and states across the continent including Southern California and New England. They had a search bar were you could type in an address and it would show you a map of the area, she typed in a few random addresses and each time was greeted with clear picture. With out a second thought she typed in the word Byberry but no address.

She was still greeted with a map of the facility however. She had stared

She was still greeted with a map of the facility however. She had stared at it blankly, feeling empty and void, then the picture started to scramble as she revisited old memories and pains. She

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had the address now and had found out how to find it, though she didn’t understand this fact until the thief crept up her stairs.

They came to the exit and she told him to turn off as they entered a posh neighborhood with sprawling green lawns and thick hedges surrounding large homes with two car garages and asphalted drive ways. The Victorian style homes were dark and foreboding in the night with only star light in the sky. They came out of the residential area and came to a gravel road marked with a sign that said private drive.

“Turn off the head lights.” she said.

The road went up into a woody looking area that was dark. His hands slipped on the wheel as he looked out into the dark forest. He was afraid of driving into a ditch or into a tree.

“The road goes straight up, you need drive only a few more feet and I’ll let you go.”

He swallowed and pressed gently on the gas and slightly accelerated as the vans tires crunched on the gravel. They drove up until they hit the crest of the hill above and he could see the top of a stone gray building just above the next hill.

“Open the door and get out.” she said in a voice that brooked no denial.

He slid out of the van and stood still as the hairs around his neck kept him close by. He heard her slide out and walk up behind him.

him close by. He heard her slide out and walk up behind him.

“Walk forward.” she said.

His bare chest shook as a wind whipped up among the trees, he began to shiver and heard the woman behind him titter. They passed a patch of scrubby bushes and stunted pine to a rocky slope that went down at a forty degree angle into darkness he could hear a chuckling stream. He was suddenly afraid she meant to drown him, the only thing he dreaded more than spiders was drowning.

He stood looking down into the darkness below as goose bumps covered his arms and chest as

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the hairs holding him began to loosen. He sucked in the night air trying not to blubber again. His heart began to beat steadily as he felt a flicker of hope that she really would let him go.

“Please...I did what you wanted. You said you w...wouldn’t kill me.”

“I won’t, the rock above your head is going to kill you.”

He looked up and before he could scream a large bulbous rock hovering above him came down with deadly force, pulverizing his skull and killing him instantly. The thief collapsed and rolled down to the bubbling stream below into the dark. Galadriel walked away from the van toward the next hill crest when a purple vapor floating ankle high caught her eye.

She walked into the deeper forest through the purplish wisps that was barely visible on the dark woodland ground. The violet aura snaked

barely visible on the dark woodland ground. The violet aura snaked around her ankles and the trees never dissipating or floating away, unmoved from the occasional breeze. The violet mist went deeper into the trees, she crossed over a downed pine and found the source in a clearing.

It was a mound of dirt that had been dug and refilled many times. The grass was gone and only black brown dirt and weeds covered the area.

From the mound purple mist slowly streamed out of various pores and holes in the dirt, she could see that the aura rising was not just one shade of purple but many shades, iris, plum, sangria, wine, magenta.

Each shade was a horror filled with endless death.

She climbed the mound and kneeled down, the mist flowing around her in its multi shades of purple. She hooked her finger and began raking dirt away, flinging the dirt to either side of her at a manic speed. She was elbow deep when her nails scraped something hard and cold and round.

She slowed and began to dig out around what looked to be a rock though she knew it was no rock. A few moments later she held the skull in her hand, carefully brushing away at the child sized skull. Was it Donna’s, she wondered? No, it was too small.

The only light in the forest was her preternatural green eyes. She placed the skull gently back down into the hole and walked towards the Byberry.

The man working the security booth was the same who had been there during her stay. He stood in his tiny booth rubbing at his crotch absently.

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He was reading a glossy skin magazine titled ‘Hot Young Bitches Of The Orient’ with a dull grin. He was caught on page 116 which showed a brown eyed Filipino woman wearing a silky blue kimono holding it open revealing her small breasts and her pink panties. He had never had a piece of Asian pie but would have given his left nut for a slice right now.

He was concentrating on the curve of her hips when he saw her standing on the other side of the booth smiling wantonly at him. He looked down at the magazine and back up at the glass and blinked stupidly at the woman from the magazine standing before him.

Her eyes were green but he hardly noticed as she held her kimono closed around her, fluttering her eyes bashfully at him. He wanted to see her tits, to see if they would fit in his hands like he had just been dreaming, or if he could fit one in his mouth, but he was afraid to approach and break what ever magic was working on him, he hadn’t felt this hard since puberty.

He put his hand on the glass were the breast pressed up against the it through the blue silk. She smiled again and wagged her finger and began to lick her lips seductively. He smiled a dopey grin and stuck out his tongue and began to flick it in and out of his mouth. Her smile faltered just the slightest, as her eyes suddenly glowed with bright light as his tongue was simultaneously wrapped up in thick stands of hair coming through the fence and into the booth.

He could feel the strands grip him and he began to gag as they touched his throat, he saw the olive skinned Asian woman change before his eyes into a dark hooded figure with black hair and glowing eyes, her skin was now the color of cream. He tried to scream but the hair holding his tongue suddenly left his mouth with his tongue. His scream was just a bloody gargle as he fell out of his booth on his side holding his mouth closed with his hands.

His tongue flopped to the ground with a wet slap and twitched slightly then laid there like a dead fish. She quickly climbed the high chain link fence and approached him as he went for his pistol but she pulled his arm away and twisted his head with her bangs until his neck snapped.

arm away and twisted his head with her bangs until his neck snapped.

She rummaged in the guards pocket and removed a set of keys that were clearly labeled and smiled.

Miss Harker sat at her desk just out of sight of the glass vestibule entrance. The hairs on her neck were sharp icicles but she didn’t know why. She got the urge to look out the door and see if Buddy was at the booth. She got up and went to the glass door but didn’t unlock it.

She stood in front of the glass and put a hand over her eyes to cut the glare from the fluorescent light above. The booth was empty, he was making his rounds apparently. Was he drunk again? If he was he would come inside eventually and make her an offer for one of the children.

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He would pay her in some way or another and that would be fine, the girls were mostly skanks and filthy trollops like their mothers before them.

She felt very little guilt about where most of them would wind up. She looked on for a moment and went to the restroom.

She came out a few moments later and had to pass by the front door to get back to her desk. As she passed she had the sensation of being watched and saw a dark figure standing at the door in the corner of her eye. She felt startled but assumed it was Buddy looking for his late night treat and went to the desk to get the keys to unlock the door.

She went to the door with keys in hand but saw no one there and was frightened again for no reason.

“Buddy?” she said with numb lips.

She felt her heart kick up its beat as her hands felt like ice. She approached the door quickly in an effort to forget her fear, thinking Buddy

approached the door quickly in an effort to forget her fear, thinking Buddy was just trying to pull one over on her. She brought the key up to the hole but stopped as she realized it was already unlocked.

She pushed the door and it opened easily on its hinges, she held it open with tented fingers as she looked out before stepping outside. She looked into the near empty parking lot, a lone arc sodium cast a forlorn shine above the glass booth.

“Buddy?” she called out but not very loudly.

There was no sound except the skittering of leaves in the forest. Miss Harker went inside and locked the door behind her. She walked back to her desk but didn’t sit down still wondering how the door got unlocked. It was Buddy of course, he had been drinking in the woods got randy and let himself in while she was in the restroom.

He had forgotten to lock the door behind him was all. But drunk or not, Buddy always made sure to keep the doors locked at all times to keep the little birdies from flying away, he would say to Miss Harker and give a wink. In many ways he was hard to keep in line, she often had to provide for him when the pickings were slim in their little chicken factory, but about locked doors he didn’t falter.

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She convinced herself it was Buddy being forgetful, she would just harass him sternly when he came back. Maybe she would make him remember in a way only a woman could, she thought suddenly being overcome with lust.

She felt a dirty smile cross her lips and warmth enter her body in a lovely rush. Her sudden lusty thought was cut off by a voice coming from the

rush. Her sudden lusty thought was cut off by a voice coming from the hall just behind her were the dormitory lay.

‘...piggy...”

It was barely audible and she barely caught the word in her ears as she was in mid shudder from her little fantasy. She felt cold again and turned to look into the semi dark hallway, the only light was from the window at the other end were another street light hung above outside. She stood waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dark but she saw no one.

She still held the keys in her hand and gripped them tightly feeling anger.

One of those little skanks was out of bed calling her a pig. She squeezed her hand around the keys until it hurt and marched towards the dorm room, expecting to see them jumping on the beds laughing and caterwauling like alley cats in heat.

Piggy, porker, fatty pig bitch, slovenly cow pig, as her mother called her so often who had brown eyes, though in her sudden flashback her eyes were green. She was biting on her lip when she got to the door, opened it ready to discipline them. But the dorm was dark, the eight or nine girls laid in bed quiet and unmoved.

Miss Harkers heart was beating loudly in her chest, she listened closely for a titter or a laugh or even a feigned snore, but she heard nothing. She closed the door and locked it staring at it with a numbness she hadn’t felt since she was a child.

“...piggy, piggy...”

The words sent ice rippling down her spine as they echoed to her. She looked back to the other end of the hall and saw a figure floating a few

looked back to the other end of the hall and saw a figure floating a few inches above the floor, feet dangling in the air. The darkness of the hallway and the bright fluorescent from behind made the floating figure a dark silhouette.

An absence of light, a shape cut out of reality. But there was a light, two hollowed circles of

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green light began to fade in and out dully. The fear gripped her heart as the figure began to float toward her as if being pulled by a string.

She watched the figure slowly come closer approaching the pitiful light of the arc sodium just outside. She saw the fine feminine shape of her legs in denim shorts and a striped hoody covering her head. The flow of her bangs put her in mind of Medusa, she dug into her blouse and ripped the silver crucifix that lay upon her breasts.

She closed her eyes as the woman touched the ground and stood so close she could feel the heat from the lights of her eyes burning her face.

She held the silver cross high as she slightly crouched down. Her mind raced with Bible passages, assured that her faith would protect her.

“...thou...thou shall...shall not suffer a witch to live...” she stuttered.

