Death Dreams Dire Wolves: Part Six

Chapter Eleven: Fountain

Manzer thrashes around in the water, fighting for dear life against whatever it is that has a hold of his angle and doesn't not seem to want to let him go. The grip is so strong that Manzer can almost feel the circulation in his ankle being cut off as the icy fingers of this thing pull with full force. The current created of him being pulled is a strong one and the confusion it creates as it yanks Manzer around makes it almost impossible to fight back.

Manzer looks Down at his ankle as he tries to make sense of what is going on, and through the clouds of hair and darkness Manzer can make out the decayed face of a young woman. She has no eyes where her eyes should be, only black holes that stare deep into the very center of Manzers fears.

Drowning was never something Manzer was hoping to experience. But the way things look, it seems Manzer is about to meet his end and the hands of some sort of supernatural force here to drag him to an abyss of deep water.

Just as it seems Manzers lungs are about to collapse, and all the world is going dark, the face below him says something he can't quite make out. Mouthing a word that seems distorted by the harsh nature of the water. As the world blacks out Something inside Manzer comes to life, something powerful. So powerful in fact that it allows Manzer to fight back. Manzer looks down at the ghoul Grabbing his ankle, and just with the sternness of his stair, the spirit seems almost broken by horror. Manzer can feel it let go of his leg, and say the words. "It wasn't you."

As soon as his leg is released Mnazer Begins to swim towards the nearest light. Following the path of the bubbles he makes as he gains distance from the Dark Creature at the bottom of a watery grave. As he finally reaches the surface he grabs into something solid. It is not the surface of a rock but something smoother, glazed. It is difficult to pull himself out being that the surface of whatever it is is so slippery, but despite this Manzer is able to muster enough strength to pull himself to the surface of the water, and finally break free from the dark.

The world around him is bright, well let and full of the thing Manzer needs most at the moment, which is air. He takes a long heavy gasp as he finally reaches the outside world, pulling himself out of the water as fast as he can and falling over a short ledge onto his side.

After Getting some air in his lungs Manzer looks around trying to find out where exactly he is. And in doing so, he realizes that he has just crawled out of the shallow Fountain in the Middle of the Mall.

Manzer tries to catch his breath as he puts his back against the cold wet colored tapestry tiles of the mall fountain. The turmoil of recovering from the state of shock keeps him under a heavy pressure of mental aptitude and disbelief as he still struggles to understand the deeper implication of the well lit world around him, and its stout difference in shape and form from the thick forest he was sitting in. The concept of being pulled through some dark place of deep shadows and watery graves is a mind shattering one, as the actualization of his greatest fears comes to clash with a lifelong pursuit of understanding the intricate nature of science. For some time Manzer knew that what just happened was impossible, but in light of recent mind altering events and knowledge, he began to carefully consider that what he saw and felt may have just been a deep state of delusion, made to objectify his forgetfulness of time and place.

Everything in Manzers head now begins to make sense in a conventional sense of theory; but not in a way that keeps his stomach from truing about the tarnished steel resolve of a once smart young man now coming to the realization that he may in fact be losing his mind. The heavy exception of reality is a tragic one, tempered in the rust proof galvanizing duality of who he really is as a person. The fact is heavy on his shoulders, but all things still seem to balance on the apex of a prodding fact placed at blind spot of a search light that can never see itself in its own reflection.

A gnawing presence of uncertainty that would stand to voice the concern of the intrepid argument of the latter as Manzer considers the evidence, at first it seems to take the presence of something relative to a scratch you give yourself while sleeping, but as things soak into the concerning inkblots of a mind trying to make sense of the confusion, one presence becomes very clear in its cold depth of very real pain.

Manzer then looks down at his ankle, examining the tenderness and sensitivity of its awareness. Although his feet still hurt in concept, the attack made against his ankle becomes something of a more drastic presence. Pulling up his pant leg, Manzer looks at the ever growing discomfort of a very serious wound, taking the shape of a human hand print sunk so deep into his flesh that it is now bleeding.

The hand print matches all things relative to his episode, and the handprint on his ankle is much larger than his own and in a position that would be impossible for him to manage, even if he were to twist his hand. (It is very difficult to grab one's own shin from the front with upturned fingers.)