The only sound was the rattle of her silver chain and her beating heart. A laugh like glass breaking filled her ears, she suddenly felt her mid section embraced in a death grip.

“Then suffer...” she hissed.

She moaned as her ribs began to crack and buckle, then she screamed

She moaned as her ribs began to crack and buckle, then she screamed as her ribs imploded into her, crushing her vital organs into a bony bloody mulch that spewed out her mouth like bile. The body flopped to the floor like a rag doll. Galadriel looked down at the body, feeling a dark joy fill her.

The sound of muffled voices and crying caught her attention. She looked to the door of the dormitory, a sliver of yellow light shone through the bottom shadows passed before the light was turned off. Galadriel unlocked the door and opened it to the dark room and felt run over by memories.

The room still held the same gloom, its wood paneled walls had been painted over in white, but it was the same otherwise. She walked further in and saw the same footlocker as before filled with cast off clothes and blankets. All the beds were empty and the room was deathly quiet.

The floor was covered with the same kind of aura however the auras hear were deep blue with wisps of red and purple. In the silence she could hear someone taking deep watery breaths, 186 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

followed by a murmur. She walked down the aisle of beds towards the open doorway of the bathroom.

She went inside and saw them all gathered into the corner. There were eight of them, all at varying ages. One looked barely older than a toddler, she held a naked baby doll by the hair looking at her in fear as well as awe, her hairs were as blond and curly as her doll. They stood together arms about each other, a few crying quietly the others ready to break down and fall into hysterics wishing for this nightmare of an existence of end. A tall girl with brown hair who looked only twelve stood in the front of them all with eyes dripping tears and a considerable shiner on her face that looked a few days old.

Her mind raced with a panic and angry confusion, but it was open, Galadriel saw her being pummeled by Miss Harker for trying to refuse Buddy. He was at her often and was torn up down there because of him.

She looked deeper into her mind past the pain and saw her behind a wheel of a car, not just driving but fixing it as well, she was her fathers helper when he was still alive.

“We coulda had it fixed by now, if you had gotten up sooner, Sleeping Beauty!” her father said teasingly.

“I think you need beauty sleep more than me, dad!” she said back to him as he removed a gunky oil covered rag from his pocket.

“Ugly! I’ll show you!” he shouted joyously and threw the oily rag at his daughter covering her face with gunky residue.

They had both laughed until they cried, it was the memory she replayed in her mind before she fell asleep at night. She was nothing but fear and pain that soaked in a building anger, she wanted to beg for mercy and fight until she died both at the same time in a complex swirl of emotions, she would have smiled and greeted death warmly in hopes of maybe see her daddy again in heaven, for now though she held a both arms out in front of the others in protection refusing to die today or to let the younger ones suffer, Galadriel felt a surge of love for her and spoke directly to her.

“There is a van outside, beyond the gate and below the hill. Take everyone and leave.”

She stood with her arms out still for a moment, her aura never changing

She stood with her arms out still for a moment, her aura never changing color.

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“Leave, now!”

Her aura dulled in color as she put her arms down slowly. She looked to the others but they were all silent She stared at Galadriel as another girl beside her began shaking her shoulder.

“Come on we can go.” another girl about the same age said pulling on her shoulder trying to draw her to the door.

“Are you real?” she asked.

The girl pulling on her shoulder whimpered and drug her to the door, she went willingly with the others following close by, the youngest ones held onto her nightie as if following their mommy. The girl looked back at Galadriel for a brief second before leaving. The youngest girl with the baby doll stood at the door way looking back at Galadriel with wide shiny eyes.

“Come on.” whispered another girl who suddenly pulled her out of view.

They didn’t see Miss Harker as they left and Galadriel heard the van pulling away into the night. After a moment of thinking she went to the parking lot. Outside it was slightly chilly despite it being Summer, the Byberry felt like an oven and the breeze outside was refreshing. She walked the perimeter of the building and came out next to the gated playground.

She wasn’t interested in the playground but the two cylindrical objects standing against the wall beside the chain link fence. They stood side by side about ten feet high and wide in the middle their white bodies contrasted brightly to the dull gray stone. Their tops were capped off with gauges and hoses that went into the the building.

They were almost blank, the only writing was on the bottom of the tanks which said: PROPANE, followed by: flammable with the no smoking sign beside the red font. Galadriel walked a distance away and removed the guards pistol from her pocket and pointed.

She pulled the trigger and almost dropped it from the kick and loud report. Then she heard a sound like air escaping from a balloon, she held the pistol with both hands and shot again and was greeted with a loud explosion as a fountain of fire roared into the air followed by another great boom of the other tank exploding.

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The wall suddenly collapsed into the roaring flames as smoke filled the night in a thick black cloud. Deeper inside the building behind one of the windows which showed only darkness now brightened with orange eyes before exploding and raining glass on the parking lot. The force of the blast pushed against her but she stood firm as the heat of the fire climbed.

She stood watching part of the building collapse into itself as the flames crackled loudly like pop corn. The sky reflected orange light which wavered like an aura. In the distance she heard a siren begin to wail followed by another siren that sounded closer.

Galadriel dropped the pistol and walked into the forest far away before anyone arrived. She walked for twenty minutes not thinking just trying to get away from the fire and sirens. She walked with the Byberry at her back and only looked back once but she saw only the orange fire light

back and only looked back once but she saw only the orange fire light reflected in the sky.

After forty minutes of walking into heavier woods she came across a clearing and found a set of train tracks gleaming under a weak arc sodium light above a sign with an arrow pointing ahead. She followed the tracks for more than an hour before she saw the city skyline again coming out of the forest near the 30th street station. She left the train tracks and crossed an embankment that led her to Fairmount Park.

She made her way to Broad street and was on the Orange line before the morning commute started. The sun was rising as she entered the front door and finally felt more at ease. Then she saw it again, the purple aura that meant death or impending death apparently.

She had noticed it when she reached her own door and looked over to Mr’s F door and felt her heart drop. The mist didn’t come very far, and came out from under the door in short puffs. If she hadn’t been looking down at her keys she might of missed it entirely.

Galadriel walked quickly to her door and began to knock but gently.

“Mrs F?”

She listened and heard nothing and knocked again, a little louder.

“Mrs F?” she said again.

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She then heard a moan, low and filled with pain.

“Mrs F!?” Galadriel nearly shouted.

She turned the knob and the door opened but was stopped suddenly by the chain lock. Another moan escaped from the apartment that was slowly filling with morning light. She put her shoulder down and rammed her way inside, the chain broke and clattered to the ground with ease.

She looked around the room that was nothing but old looking furniture and pictures hanging all over the walls. The living room was dark and the smell of peppers hung in the air. She walked in further and saw a door on her left slightly ajar, out of it spilled a white light.

She walked over and saw Mrs F laying on her back in a flannel nightgown her lower half was on the bathroom floor, a lone slipper hung askew on her foot. A hand was draped across her chest which went up and down erratically. Her breath sounded ragged and weak, another moan came out of her mouth in a long low sound that was dreadful.

Galadriel went to her quickly, not worrying anymore about hiding her change and knelt beside her taking her hand which was ice cold and clammy.

Mrs F didn’t seem to notice her, her eyes were glazed and looked all over before finding her face. Her eyes opened wide, not in fear but in joy.

“Nancy.” she said in her broken accent.

Her other hand gently caressed Galadriel’s cheek in such a motherly way she felt tears burn the back of her eyes.

“Nancy, sei bellissima, lovely bambina.” she said with tears in her eyes.

“Nancy, sei bellissima, lovely bambina.” she said with tears in her eyes.

“Please, what...what can I do?” she said holding her hand in both of hers.

“Per me.” she said gesturing with her chin over Galadriels’ shoulder.

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She looked back and saw a mantle with a collection of orange bottles that were filled with pills and capsules of many sizes and colors. She got up and started to gather them up.

“Non quello. Picture.”

She looked back at the mantel and saw a very old color picture and grabbed it from its place.

“Si, si.” she said trying to reach out for it.

It was an old fashion digachrome picture of a woman and a young girl still in her teens sitting together. Galadriel felt her heart lurch when she saw the young girl had a ghastly scar on her face, though she smiled brightly at her mother, Mrs F, who looked much younger and thinner. She knelt beside her again as she gave her the picture, her fingers were just skin packed with ice.

She moaned again as she looked to the picture a tear cascaded down into her ear. She caressed the photo.

“I miss her so, fa male, I miss her, my Maria. She hurt so bad, I could do nothing.”

nothing.”

The memory popped into Galadriels head almost of its on volition, it happened not long after the digachrome was taken. Mrs F came in and found a letter from a man Maria loved in secret. It was not a happy letter, it said many cruel and hurtful things about her daughter from a man she was in love with.

She crumpled the letter and called out to Maria but she did not answer.

She hurried into her bedroom but it was empty as well, then she saw the bathroom door was open and the light was on. She called her name again and opened the door wider and saw her in a tub filled with water that had gone a horrific shade of crimson.

She saw Maria’s wrist hacked open violently with a razor that sat precariously on the tubes rounded edge, she wailed and rushed to the half full tub. The pain for seeing her daughters dusky marble eyes was so great Galadriel felt her heart being ripped in two. She gasped a great breath and was back in Mrs F’s apartment, holding her icy hand again.

She had been rushed out her mind because she had died, her chest was still and her eyes were

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partly shut. Galadriel squeezed her hand hoping she had just passed out but she did not stir nor breath. Galadriel felt tears stinging her eyes again as she placed her hand down and kissed her wrinkled forehead.

She wanted to cry but she pushed down the urge into a tight green ball of rage and felt it rush up into her brain as she let out a great roar, her eyes filled with a blinding green light and every object nearby began to shake and rattle and fall to the floor. Picture frames with glass smashing to the hard floor, ceramic dishes and plates falling out of the kitchen cabinets in a wave, window panes cracking and shattering into minuscule shards

a wave, window panes cracking and shattering into minuscule shards with loud shrieks.

She felt the whole apartment shake before her mind began to settle down again and the white noise filling her head began to dissipate. She kissed Mrs F’s forehead again and sat with her quietly for another moment.

Before leaving she used Mrs F’s home phone.

She called an ambulance and left the address telling them she was having chest pains. She left the door open and went to her apartment and laid down with the music from her poor mans PC playing loudly. She watched through the peep hole as the EMT took her away and a police officer closed the door and adorned it with yellow police tape.

She stood at the window and watched the ambulance take Mrs F away, feeling much like she did when her mom died or when Paul had been executed. She felt the old familiar rage build inside her again, as she thought about how easily those she loved were always being taken away from her.

Maybe love wasn’t real, darkness was real. It kept her warm inside since love was a silly thing for weak little girls, she was no longer a little girl.

She was a woman that was fueled by the dark loving embrace of rage.

People didn’t love because there was no such thing, a biological reaction to pig lust, it was just a polite version of rape in the end.

What about your mom and dad, they were in love? No, she said to no one and buried that question under her rage which felt more logical more sane. Love was just a made up word for little girls that fancied themselves princesses, but they would grow up old and sad and jilted.

To be a thing seen but not heard, raped but not loved. She let the curtain fall back and went to her bedroom to sleep. She stirred briefly in the

fall back and went to her bedroom to sleep. She stirred briefly in the afternoon while she slept when the dream lyrics came again.

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‘Tell me your name, I’m dying here.’

She ignored the them and fell deeper into her slumber.

The black Lexus made a sliding stop as he headed north on Broad street, though it was a green light then quickly turned onto Federal heading east.

The car quickly maneuvered around a idling mail truck with out losing any speed.

In the car’s back seat sat a man who hadn’t been this scared since the night Kenny got a Louisville slugger enema. The black Lexus came to a complete stop at a sign to let an old woman pulling a hand cart filled with groceries cross the street.

“Fuckin old bag, hurry up!” said Tom Noah.

He revved the cars engine and the old woman hurried on quickly. When she was finally across, Tom speed off towards Tenth street.

“So where we headed?” asked Ray.

“Shut the fuck up.” he answered looking quickly in the rear view mirror meeting his eyes.

So Ray shut the fuck up. He knew of Tom Noah, knew who his brother

So Ray shut the fuck up. He knew of Tom Noah, knew who his brother was too, though he had never met either of them. He didn’t know anyone personally who did, though there must have been someone he spoke to who did. He didn’t talk to the cops about what happened, he just ran home and hid for the rest of the night.

Then the police found Kenny’s body the next day and found out they were together that night and took him down to a police station for questioning, taking his picture and finger prints. He told them he had left Kenny, who was still alive at the time, to get some grub and head home.

They believed him, telling him he was not a suspect and could go home, however they advised him to stay in the neighborhood. The police didn’t mention the video camera that proved he was lying, he was ignorant of it and assumed he was free and clear.

A week had passed and he tried to put it all behind him, though he had nightmares every night of that green eyed woman. He would drink heavily until he blacked out to keep himself free of the 193 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

horrible green colored dreams. He was just finishing a fifth of some nasty bootleg whiskey while standing on Fifteenth and Porter when the black a Lexus pulled up to the corner.

The window rolled down and Ray was suddenly certain he would see the glowing green eyes of that woman. Instead it was the eyes of Tom Noah, though no less dangerous.

“You know who I am?” he asked.

Ray too shocked to speak only nodded. He looked just like his capitalist brother with the exception of the clothes and hair. John wore expensive suits and thick wavy hair, Tom however kept his hair short and dressed like a regular working guy with work boots and jeans.

“Get in the back.” he said and rolled up his window.

The car drove another block and pulled over at the cross streets of 9th and Federal near the corner, across the street was the Capitolo playground. Tom turned around to face Ray, he placed his arm on the back of his seat in his hand was a heavy black revolver held side ways but pointed at his mid section. He stared at Ray for a moment quietly watching him.

Ray felt the bootleg whiskey turn over in his stomach as those lunatic eyes searched him, he looked down drunkenly at his dirty sneakers.

“Look at me, dawg.” he said calmly.

Ray looked back up at Tom and saw the revolver was gone, he still had a hard time looking at those eyes. They were eyes that shimmered with rage and murder, he held his face up though.

“There was a camera in that alley, dawg.” he said as his hand disappeared behind the front seat.

Ray waited for the revolver to come out, instead he produced a long bulbous cigar that had been opened and refilled with a type of weed that gave off a rich odor before even being lit. He produced a silver Zippo and lit it up, the car filled immediately with smoke. He took a deep drag and held it in for a moment as he watched Ray, he let out the drag before speaking again.

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“You told the five-oh you didn’t come back to the alley from the gook store. The cops saw the video, dawg. They saw you running like a bitch, when you came back an saw whatever the fuck happened.”

He dragged again but didn’t pass it to Ray, he just waited to see if Ray was not too drunk to understand the situation. Slowly it did dawn on him, and the cops let him loose even though they knew he lied. Christ the rumors about dirty cops working for Tom Noah were true, Ray realized as the illegal hooch swirled in his stomach.

“You knew, Kenny?” asked Ray.

Tom looked at him for a moment and suddenly put the crooked blunt in his mouth and reached over gripping him by the neck with his hand. His fingers felt murderously strong and pinched his throat shut.

“Don’t worry bout who da fuck I know, I knew your momma when she was suckin dicks for dough nuts.”

He let go and toked on his smoke while Ray hacked and coughed, he felt his stomach lurched and bubble. It sound like a washing machine and was loud enough for Tom to hear.

“You throw up in here, yo ass goin be swimmin in the river.” he said evenly.

Ray took deep breaths and stopped his gorge from rising any further.

When he was down just gasps and hiccups Tom continued.

“Like I was sayin, dawg, the camera shows your narrow ass running like a bitch wit his pants on fire. You gonna tell me what happened, or do you what to wind up on the bottom of Delaware?”

Tom listened to his story, he took a drag from his blunt but placed it on the ashtray as he listened. He said she got inside of his head, when Tom asked him to elaborate he went a whiter shade of pale and let that part drop. He looked ready to either pass out or vomit or both when he finished the story. His face was dripping with sweat, the smell of rot gut whiskey filled the car.

“Don’t move.” Tom said and got out of the car.

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He walked on the concrete pathway that led to a basketball court were a half dozen men played hoops on the asphalted court. Tom walked court side and stood next to a bench with a few items on it, as the men continued to play. A well muscled half black man was dominating the court with brute force.

He shoved out of a pocket and threw a perfect shot through the chain netted basket which jangled musically as the ball went through. He had black hair that was cropped close to his skull, Tom had known him while in Eastern State and was still a heavy hitter in the neighborhood. He threw off another defender with a hard shoulder and swooshed another basket.

“That’s game nigga.” he said when he saw Tom.

He walked over and grabbed a towel to wipe his hands before shaking hands.

“Shit Tom, I didn’t think I’d see you around.”

“You still hittin, Rocko?”

He looked up at his face to see if he was messing around, and saw that he was serious. He only shrugged his shoulder though.

“Depends.”

“On what?”

“Money.”

“Shit, nigga. I got the green, I just need someone that worth it.”

Rocko sat on the bench and gulped water from a bottle before answering.

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“Must be a bad mutha fucka if you comin to me wit a blank check. He one of them gooks from Arch street?”

“No, she ain’t.”

“She?” he said with a laugh. “You fuckin wit me?”

Tom sat down next to Rocko and looked out at the court which had filled with younger boys playing with a scruffy looking blue and white ball, now that the men were done playing.

“You know Duke Foreman?”

Rocko had been wiping his face but stopped when he heard the name.

“Yeah, heard that cracker lost his mind and cut out his eyes over there?”

he said pointing over his shoulder where yellow tape still hung. “I knew him and that crazy wop Palumbo. I heard that mutha fucka got ripped in half. That true?”

“Yeah, had his legs ripped off like an over cooked turkey.”

“And a female did it?”

“A witch.”

Rocko looked at Tom for a moment but didn’t answer right away.

“Palumbo was family to me, and he worked for me, so did Duke. I talked to a couple a people already, that cock tease Palumbo was trying to bang and the drunk fucker in my car.”

Rocko took another drink from his bottle and put his towel around his neck before answering.

neck before answering.

“What she look like?”

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Tom reached in his back pocket and removed a computer print out that was slightly pixelated and handed it to Rocko. The face was barely visible, what stood out were her eyes that seemed to be shining.

“Hard to make out her face.”

“You’ll know her when you see her.”

“Yeah, cause she’ll be flyin on a broom stick, right.” he said with a grin.

“Ain’t a joke, mutha fucka.” Tom said gravely.

Rocko knew Tom didn’t have that kind of humor in him, and the look of murder in his eyes convinced him.

“What’s the info on this bitch then?”

“She’s strong, she strangled another motha fucka a few days later until his head popped off. She might be on PCP if she’s ripping niggas to pieces. She’s been around this neighborhood mostly. I tried talkin to Duke, his mother had him put away cause he said the bitch was in his head, tried slashin his fuckin wrists afraid she’d come find him.” Tom said looking out on the park distantly.

Rocko blew air through his lips in disbelief, but felt chilled by Duke’s demise. He shook his head and ignored the sudden unease and handed the picture back.

“How much?”

“25k.”

Rocko visibly started at the figure, the most he ever made on a hit was 15

and that was for rubbing out an unfaithful wife for a lawyer from Bucks County. The average price for a hit was ten to 12k normally.

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“25?”

“You might not want to go alone, she took out three at once and Palumbo was packin heat. That cock tease said she took slug like it weren’t nothin.”

“Maybe she wearin armor.”

“Maybe she’s a fuckin witch, she made my nigga Duke go loco. Gettin up in his fuckin mind, motha fucka.” Tom said pointing at his own head like a gun. “She fuckin evil, you feel me dawg? Get some holy water and drench that bitch till her ass is meltin, burn her at a fuckin stake, just kill this fuckin broad.”

Tom reached into his front pocket and removed a tightly wrapped brown bag and handed it over to him.

“There’s twelve five there, I’ll give you the rest when you cut off her head and bring it to me. Deal?”

Rocko took it without looking.

“How do I find her?”

“I want you to take the witness wit you, like bait. I’ll introduce you.”

Ray sat in the car dozing with his head leaning on the glass, snoring loudly. Tom quickly opened the door causing Ray to fall onto the ground.