As Manzer thinks and calculates the possibilities. He can feel someone's eyes looking at him from the courtyard from under a pink head of hair.

"Hey, kid you okay". Says Beatrice as she looks at Manzer with an expression due diligent concerned confusion.

"I....." Says manzers as he tries to cover up the blood on his ankle. "Yeah, just cooling off." He responds.

Beatrice gets closer and examines Manzers state of being drenched from head to toe. "Diving for quarters? I think the arcade operates on credits now so kids would stop doing that."

"Arcade? Nah, just a long day is all."

"Right.... Hey aren't you supposed to be at school?" Beatrice says as she notices the red on Manzers ankle. "Hey are you alright?"

"Oh, yeah just a skate accident. I'll be fine."

"Oh yeah, the gnare demands sacrifice to get it. But, you should at least let me get you a bandaid; and, hey where are shoes?"

"Oh uh, I must have left them... Somewhere."

"Yeah, Right... Hey, my reputation with the cops is as bad as it is already. If you're in some type of trouble, I have to call the cops or I'll get into trouble too."

"No I am not in any trouble, school got canceled today."

"Canceled? Why?"

"Something about some dead body some kids found, I think it's just a prank or something. Kids trying to get out of school."

"Dead Body?" Beatrice says as she looks manzer up and down. Hey where is your skateboard?"

"My board."

"Yeah."

"I uh....." Manzer is at a loss. Beatrice knows all the questions to ask and isn't backing down. "I left it somewhere.

"Okay... I think I know what is going on. Come with me." Beatrice says as she holds out her hand.

Manzer is hesitant to reach out to her, but something in her eyes makes her seem like she knows more than she is letting on. Considering what Manzer just heard sister Therin talking about, and Beatrice's admitted past, things might not be all that they seem; but Manzer has few friends and not many places to go.

Manzer reaches out his hand and grabs onto hers, and almost immediately he feels safer than he did just a few minutes ago.

Chapter Twelve: Burden

Manzer is introduced to the back room of Beatrice's shop. A place that is in no way shape or form subtle in its decor for the recognition of the intrinsically strange or weird or even; creepy. The shop is a cavalcade of other worldly and seemingly almost supernatural things that play tricks on the very sense of one's understanding of normality.

As Manzer was walk’d through the shop trying to avoid putting too much burden on his injured feet and ankle, it was explained to him that a number of the objects and oddities in this shop of strange collectors items are more than a few hundred years old. The oldest thing being. Mirror covered in a thick felt blanket, said to be one of the oldest mirrors ever made.

Niw manzer is in the back room away from prying eyes of the mall security and the passer byes who may gawk at the scene of intimate vulnerability.

Beatrice has Manzer sitting on top of a counter made to wrap or bag some of the smaller objects in the store. As odd as it is that some of these trinkets and grimms keep sakes would ever be considered a proper gift for anyone, the idea isn't to foreign to Beatrice considering that she sees a good number of things being sold in the store.

"A lot of people are really superstitious," Shes says while putting the proper disinfectant on Manzers leg and feet. "Seems like alot of people around here always have some ritual or oddity that they are interested in acquiring. Most of the stuff we sell is done through a non disclosed auction, or a secret website."

"Yeah, I would imagine a lot of people would not want a lot of people to know about a monkey's paw collection, or jar with a brain in it." Manzer says as he winces through the pain.

"No, not many people would." With Manzers wound all cleaned up, Beatrice is able to get a good look at the wounds. "Man kid what happened, Did you get attacked by a water ghost?"

"A, what? No, of course not ghosts aren't real... Right?"

"We get a lot of supernatural catalogues that come through the store. You see a lot of wounds like this in them, like people have been freezer burned, and this looks like..."

"No, no way. Can't be, I mean, a branch just hit my leg pretty hard is all." Manzer says, trying to make up for his panic.

"Are you sure? Because-"

"I am sure. Okay. Ghosts aren't real. They are just fairy tales an camp stories."

"Then, where are your shoes?"Beatrice asks, giving Manzer a raised eyebrow of discernment.

"Left um in the bushes."