“Greasy fuck smudge my windows.” Tom said as Ray stood up.

“You goin wit my nigga here. You do what the fuck he says and keep your fuckin mouth shut or he’ll make you his bitch. Your gonna help him find the witch.” he said gripping his shirt in a fist.

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Ray began to shake his head in negation, Tom slapped him swiftly across the face leaving a large red mark on his cheek.

“Yeah, bitch you are.” he said gripping him by his shirt. “You got a secret, I’ll find out what it is. Cops maybe dumb fuckin pigs, I ain’t. You gonna sober up and hang out where this bitch found you and your ugly fag friend. You run I’ll find out what you did and even if I don’t find out I’ll kill your whole fuckin family. You feel me, motha fucka?”

It was night and a late evening mist hung over the weedy lot on Annin street. A fire in the barrel had been burning brightly at first but as the night wore on it began to dampen down and flicker weakly like an orange strobe light. Ray had spent the last three nights, all night in the lot waiting.

It was nearly three in the morning as he stood in the driving mist, smoking cigarette after cigarette waiting. Each night had ended with out incident and leaving Rocko in a foul mood every morning when the sun came up. Each morning Rocko took him back home and told him he’d be back that night and that he’d better be there when he came back.

He stood waiting for morning to come again, the place was empty of life, a lone light at the end of the alley shone weakly. The shadows were dark and empty but Ray was terrified and felt his heart jump into his mouth when he heard Rocko honk his horn. He had two others in the car with him and were packing heavy pistols on them. They gave Ray a vile of holy water and nothing else.

He left the alley and saw Rocko waving him over so he got in the back seat. It was quiet in the car, a haze of cigarette smoke hung in the air like a gray fog. Ray was to afraid to speak so he sat quietly.

“What you wanna do, Roc?” asked a baby faced man called Flowers.

He looked around the neighborhood before looking at Ray.

“Was your nigga tryin to grab her ass?”

“Huh?”

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“The witch cracker! Was he tryin to get some? He know how to take no for an answer?”

He mumbled something, and Rocko rolled his eyes. The bearded heavy set man with olive skin and wiry black hair sitting next to him punched him quickly in the face with a tattooed fist.

“Easy, Zeke, I need the mutha fucka still. Did your friend like to grab ass?”

“Yeah.” he said with bloody lips.

Rocko nodded and looked back the other way again, thinking again.

“So what ya wanna do, Roc?”

“Let’s get some more bait.”

Forty minutes later they were leaving the cross streets of Broad and Locust. Rocko had driven around the block until he saw a blond in a hot pink mini skirt and halter. He pointed at her and Flowers got out and approached her. Ray wasn’t sure what to expect and felt terror steal his heart when Flowers walked up and punched her directly in the face, Ray whimpered audibly.

“Quit actin like a bitch.” said Rocko glancing at Ray in the rear view.

Zeke got out of the car to let Flowers put her in, he pushed her roughly into Ray. She was crying and grabbed at Rays shirt, a shiner was forming on her cheek, her eyes were drenched with panic and tears.

“Settle down bitch.” said Zeke as he got back in and pulled her up by the back of her halter.

“Wh, wh, what...” she stammered.

“Shut up, I said.”

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“My pimp...he...”

“Bitch, I’m your daddy now,” said Rocko turning to look at her. “sides, you live through this you won’t need to work again. You take dick for a living you can take a few smacks in the mouth.”

They drove back to Annin street, dawn was still hours away and the sky was still dark with night. The past few nights had felt futile to Ray like kids waiting for a Bigfoot or a UFO to happen by out of chance, now though it felt like they were playing for real. The mist was still hanging in the air like a curtain.

When they arrived they all got out, Zeke took the hooker roughly by the arm. Ray didn’t move and had no intention of going.

“Let’s go, you bitch ass cracker.” said Rocko.

Rocko opened the trunk and removed a pair of twelve gauges that he handed to Flowers and a large black handled machete with a platinum blade. Rocko took a small machine gun from the back of his pants and removed a clip from his front pocket and quickly put it in with a metallic snap.

“Let’s go.” he said.

The woman shrieked as Zeke pulled her and he slapped her with an open palm that echoed loudly. They walked to the lot, the woman tried to pull away but Zeke using his weight threw her into the burning barrel which fell showering her in hot embers. She quickly screamed and began beating on her shirt and hair which were not burning but getting smoldered in hot ash and sparks.

She started to rise and Zeke pushed her back down with a booted foot.

He laughed and kicked her down again.

“Nah, let her up.” said Rocko.

Zeke helped her up but pushed her to Rocko. He grabbed her and began squeezing her breasts roughly out of agitation rather than sexual gratification. She screamed and was panicking so he 202 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

kicked her by the ass to Flowers who shoved his hand between her legs.

She screamed again and tried to claw at his face.

“No you don’t you dumb fuckin quiff.” he said with a laugh and punched her in the face.

She collapsed to the ground in a loud wail, her face was a bloody mess.

Zeke pulled her up to her knees by pulling her hair Rocko got in front of her as she wailed and cried. He took her head in his hands and spoke to her.

“Keep crying bitch, keep screaming. Ray!” he said pulling out his gun again.

“Punch her.” Rocko said calmly.

Ray stood still, his stomach doing flips as the woman cried. He didn’t move so Rocko pointed the gun at him.

“I said punch her, or I’m a spray your brains all up in this place.”

His knees shook fearfully as he approached her and with a shaky balled up fist and struck her in the head with pitiful strength. In his terror he wept as he punched her before Rocko shoved him back roughly to the ground.

“Man you swing like a fuckin bitch.” he said putting his gun back and returning his focus on the woman.

Rocko rearmed with the machete took the womans arm with his free hand and slowly cut a thin line across her forearm. She screamed so loud Ray covered his ear, feeling the urge to vomit come over him as every

Ray covered his ear, feeling the urge to vomit come over him as every square inch of skin went to goose bumps. He stood up and walked back into the wall with his ears covered and his eyes running with tears.

The dim bulb just to the left began to blur in his eyes as it began to flicker suddenly. He forgot the screams of the hooker as he looked up at the bulb which began to flicker faster and grow brighter. He could hear the filament in the bulb start to rattle, a faint hissing sound began to emit from the bulb which grew in volume as the bulb grew brightness.

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“Please god, no...” he whispered as the bulb grew as bright as the sun.

“The fuck?” said Zeke looking up and noticing the bulb.

Before anyone else said a word the bulb popped loudly casting everything in near darkness. The pop was so loud they all jumped. The only light was the slowly dying embers of the burning barrel scattered about. Ray saw it all happen in less than a minute and felt his legs quiver with terror when a pair of bright green eyes appeared just a few feet away at the lots opening.

“Jesus Christ!” said someone.

It was dark but Ray saw Zeke and Flowers raise their shotguns in the direction of the glowing eyes and fired turning everything white momentarily. Everything was quiet for a second, he could hear their hectic breathing.

“Did you get her?” asked Rocko.

“I don’t know...” said Flowers.

Ray’s back was still to the wall, he wanted to run but the terror had welded his feet to the ground. For some reason he he had the urge to look up and when he did he slowly slid down to the ground in a breathless whimper. Above him was a landing of a derelict fire escape, it was there she hung by her feet and hands, like a nighttime creature with alien green eyes blazing.

Although she was a dark figure, Ray could see clearly her eyes burning a green merry hell. Ray felt his bladder empty as she suddenly came down between Zeke and Flowers who stood just behind Rocko who was still looking out on the street, both of them raised their shotguns to her head.

She did a sudden split as Flowers pulled his trigger and evaporated Zeke’s head in a gory explosion. Before he could register what he had done a tight band of hair, as strong as steel, suddenly gripped his hands as it held the shotgun, which was being reversed into his face. The hair wound around the hand holding the pump pulled, discharging the spent shell and loading another, his finger was wrapped around the trigger which was squeezed by the hairs around it causing the gun to fire into his head.

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Both were dead before Rocko had turned around and was face to face with her, he raised the machete and swung with all his strength but she ducked it easily and grabbed him by the face much as he had the hooker who had ran away when the guns started to blaze, and looked into his eyes, staring. After thirty seconds he fell to his knees and dropped his blade, arms hanging loosely to his sides as he let out a slowly building wail that was breathless and high pitched.

She released him and picked up the machete and with a quick swipe she removed his head which thudded dully on the ground. The only sound

removed his head which thudded dully on the ground. The only sound was Ray’s hurried breath, he realized suddenly alone now and covered his mouth, though she knew he was there. As she approached him, he rummaged in his pocket and took out the vile of holy water.

He removed the cap as she stood over him and splashed it on her. She quickly grabbed the vile and looked at it with her bright eyes and began to laugh in sounds of broken glass. She tossed the vile away into the darkness.

He could see her face, her smile was a werewolf at midnight howling at the full moon. He began to cry again and vomited on himself. Her smile deepened at his weakness.

“Please...” he sputtered through grimy lips. “please...I’m sorry....I’m sorry...”

The smile vanished, her face was slowly being cast into darkness.

“He’s sorry...” she said in a low voice. “he’s sorry...”

Her hands were suddenly wrapped around his head almost lovingly.

“He’s sorry...” she said again in the same low voice and gripped his skull tighter.

Ray could feel her rage building inside his head as her hands grew tighter around his skull. The fingers gripping him were like iron bands slowly being cinched around his head as a thunder of screams filled the inside of his mind. He let out a deathly shriek as the stench of hot blood filled his nose.

filled his nose.

“he’s sorry, he’s sorry, he’s sorry....”

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Each time she said it her voice grew as did her grip on him. The screams in his head increased with volume rupturing some where deep inside his brain.

“HE’S SORRY HE’S SORRY, HE’S SORRY!”

With each sorry she squeezed and squeezed, she relished his loud moans and mental thrashing as blood seeped from his nose, mouth and ears in a torrent. She imagined a rotten tomato as she her hands vibrated with preternatural strength, suddenly she felt something like a thick egg shell crack in the mans head and his screams were silenced. She released him and his body went over like a heavy sack of meat.

John Noah sat in his den on the third floor of his home that had been built during the Revolution, he had every floor renovated except the basement which still had a tunnel that led all the way to the waterfront along the Delaware river. His brother Tom would use the tunnel to come see his brother without being seen, there was always at least two men guarding the tunnel.

Tom had just come into the den, brushing angrily at the dust and cobwebs that were caught on him. Tom hated the tunnel, but he couldn’t talk about the situation over a cellular. John was going over appointments scheduled for the morning which was still a few hours away, he didn’t mind though, he was an early riser where as Tom would probably not go to bed until the sun was up.

Tom was already pissed and felt more rage at his brothers cool demeanor and disinterest in his brothers anger.

“Fuckin witch, fuckin bitch witch. She fuckin killed em yo. Fuckin killed em, fuckin Rocko, everybody.”

John glimpsed quickly up from his NovaX Tap Screen and gave a quick sigh before looking down again.

“Fuckin holy war man, you feelin me dawg?”

John ignored him, filling Tom with rage.

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“Yo!” he said slamming his fist down upon Johns desk shaking everything on it.

John rolled his eyes up at his brother who pulled out an over sized blunt cigar packed tightly with weed. He lit it with a quick flip of his Zippo while eyeing his brother back.

“Ahh, you hearin me now, dawg?”

“Stop talking like some uneducated nigger. And put that god damn thing out, I have Good Morning Philly coming in two hours for an interview and I don’t want you stinking up my house.”

“Aw fuck you,” he said though he butt it out before continuing. “fuckin

“Aw fuck you,” he said though he butt it out before continuing. “fuckin Rocko dead, motha fucka. Him everybody on his crew, fuckin dead and you busy playin wit yourself on the Thin Screen.”

He pointed at his brother who still sat at his desk but was giving Tom his attention. This was becoming personal for him, something John had warned him about time and time again. But Tom was never one to listen, and if he did, it was with half an ear.

“My fuckin people dying on the fuckin streets yo. This fuckin bullshit, if one of your rich cracker ass cracker friends was gettin greased your ass would be sendin in the fuckin SWAT team yo. You don’t give a shit about our peeps,that ain’t fair nigga, shit that’s ice cold, baby brother.” he said shaking his head.

John gave a slight nod at Toms speech before he spoke.

“And I warned you, did I not? You as well as I saw what she could do, but still you wanted to attack when we still knew very little about our opponent.”

He made a tsk tsk sound as he stood up and approached his twin.

“You go to fight an enemy whose power is still unknown and piss and moan about how unfair it is your useless fucking friends were massacred.”

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He stood nose to nose with his brother, Tom’s rage was like balloon it would fill quickly and pop even quicker. John’s rage was like the bidding of a volcano that was usually dormant, and rarely needed to blow, though Tom felt he had edged close to an eruption just now.

Tom felt he had edged close to an eruption just now.

“You will not, I repeat, you will not send out another one of your half nigger goon squads again, not for anything, I don’t care if she raped one of your cell mates, am I making myself clear? This isn’t the god damn wild west, perhaps this should serve as a reminder about the company you keep.”

He spoke with a controlled fury, still nose to nose with Tom, who slowly stepped back from him with a flop of his arms. He sat on the leather wing back in front of the desk and roughly put his feet on John’s desk, he fingered his blunt but didn’t light it.

“So we do nothin then?” Tom asked looking at his cigar.

“First you learn patience. Second we find out who she is, where she lays her head at night.”

Tom sighed lightly as John rummaged in his desk drawer.

“We’ll find her, instead of trying to draw her out.”

Tom shook his head in negation, he was battle ready and his blood was boiling.

“Shit, how the fuck long that take?”

John smiled and laughed lightly as he removed a gold butane lighter from the drawer and clicked it on.

the drawer and clicked it on.

“We’ll use the police to track her down,” he said lighting his brothers blunt. “when we know what we’re up against, then we move. Agreed?”

Tom toked on the blunt and nodded.

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“Good, now open a window or get out.” he said lightly making Tom laugh though he did leave a few minutes later.

John sat back down at his desk as the night crept towards dawn. The witch, as some had been calling her, was brutally murdering people. No one, not even the police understood the randomness of her victims. John how ever knew what was driving this witch or what ever she might be.

Nearly everyone she had killed was in some way a sexual deviant. The pimp with the green car, John had checked his rap sheet and word through the neighborhood was he had a heavy hand with his girls. The ugly blond that got the Louisville enema had been arrested for sexual battery and statutory rape a couple of times. The burly guy who was a big shot with the TL, calling him a deviant would have been an understatement.

The cops had gone in the trunk of his car and found the kind of cutting tools you didn’t see outside of a butchers shop. John had that kept under wraps, the TL was always eager to protect its own. Everything fit a pattern for the most part.

He knew she had been at a Liberty Pharmaceutical office, meaning she had to have been a patient at some point. Something they gave her changed her, they had video of her but her image was mostly distorted so

changed her, they had video of her but her image was mostly distorted so positive ID was impossible. She came there for answers but got none.

She haunted the neighborhood like a nightmare, hiding in the shadows and under the broken street lights where only the rats would scurry. Then she left the neighborhood, and destroyed the Byberry orphanage. That had perplexed him.

He turned in his chair away from his desk and down onto the city below as the sky grew lighter. She hit the Byberry, why? It was obvious because the place was a kiddie factory for pederasts. But why got all the way to the Byberry facility up in the boonies?

The Byberry took the over flow from the other facilities, two of which were down town. She didn’t hit those, why? It was personal, she had someone steal a vehicle, drive her up there then killed him and threw his body into a stream. The police had deduced that when one of the officers at the scene recognized him from an arrest the prior year for car theft. The video camera at the edge of the drive showed only static.

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Another camera above the security booth showed the on duty guard ogling a skin mag before the video distorts again for a minute, when the video clear there is only a body. She stole a ride for the kids and destroyed the whole place, why go to all that trouble? It dawned on him so suddenly he sat up with wide eyes at how long it took him to figure it out. She had resided there, if she had then her name would be in the system.

He picked up his cellular and made a call to his personal sectary Lulu who was always available at any time and was one those in his inner

circle. She had been with him since the eighties and kept all his affairs and such on an even keel.

“I need a list of every kid admitted to the Byberry for the last decade.”

“Right away, Mr Noah.” she said brightly despite it being and hour before sun rise.

She called a few minutes later, not as chipper.

“I’m sorry, Mr Noah. The fire destroyed all the records.”

“Fuck,” he said before apologizing for his vulgarity and hanging up.

He put his cellular on his desk and turned back to watch the city wake up, when his cellular rang again. It was Lulu.

“You’re gonna love me when you hear this.” she said before he could speak.

And he did love her when she told him that a month before the fire all the records had been transferred to the city’s intranet to save on space and money.

“Lulu, thank you, I’m going to text you a number to forward those records to. And by the way I love you.” he said before hanging up.

The number was a police detective from the ninth district that was heavily in debt to his brother. It was ten minutes after he hung up with Lulu when Detective Patrick Veasy called sounding exacerbated.

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“Uh Mr Noah there’s like five thousand names on this list.”

“Well that’s just the Byberry, the next one will have at least double that and you can get started.”

“Oh, but I have vacation coming and my wife...” he said in high voice.

“Come now, Veasy, this is easy basic detective for a pig with a badge.

Show some enthusiasm, I need you to cross reference all the names on those lists. If any names match you are to contact me directly, not my brother, not my secretary, only me. Is that clear, Detective?”

“Yes, yes, of course, sir only you.”

“Very good, and you better hold off on that vacation, Detective. I may need further assistance.”

“Yes, sir.” he said weakly.

John smiled as he imagined the cop deflate as he said it.

“Oh and Detective Veasy,”

“Yes, sir?” he asked in a nervous voice.

“Yes, sir?” he asked in a nervous voice.

“I don’t want to wait all day, get it done quickly.” he said and hung up before Veasy could say anything.

It was an easy morning though it felt endless to John, the interview was at 7 AM but the crew had arrived at six to set up. Other than a cameraman that scratched the hard wood floor, whom Lulu scolded John was pleased to see, the interview was a cake walk and went off with out a hitch. He had a meeting with a his security team at Black Beards and enjoyed a late breakfast in the restaurant at the casino that employed a team of French chefs.

He had another meeting downtown with a few members of the city council that he didn’t have

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under his thumb, yet, about ordinance nonsense which took up the rest of his morning. He was the picture of calm, but inside he was anxious. This woman held a power that was other worldly, and he craved to harness it.

Liberty Pharmaceutical was his bread and butter, he found the best chemists and doctors in the world to work for his company and create the wonder drugs the company was famous for. And now they had apparently made a drug where wonder was an understatement.

His driver Louie was taking him back to his Townhouse when he received a text from the detective with a name: Nancy Darrow. An hour later in his office he sat at his desk looking over a file rushed across the city by a courier from an office that handled all of Liberty Pharmaceuticals paper work. It had only scant information about her but it had an address and he called Veasy who promptly sent an unmarked to find a hole near the apartment and crawl into it with both eyes open.

He looked over her medical history and saw a half dozen digital pictures included that showed what was called Hidradenitis Suppurativa. He knew very little of the disease but from the pictures and the information taken by a nurse it was extremely debilitating. The nurse made a note that she was dependent on a cane as well.

And her face was mauled by it as well as the hair that grew on her head.

There was only two clear pictures of the witch and her face didn’t appear scarred and her eyes were green where as the pictures taken by the nurse showed blue eyes. The attack on the Washington ave location was the day after she visited, the medicine they had given her was one of the newer ones that were still in the experimental phase and had only a its code number on the capsule.

The biotic wasn’t even the best they had made according to Dr Fischer, whom John had consulted with when he found out the meds she had been given. He sounded ancient when he had spoken to him on the phone, he still had a noticeable accent which was made creepier by his scratchy voice, he reminded John of the old man that looked like the doctor from that German snuff film DR Caligula or some name similar to that.

The fact he was an old German man didn’t help with that impression, he had worked for Nazi Imperialists during WW2, trying to create new kinds of medicines for the military by experimenting on humans in the concentration and POW camps. He must of had a lot of successes because after the war he was given immunity and worked for the Feds for twenty years before going into the private sector.