"By the fountain?"

"Where else?" Manzer says looking for anything else to put his attention on.

"You know kid, you are a pretty good liar. But you do not have to lie to me. Trust me."

"Trust? Why should I trust anything? For all I know this is all just some hazing prank everyone puts the freshmen through. Yeah I bet the psych ward at the hospital is even in on this right? Town tradition?"

"It's not funny to joke about those places in Manzer. It's okay to believe in things that are a little- extra ordinary. I mean look at this place. It's not going out of business any time soon."

"Yeah sure, and diamonds are forever right?"

"Well aren't they?"

"No, they aren't." Manzer says as he collaborates on a simple fact.

"Well kid, whatever it is that you did to your leg, it seems to be healing rather quickly, and your feet are too. I mean, the blisters are pretty unnoticeable at this point."

"What? No way?" Manzer looks down at his feet and sees that Beatrice is telling the truth. Manzers feet are quickly healing, almost to the point where the blisters and soreness are completely absent.

"I've never seen anyone heal so fast." You got a pretty good metabolism for a kid so small."

"Ugh. Yeah I guess. I mean, I guess it's just cellular memory from so much skateboarding. I think I read it in a medical book somewhere. Flash healing and stuff."

"Sure, flash healing." Beatrice says as she puts the cap on a bottle of peroxide. She wraps a number of bandages around his ankle.

"Not the weirdest thing I have ever seen. But okay I guess science wins this one." Beatrice begins to put her other supplies away.

Manzer looks around the store at the plethora of oddities and strange statues and objects. As he does some of the objects seem to stare straight back at him with a conciseness of their own, one in particular is a painting of a woman that seems to look directly into the pit of Manzers soul. She is smiling and looks to be crying in this painting.

"What is the strangest thing you've ever seen Beatrice?" Manzer asks as he looks back at a painting that stands as an awful reminder to the frailty to one's own stake in reality.

Beatrice is hesitant to answer, with the consideration of where she works she must have allot to recall and a number of instances to remember, but even as she thinks about what answer to give, she still manages composure in packing up the first aid objects that she just used to bandage Manzers leg in a neat orderly fashion.

"If I tell you. You have to promise never to tell anyone else."

"What, why?" Manzer says as he re-imagines the serious threat to life he just faced, and knowing his question is a little stupid.

"These things are dangerous, Manzer. They don't exactly like knowing they have been talked about, or revealed. If they find out that you know about them, they come after you, and they do not stop until they kill you." Beatrice says as she looks Manzer deep in the eyes from a figurative tower of hurt and secrecy, one of loneliness and suffering.

"Okay, I promise."

"Really, you swear not to tell anyone what I am about to tell you?"

"Yes." Manzer nods.

"Pinky Promise?" Beatrice says holding out an extended pinky.

"What?"

"Pinky Promise, its a thing. A bond. Between two people who share a promise. I learned it from one of these books. If you break your promise then i get to take something from you." Beatrice says with a very serious look on her face.

"Take what?"

"Your Pinky."

"Wait hold on hear I am not about to give you pinky."

"Oh so you like breaking promises then. What are you, a promise breaker?" Beatrice says taunting Manzers intentions.

"N-no of course not. I dont break promises I just, don't make a lot of them is all."

"Well then, this is a good start to a new way of doing things. A pinky promise is a sacred thing. So do not take it lightly."

"You are serious?"

"You have no idea how serious I can be, kid. Take the promise, or never know what I saw."

"Okay okay." Manzer says re-arranging some of the thoughts in his mind. He knows he is gonna need Beatrice help if things like that water ghost plan to keep coming after him. Not to mention; whatever it is that Sister Theron Seems so involved in.

"Fine I- I promise." Manzer says finally into the face of Beatrice's extended pinky.

Beatrice laughs. "No, hold out your pinky." She says, and manzer does so. "Now if you turn out to be some sort of monster, it's a promise you cannot break." She says, linking her pinky with Manzers then shaking her hand like a hand shake. "Promise."

The lights in the room flicker, and things begin to shake. Manzer looks around in panic, and so does beatrice. There is a burst of odd energy in between them and suddenly everything goes dark.