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He had already been with Liberty Pharmaceutical for a few years when John became the companies anonymous head. The doctor was one of

the few people at Liberty Pharmaceutical that knew who payed the salary. Fischer’s advice was to capture her, he had been adamant.

“You must,” he hissed “acquire a live specimen.”

“Can’t we do more trials with the biotic?”

He barked a dry, scratchy chuckle before answering.

“American’s and your haste. There is no more need for trials until I know why this hexe has been affected.”

“Hexe?”

“A witch as you called her. Perhaps she has eaten children to keep her strong, eh. She has green eyes, will her hair and skin be green as well I wonder.” he said with a laugh that made John think of a sandstorm.

He pushed the contact button on his cellular and called back Detective Veasy.

“Talk to me Detective.”

“There’s an empty row home just across the street from the suspects apartment on the second floor. I’ll have two guys watching around the clock, do you want me to have an unmarked around the block to follow in case she leaves?”

“No, not at the moment. I want you to watch and wait, unless she’s got her bags packed stay put.”

“Yes, Mr Noah, stay put, I read you.”

John ended the call and had Lulu order lunch from a sandwich shop called Gooey Louie’s and

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made a few conference calls in between a six inch cheese steak and a large RC when Lulu brought in a small brown package sent from Fischer’s office. Inside the small brown box was an intravenous injection gun, wrapped tight in thick bubble wrap, with a large plastic vile attached to its undercarriage. There was also a note accompanying the box.

‘Thorazine, careful she doesn’t cast a spell on you before you knock her out’

Dr. F’

John was still in his office as the stars blossomed in the sky while he and Tom discussed the situation about the witch.

“You ain’t gonna put a cap in her unholy snatch?” he asked disgusted as he sat on top of his brothers desk.

John leaned back as the last of the red sun light washed the shoulder of his suit in crimson. He explained the idea again and the reason.

“Shit man, you got to be kiddin me. You need to burn her witchy ass at

“Shit man, you got to be kiddin me. You need to burn her witchy ass at the fuckin stake. Shit momma would roll in her fuckin grave you fuckin wit a devil bitch.” he said though with less animosity.

“And I should what? Destroy half the neighborhood trying to kill her? That would be killing the golden goose. She’ll be an asset to us...”

“to you maybe...” Tom interrupted but John held his hand up and continued.

“..to us. Could you imagine if we had her ten years ago? She would have made cleaning up West Philly a lot smoother.”

“So you what, gonna give her a motha fuckin job?! Nigga I got a homies...”

“I don’t need some half educated fool who sells his sisters ass for crack to work for me.”

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“Uh huh, well lemme ask you this, what if she don’t want your fuckin job.”

“I’ll show her it will be in her best interests. However my only interest is the blood that flows in her veins.”

“Shit,” Tom said shaking his head. “an I just sit here with my dick in my hand.”

“I will require your assistance.” John said taking the injection gun out of a drawer and sliding it across his desk.

Tom picked up the gun that looked like a toy with it’s white plastic handle and red foam on its pistol grip. John approached his brother and put a hand on his shoulder.

“I know she killed friends, Tom, that’s why I want you to put her to sleep.

Because you know how important this is for us, and that you’ll take care to do it right this time. And you’ll have a SWAT team escorting you.”

“So we go in blazing with nothin buy a fuckin water gun, am I supposed to thank your ass?”

“They’ll all be armed, however you are to stress to them they are to use live fire as a last resort.”

“Yeah,” Tom said lightly.

“Alive, Tom.” he said grabbing his arm. “I need her alive.”

As the sun rose over the city, a pair of plain clothes officers sat in on the second floor of an empty apartment in the master bedroom across the street from the witch’s apartment. It was humid the whole night and the day didn’t look to be any cooler as the sun took its place in the sky.

They left a curtain partly opened as they sat behind it looking down at the front door to the duplex. They kept an eye on the upstairs windows looking for a light or shadow movement but the shades were down so they watched the door.

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“Jesus fuck it’s hot,” said officer Amish. “shoulda picked up a fan or somethin.”

“Ah ya pussy.” said officer Bilby comfortably. “Sides, Veasy said keep on the down low. Me I love the summer, ninety in the shade.”

“Fuck that shit, I’m all for winter.”

“Your lucky you don’t freeze your ass off at them Yellow Jackets games.”

“Sting, Jackets Sting,” said Amish proudly.

“Ya know I read once they almost changed there name to the eagles.”

“Eagles?” asked Amish. “That’s a stupid friggin name eagles are dumb animals.”

“I don’t know, I saw on mytube an eagle eatin a fuckin cat. No shit a fuckin cat.”

“Nah, Yellow Jackets a better name. Those suckers are mean, gettin stung by one a them hurts like a bitch. You know how many people are killed every year from Yellow Jackets?”

“How many?” asked Bilby.

“Fuck if I know, but I had a baby cousin get stung by one an she went

“Fuck if I know, but I had a baby cousin get stung by one an she went into a fuckin coma for three days. Besides when the fuck you ever see a god damn eagle in Philly?”

“Shut up, shut up, someones coming out!” said Bilby excitedly.

Amish pulled out his tap screen as the hooded figure exited the door. He looked to the picture on his cellular and recognized her.

“Do we tail her?” asked Amish.

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“No, Veasy said to keep him updated and stay put. It’s too fuckin hot and I ain’t gonna lose sleep if she never comes back.”

Galadriel was in last of the dying sun light shining through a window while lying in her bed. She felt lost again and slightly afraid. She hadn’t been outside since the night a group of men tried to kill her. She had approached the weakling that was crying, his face was familiar but she couldn’t be sure if or when she ever saw him before.

His apology had enraged her so much she crushed his skull. It wasn’t until later she realized it was some kind of trap, she could have easily found out from him but had been over flowing with too much fury to think straight. The other men were not weak, they were armed and had beaten a woman to draw her in.

She would have to stay inside for a while. Some of the people she had killed could have been serious criminals with dangerous friends. The Italian mob maybe, two of the men looked Italian and sounded like wise guys. She had no idea, she didn’t even have an idea of what she really was, her enemies saw her as a witch.

was, her enemies saw her as a witch.

“Double double, toil and trouble,” she said playing with one of her bangs.

Was she a witch? An actual witch. She got out of bed and went into the living room and sat in front of her thin screen with keypad in hand and searched the deep net for witches. Most of what she found though was useless, books written by male members of different churches associated with Catholicism.

She did another search using the terms real witches. Most of the results were of the war against witches in Salem, followed by other battles fought for religious liberty against the unchristian. She refined her search term again, this time including Philadelphia in the search.

Many results appeared most just supplement pieces, she sifted quickly through them and found a trio of articles on the deep net about a witchcraft trial in the 70‘s. The first article was from 79 about an occult shop that was being closed by the city for violating federal and local law as a a peddler of unchristian values. There was a picture of a store with a hanging sign that said Harry’s Occult. Taped to the store front window was a large official looking document with the TL logo and the city’s emblem across from it, below these was some writing that was too small for her to read.

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Another picture on the site showed an elderly man being led away in handcuffs, behind him was a middle aged woman. Her eyes were glossed with tears she had a hand placed over her mouth, Galadriel could still see the points in her chin from the frown she was covering. Below the picture was a caption that said:

‘Alan Finnegan, proprietor, is led away by police, behind him is his

‘Alan Finnegan, proprietor, is led away by police, behind him is his daughter Marcia Finnegan.’

The second was a follow up from 1980 following his execution for not renouncing his faith and charges being brought up against Marcia Finnegan for the same charge as well as practicing witchcraft. The last story wasn’t dated but the picture showing Marcia Finnegan didn’t look any older, she was coming out of a building being escorted by a narrow faced woman with a TL armband on her left and a police officer on her right, Finnegan’s eyes looked empty. The article said Ms Finnegan had given up herself up to Jesus and would be closing the story.

The article said she had spent six months in prison for making slanderous remarks about the Catholic Church and for practicing witchcraft, without recanting she would have been given death, the articles author stated. One of the TL members involved with case in some way had been quoted in the article when asked if it was safe for her to be back in society.

‘When we first brought her in, she said all kinds of blasphemous things, sayin she could see and hear things people were thinking, and all kinds of other nonsense. But she renounced and swore on a bible accepting Jesus as her Lord and Savior and the laws the law so she’s free to go.’

The third article was dated 1988 but had no mention of witches or anything regarding the subject. It was for a flower expo that was being held at the Reading Terminal Market downtown. The article was about the flower shops that would be participating in the annual event and had talked to a few people participating. She scanned the article and saw why the article had appeared.

‘Many of the owners here are excited to show off their best stuff, my favorite bouquet this years was a sunrise splendor of peach colored roses presented by a small shop called Finnegan’s Flowers located at

roses presented by a small shop called Finnegan’s Flowers located at 1238 South street.’

Galadriel put down the keypad slowly after she reread the second article.

She could see and hear things people were thinking. A witch that had a power like her own. South street wasn’t far, but it was past dark now and the store was probably closed.

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She went back to bed and laid down, deciding to wait until morning.

Sleep was a long time coming, she kept trying to imagine meeting another witch tossing and turning as the night wore on. Eventually sleep claimed her racing mind, she heard the dream lyrics again and the sad sweet twang of the guitar.

‘Got you where I want you’

She awoke startled thinking the song was playing on the radio player but it was playing some odd German techno song called Das Fukken. She stayed awake until the sun rose with the radio player still on hoping that song might play but it didn’t because it only existed in her dreams.

South street was less than a mile and Galadriel walked it quickly as the sun broke open its light upon the sky and city below. She turned down South street walking along Twelfth when she realized the flower shop had once been Harry’s Occult shop, the hanging sign was different as was its display but she immediately recognized the brickwork. She stopped for a moment worried.

What if she really had renounced her faith, what if she was a TL

informant now since she had to plead her way out of jail. The sign on the glass door said closed, though judging by the fresh flower in the window

glass door said closed, though judging by the fresh flower in the window it was still in business. Perhaps the TL have been helping her with customers since she was probably one of them now.

Still, I should wait and see, she thought. Answers weren’t going to come on their own. Across the street, adjacent to the flower shop was a trio of burned out husks of row homes that were nothing but shadows in the corners. Galadriel looked around as she went into the left most house where a wide corner of a red brick wall that was diagonal to the former doorway stood under a partial roof, no cars or people were coming.

The remnants of the hard wood floor creaked and snapped as she retreated into a corner, waiting for the Finnegan woman to arrive. She had no watch but was in no hurry. It was only ten minutes later when a woman turned a corner heading towards the shop with keys in her hand.

It was Marcia Finnegan, her hair was long and straight, she had it tied back with a braided piece of raw hide. She was slimmer than in the picture and her face was worn with frown lines and wrinkles, her eyes were forlorn and tired. Galadriel had decided if the woman had a TL

armband she would leave, the woman had no armband nor was she dressed in their blue and white garb but instead in a long denim skirt and shirt that was swirled and spotted with many colors.

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Galadriel walked slowly a few feet further out to see her better, although she made no sound the woman looked across the street as she unlocked the door to her shop. Her breath caught when Finnegan looked over, but her look was brief and unconcerned, Galadriel sighed. She wasn’t sure why she had become so nervous when she looked, but it had unsettled her.

She walked back into the darkness, and although the sun rose high and bright she was a shadow among shadows. The flower shop had sporadic customers, none were TL, perhaps she wasn’t actually apart of their

customers, none were TL, perhaps she wasn’t actually apart of their group. Or maybe she pretends so she can draw in people and rat on them.

She still was ignorant of what colors she kept seeing around people actually meant. A search on the Deep Net had limited information about, though she had learned what she was seeing were called auras. If she could see and hear peoples thoughts then surely she would know about the auras.

Hours passed, people came and went, cars honked their horns, buses droned past Finnegan’s every fifteen to twenty minutes. In the late afternoon she sat on a section of a staircase that was on its side near the window broken and black from some long ago fire. She still worried about the TL and felt her heart race with trepidation at approaching her.

The police could be looking for her, she didn’t get the newspaper or look at the news on the Intranet that Paul had called sometimes yellow news.

There had to be camera at the Washington avenue plaza that had seen what she did, the Byberry most definitely would since it was government property.

Those had been the main line in her thoughts as the sun westered, the heat was still building as dense gray clouds built up behind it, plump with rain. When the last of the orange light left the sky the sign on the shop door turned to closed. Galadriel had decided against going in and was about to leave when the door had opened.

She thought the woman was taking out garbage but was empty handed, it was then she realized the woman was crossing the street and walking to the house she hid in. Galadriel held her breath as the woman stood just outside the crumbling doorway, she had a smile that was kind and inviting.

inviting.

“Perhaps you would like some ice tea, I just made some.” she said as if asking a neighbor or friend.

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Galadriel froze unsure if it was a trick of her own mind, but knew it wasn’t the case. She kept her hood up and came out of the dark and into the light of a arc sodium street lamp.

“You knew I was in there?”

“Your thoughts are loud. Please come in and have some tea, I have no allegiance to the TL.” she said gesturing towards the shop.

Galadriel still held some apprehension, she realized she could go into her mind and pry out any secrets with easy brutal force and break her body.

Have I really come to such a pass, she thought morosely. Perhaps but the Finnegan womans lovely care worn face and her parched throat were too much to ignore.

“You can call me Marcia.” she said as they went inside the flower shop.

Galadriel walked inside and was greeted by the sweet smell Magnolias and Lilac. The shop was small but homey with a counter and sink in the middle of the floor that had a variety of vases sitting upside down in a dish drainer besides the sink. On the counter was a carpet of silky petals of many colors dominated by green from various stems and leaves clipped from flowers.

Along the walls were double shelves brightened with yellow track lights lined on the ceiling above, most of the shelves were empty but some held artificial bouquets as well as a few real ones, with laminated index cards attached to the vase, bearing the names of the flowers used in the arrangement. The smell of the flowers eased her racing heart and mind.

They walked to the back were a door stood partly open, yellow light and the scent of mint greeted her as they went through.

It was a sitting room with real wood paneled walls adorned with sporadic pictures. In the corner of the room was another sink and counter where a pair of glasses that sat condensing on a plastic tray, filled with tea and ice. On the ceiling was a fan spinning slowly but the breeze it made felt refreshing compared to the thick humidity hanging in the air outside.

On the right hand side was another table with a trio of mis matched wooden chairs. Marcia gestured for her to sit as she brought over the tray, the ice clinked musically when she sat the tray down. Galadriel sipped and thanked her, trying to figure out how to begin when Marcia spoke first.

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“How did you know who I was?” she asked sipping on her tea.

“I found some news articles about you on the Intranet.”

“Articles?” she asked.

“Yes, one was about Alan Finnegan.”

Marcia nodded but didn’t speak for a few moments, perhaps thinking about the day he had been arrested.

“My father, they had been trying to put him away for years.” she said as her face folded into a deep frown.

“Was he a witch?”

“A high priest, it sounds like a big fancy title but he was just an ordinary man who loved his family and proud of who he was. He refused to renounce even in the end.”

The sadness in her voice was as thick as the humidity outside, they had lapsed into a brief silence, only the gears of the slow moving fan could be heard.

“Could he hear thoughts like you?”

“No, though the gift ran in his family. Do you know about the auras?”

“Yes, if I concentrate. It’s not as difficult as going inside their minds.”

Marcia looked up quickly slightly confused.

“Inside their minds?”

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“Yes.”

Marcia held her drink but did nothing else, looking deep in thought.

Marcia held her drink but did nothing else, looking deep in thought.

“You were born with this strength?”

“No, not exactly like you.”

Galadriel told her a heavily edited version of what had happened, keeping her thoughts more guarded, since she took the biotic, telling her about the people she had killed and how but not about her mother or the sexual assaults she had been victim too. She didn’t know if it was wise and waited for Marcia to become nervous or horrified but she only listened with a neutral face. Marcia got up from her seat and looked at one of the pictures on the wall from some time long ago of her with her father and another man who was closer to Marcia’s age in the picture.

“What is it you think I can do for you?” Marcia asked turning away from the picture.

“To help me with, this...whatever it is,” she said.

“I don’t know that I can. I knew you were special because your thought were loud and clear to me even from far away, but I don’t know of anyone, witch or otherwise, who can do those things which you are capable.”

They lapsed into another silence as a light rain began to spat over the city in weak spurts.

“If you want my advice, you should runaway.”

“Run?” Galadriel said as her eyes flashed greenly with anger. “Why didn’t you fight?

She pulled her hood down revealing her terrible beauty and unnatural hair.

“You are a witch, so why did you not cast a spell? A spell to turn them to pigs or cast their minds

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into darkness. I’ve read about the burning times, the fears the christers have of our kind. Are those fears not warranted?”

“It does not work that way.” she sighed heavily. “Witches don’t turn people to toads or feed them poisonous fruits. We’re children of the earth, nature is our mother we don’t harm others. There is magic but not of the fantastical sort the TL might have you believe.”

Galadriel guffawed a sarcastic laugh, the light cast from the ceiling fan bulbs flickered briefly.

“What use are witches with out magic? Didn’t you want to hurt them, to punish them as they did you?”

Galadriel saw a glimmer of bright images dusted violet of Marcia, young as she was in the articles, her eyes were wide with fright. Another dusty violent image of a dark sack being drawn upon her head by a woman with an armband while another was pushing her down, the third showed a bucket of water pouring over the sack where her face was.

The images had all been frozen, the last however was bright and vivid and moved like a stop motion film. The water gleamed with purple sparkles as the liquid began to slowly fall from the bucket onto her upturned face, a circle from her mouth formed through the sack as water cascaded down. A voice echoed from the memory asking the same question over and over: ‘Do you renounce, witch?’

“Yes, I wanted to hurt them back,” she said looking Galadriel in the eyes.

“I wanted nothing more than to get them back for my father. He gave away medicine when people couldn’t pay. He always told me it was a witches job to heal people to hold all life sacred, he said it was doubly important that a witch remember that because they always got a bad wrap from the christers. I did let go of the anger, and it did take some magic.”

Galadriel leaned in slightly, her interested piqued and asked: “Magic?”

“True love.” she said with a nod.

Galadriel leaned back an laughed an unkind titter that she suddenly cut short.

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“True love?” she asked with smile that was frightening. “Should I let a pig ravage me as I serve him his food in lace. Let him fondle me with his porky hands until I am too old and disgusting and he finds another younger woman to satisfy his hoggish urges. No pig will know my flesh outside his own mind before I rape it. True love is a fairy tale to keep a slave. Nothing more.”

Marcia got up from her seat and removed the picture from the wall that

Marcia got up from her seat and removed the picture from the wall that showed her and her father and the other man. She took it down with both hands and held it close, caressing the glass protecting the picture, were the younger man stood.

“Not all of them are pigs. Some can love you so much they die of a broken heart...” she said with glassy eyes and a lump in her throat.

“Excuse me.” she said and left the room with the picture still in her hands.

Galadriel sat alone in the room, wondering what to do next. Marcia was right, perhaps she should run, but where. Someone had set her up, somebody was looking for her. If it was the mob or someone like that she might be able to survive. But if it was the police or worse yet the TL, they had a better chance of tracking her down than some street thugs.

Galadriel felt a surge of fear that she could be locked up like up Paul and be executed or tortured like Marcia. She rose to leave when Marcia returned minus the picture, her face was puffy from crying but her voice was clear.

“I have something for you.” she said removing her hand from her pocket.

She held her hand open, in her palm was a dull brass key that looked ancient. Galadriel took the key, feeling surprised by its weight.

“What is this for?”

“Outside of the city there is a cabin my father built long ago so we could practice our faith in private when the TL was beginning to harass him.

When my husband and I were young we honeymooned there. No one

When my husband and I were young we honeymooned there. No one knows it exists. If you ever need refuge, there you will be safe.”

“How will I find it?”

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Marcia didn’t speak in words, her mind whispered to her and Galadriel saw it with her mind. She saw a road sign in white that said US-1 N.

Another sign appeared this one was green with white letter that spelled out Tyler State Park 37 mi. Then there was a large wooden sign painted beautifully in ever brightening shades of blue welcoming campers to the park.

On the western most side of the park was a disused hiking trail with a rusty jagged post standing beside the trail that ended were a stream flowed a hundred yards down. Following the flow of the water led you to a dirt road that was 4 miles long heading south surrounded by more forest.

At the end of the road sat a pair of willow trees that had been planted so close together their branches had intertwined into a lattice like roof above a swinging bench tied to a thick branch. Behind the pair of willows was a log cabin of oak.

“Why do you give this to me?”

Before Marcia answered Galadriel looked closely at her, not in her mind but at her. She saw it earlier when she saw her memories of torture but missed it somehow. The purple dusting was not part of Marcia’s memory it was part of Marcia herself.

“You’re sick.”

It wasn’t a question.

It wasn’t a question.

“Cancer. I was diagnosed at the beginning of the year. I accepted it, and I plan on joining my husband and father soon, before the cancer can take me.”

Galadriel caught another mind movie that was tinged with purple at the edges, she saw Marcia driving in a car in the dark. There are no lights but the ones from the front of her car. She is on a road surrounded by trees and tall bushes. The tires rolling over dead branches snapped and crunched loudly like brittle bones in the mouth of a ravenous monster.

The sound is too much to bear in her ears but the sounds cease as the car stops at a clearing that reveals a double sky with a twin pair of moons.

Galadriel is frightened for a moment before she realizes its the sky being reflected by a large body of still water. The car shuts off and Marcia steps out and looks at the water for a long time, the reflected moon is surrounded by swirls of purple. Marcia undresses until she is bare naked, 226 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

the moonlight shines on her skin like a glow as she walks into the water.

As she goes deeper in the water a purple fog begins to shroud over the movie.

They stood by the front door of the shop as the sky spat more rain.

Galadriel felt guilt at the hostility she displayed to Marcia. She saw an image of her own mother and was over come with sadness. She felt selfish at leaving her as she was.

“What will happen to your shop?” she asked not knowing what else to say.

“That is beyond me now. There is an apartment on the second floor, perhaps it will be a home again.”

Marcia looked into her eyes and took her hands in hers.

“I am sorry I don’t have the answers you are seeking, or that I am not what you hoped for. I hope you have no need for the cabin, but for our kind there may be another burning time.”

“Our kind? Am I a witch then?”

“A witch is someone who holds love and life sacred, a child of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water. And they are as flawed as the TL or the government.

They fill themselves with hate and anger, it must be let go.”

Marcia said the last part and gave her hands a slight squeeze before letting go.

“Thank you, Marcia.”

“Blessed be, Galadriel.”

Galadriel walked down the gaping concrete maw of the subway line on steel lined steps. A lone glass booth that normally housed a Septa operator during rush time was empty. Tonight at nearly ten o’clock it was running on the honor system so she hopped the turnstile and proceeded to the tracks below.

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Another set of steel lined steps the lead her down to a platform with a set of tracks on each side of it, hanging above each track were bright orange signs, informing travelers which one was northbound and which one was southbound. The subway was still a place that was to be feared after dark, the newspapers loved to go one about the stabbings, rapes and murders happening in the cities bowels. Tonight the Ellsworth Federal street station was deserted, though the platform was brightly lit.

The only sounds were the scurrying of vermin and the slowly approaching noise of a train. The northbound train arrived empty save for the conductor and Galadriel rode it to the end point in Fern Rock at the northern most part of the city. The station here had people in it despite the late hour, and was lit dimly.

The walls were of white tile, but since its long ago construction the tile was now covered over in layers and layers of graffiti. Even the floors of the platform were adorned with crude drawings of people and slang in a variety of spray paint colors. Trash, mostly cigarette butts and shattered bottles blanketed parts of the floor in uneven heaps.

Galadriel stepped out onto the dim platform looking around for a moment.

At the end of the platform was a wooden bench were four or five young black men sat talking quietly. One stood a broken hoverboard, trying to make it rise, but its hover engine sounded like an old man with emphysema. When she stood in the middle of the platform one of them noticed her and nudged the man sitting beside him who was holding a bottle of homemade malt liquor.

He smiled and got up to talk to her as his companions whispered. He was a few feet away from her, full in the view of his friends when the woman turned her hooded face towards them,her eyes flashed like hot green marbles. The man put his hands up and retreated gracefully back to his friends.

friends.

“My momma always said white woman would be the death of me.”

Galadriel followed a tiled hallway that was black with graffiti and went up a staircase to the city above. The neighborhood was mostly decrepit houses without doors and windows that filled streets lined with trash.

Some streets were blocked off with cars without tires or pieces of furniture.

She passed one street that appeared to have an armed guard, a young black man with a pistol sitting in the waist band of his shorts stood watching as she walked but did not approach or speak 228 ONCE UPON AN ALTERED TIME

to her though she could feel his eyes on her. She walked north for a mile on Broad, the occasional pedestrian walked here and there but never across or along her path.

A car had slowed nearby and crept up close to her, Galadriel glanced a look and the car immediately drove off. She laughed darkly. She continued north until she came to Old York road. The houses along here were sparse and not row homes but were Victorian in style. Most were boarded over and abandoned many years, a few were inhabited still judging by the blue glow coming from some windows.

The houses stopped when she reached an overpass that ran above Route 1. On the opposite side of the overpass was a Time Kill truck stop.

It was close to midnight but the station’s neon sign flashed in bright amber: OPEN 24/7

The station had a pair of fuel pump islands for both gas and diesel

vehicles. As Galadriel walked to the station she saw five large diesel long haulers, three were parked parallel to each other, cabs empty while the other two were currently filling their tanks. Galadriel walked quietly towards the rear of the truck closest to her listening to the drivers thoughts for a direction he was heading when she heard him speak aloud, she held her breath.

“You headed north again, Fred?”

The voice was far away and she released her breath slowly.

“Yeah, and takin my time too. I gotta take this big bastard all the way past Tyler state park then turn this fuckin thing down 532 to Churchville.”

“The fuck ya haulin up there?”

“Some rich asshole cut down a bunch of Brazilian Redwood to build some fuckin thing, the roads shit, so I got to take my time, least I’m getting overtime.”

Galadriel peeked unsure which driver was which, though a glimpse at the truck beside her was hauling a flat bed with a score of logs the color of sunset. She waited for the drivers to get into their cabs, when they finally did she quickly got behind the truck hauling the wood in a pair of triangles that were covered over by a hastily strapped blue tarp.

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It wouldn’t protect the wood from rain but it did nicely for hiding in darkness. The truck’s diesel engine roared as she sat against mighty logs that were a rich red and huge and put her in mind of Tolkien’s Ents. They went under the overpass and the over head lights of the road became

fewer and fewer, Galadriel sat towards the end of the truck keeping an eye out for the state park when the city was behind them.

After an hour of ever thickening trees for scenery the truck slowed down and began to turn eastward. Looking out Galadriel saw the sign for the park just a dozen yards behind them that was awash with lights from a quartet of mini spotlights. The turn was slow enough that she jumped down easily and walked along the trees unseen by the trucker who was too focused on his front tires at the moment.

She came to the entrance of the park that had no booths and a horse gate chained shut to prevent entry. She easily climbed over and walked into the blackness, following Orion’s belt in the west making her way through the woodland easily despite the dark. She walked for an hour until the ground began to incline and stopped among the woods in total darkness.

All was pitch black, animals hooted in the trees above and trundled on forest ground all around her. She pictured a great light in her head, bright and green and fiery. She opened her eyes and a magnificent light poured out, making the grass at her feet look radioactive. She looked slowly back and forth until she saw the jagged post.

The light faded from her eyes as she ascended the hiking trail, in the distance she could hear the lazy chuckle of the stream. Its mild chatter grew as she approached it, a scrim of the moon reflected weakly in the stream that was five or six feet wide. She followed the stream walking along it as it began to narrow to just a foot across before she saw signs of a road on the other side of the stream.

There was grass and weeds growing over it, but the tell tale signs of vehicles driving over it once upon a time could still be identified. She stepped over the water and walked upon the road during the darkest part

stepped over the water and walked upon the road during the darkest part of the night, only the stars and the setting moon giving light. The road went ever upwards into the forest for the better part of the walk. When the sky edged closer to dawn, she could see the white faces of mountain laurels greeting her, she smiled and caressed a flower as she passed by.

The road finally leveled out at a pair trees with branches curled and twisted about each other like many arms coated in green hair. She walked under the willows and saw the cabin sitting on a grassy hearth. Its walls were seven feet tall, three large logs of oak laid on their sides, the roof

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was arched slightly upwards meeting at the middle in a low pyramid. In the middle of the wall was a squat chimney made of stacked stones and mortar.

She walked by the stone chimney and turned a corner to find a window hidden behind a pair of wooden clap board shutter gray and slightly warped and split from many seasons of rain and snow. They could only be opened from the inside, she turned the next corner and found the door.

She stood in front of the door looking at a symbol graved into the wood. It was the pentagram, a five pointed star closed in a circle, it was as simple as the log cabin but was carved with a craftsman’s dedicated hand. The door was affixed with an brass knob attached to a key plate. The sky was bright enough now that she could see the hole for the key she carried in her pocket.

She put the key up to the hole and pushed but it would not go in at first, she crouched down making sure she lined up the key properly. She had but the hole still refused, she pushed the key in a little harder and heard metal scrape against metal followed by the click of the lock accepting the key. She turned it and felt the tumbler disengage the lock with a rusty

key. She turned it and felt the tumbler disengage the lock with a rusty squeal.

She pushed the door and it opened slowly to a dark room. The piddling early morning light showed a shelf in the distance with a cluster of candles of varying sizes and shapes, some just sticks others in glass jars, most partly melted from use. Among the wax forest was a box of wood stove matches.

She took one from the box and struck it on its sandpaper strip and lit two short white candles held in a candle tree and closed the door behind her as she lit a few more candles. The room was

bare on the walls except where the chimney was. Above the maw fireplace where an ancient pile of ashes sat was a mantel, above it hung a tapestry woven by hand that was a pentagram made of white and yellow flowers hung taught. In the corner of the room was a doorway that was covered with a beaded curtain, beyond the curtain was a bedroom where a large bed still sat, she discovered when she removed the large drop cloth covering it.