Chapter 39

[The following chapter contains strong language. Reader caution is advised.]

Wednesday 12th May 1999

More exam revision.

More missing teens.

More monster sightings.

Need I say more?

(I’m going to. Of course I’m going to. There’s more to say.)

The day started off poorly. Lucy proved herself to be an irritant and I barely left the house in time. And as I sulked in form, I had Melody staring at me.

“Can I help you?” I asked with a growl and a glare.

“You can’t even help yourself, so I doubt it.”

Even seeing plainly how agitated I was, she brazenly said that.

“What’s your problem with me?” I spoke more harshly now. “You wouldn’t talk like that to anyone else.”

“Because, Alex, you’re the only person who I can show the real me too,” she reasoned sharply. “You’re a monster just like me.”

“Can we drop the monster thing?”

I looked away from her, hoping to end the conversation there and knowing I wouldn’t have any such luck.

“We both heard Harmony say it. You know you’re a monster.”

“I don’t want you talking about it,” I snarled at her, temper flaring.

“We’re different breeds, you and I,” she carried on regardless, “but we’re still two of a kind. Ever since I figured you out, I’ve only ever shown you the real me. I do it out of respect.”

“You don’t respect me. You treat me like shit.”

“Alex… I’m not trying to be cruel. I’m just being myself. If you don’t like me, that’s fine. But I’m being entirely honest with you about who I am.”

Her eyes seemed weary, as though she were tired of putting on a persona for everyone else. Not that I could trust that that look wasn’t an act. For all her claims that she was showing me the real her, it’s not like I could accept it at face value.

“Great,” I sneered. “I’m so glad you’ve decided to be your real, pain-in-the-arse self with me.”

“One day, you’ll feel the same,” Melody insisted, smiling despite her weariness. “When everyone else has left you, you’ll know you can trust in me. That I’ll accept you for who you really are.”

I had nothing to say to that, and for once, Melody seemed to recognise that the conversation had reached its end; she turned her attention off elsewhere and let her final words hang in the air.

The day didn’t improve from there… admittedly, starting it off so poorly probably made any kind of improvement a practically-vertical uphill battle... Any time I started to feel a little better, something else dug under my skin. It took a considerable amount of effort for me to keep some degree of composure, and even then, I didn’t talk much, in classes or with my friends.

Just after 3pm, we gathered together for the third time that day; and, for the third time that day, I felt out of place amongst my friends and sister. They were all in fair-to-high spirits.

“Hey…” Dakota greeted me while bringing me into a hug. “Feeling any better?”

“I dunno,” I shrugged. “I guess I’ll be fine.”

My girlfriend pulled back a little, giving me a concerned, troubled look.

“I hope so. Maybe just getting to chill with the rest of us will help?”

“Maybe.”

For that, she kissed me. Sympathy, I suppose, since she wasn’t the type to think that would miraculously make me feel fine.

The journey back to Dakota’s was only marginally less uncomfortable than the rest of the day had been. My attention faded in and out, so I didn’t catch much more than snippets of conversation from amongst the others. Lessons and food and TV, nothing I felt I had anything of value to add to. My absence from the chatting was apparently given no notice, validating my dour thinking. I just trundled along behind them and stewed.

“Nah, we should do a movie night!” Kendal spoke loudly, excited. “We each choose one to watch and have a huge marathon!”

“Can I just ask, when you say marathon, you’re not suggesting we run 26 miles on treadmills while we watch, right?”

I could only imagine Zahid was smirking lightly as he said that. No indication from the back of his head.

“Nah, but now you mention it…”

“Sure, you just have to find seven treadmills for this weekend,” Dakota chuckled.

“I wish you weren’t joking,” Kendal giggled back. “I’d try!”

“Harriet could buy seven treadmills, easily,” Bao boasted brazenly, earning him a light slap on the arm from her.

“It’s not like I get £1,000 a week or something…” she whined with gentle tone.

“Are we doing favourites, then?” Lucy piped up. “Mine’s The Lion King, I know all the words to all the songs!”

“Titanic for me,” Harriet swooned.

“Same!”

It all happened so fast that I didn’t even have time to brace for Dakota joyfully saying that. She turned to Harriet, and I saw her bright smile from the side.

“That makes it a little easier, then!” Kendal whooped energetically.

Like a Rube-Goldberg machine, it took a few seconds for the searing impact of Dakota’s words – or rather, the frustration and pain it had caused before – to hit me. And in response, with that igniting the stockpile of emotions I’d already built up, I hit myself. Forehead, four times, hard.

Everyone else stopped, and turned to me, surprised, confused, noticing me for the first time since we’d left school. Only Dakota knew immediately what I’d done, and naturally, her expression was somewhere between surprised, aghast and angry.

“Alex-”

“Fucking leave it,” I snapped back, like a rattlesnake shaking its tail.

Zahid immediately turned back – he probably knew better than to interfere with someone so incensed. Lucy, too, shrugged me off with that, familiar enough with me to know not to bother.

The other four, though, kept looking at me.

“What’s up…?” Kendal spoke first.

“I’m a fucking idiot, that’s what,” I spat furiously, blood boiling, heart racing. Kendal moved back a little.

“Alex, just take a moment,” Dakota instructed. “Listen to me-”

“No, leave me alone!”

Each time, louder; each time, more panicked, more hurt, more uncontrolled.

“Whatever it is, we can talk about it.”

“No, we can’t, unless you all just fucking-”

Except that was my normal self talking. That was the mask which was already beginning to slip off.

“Okay, yeah, fine, let’s talk about it. Let’s talk about how absolutely fucking terrible I am, shall we? Who wants to start?”

“Dude, you’re not terrible, why are you even saying that…?” Bao asked in honest disbelief.

“Yeah, cos you don’t think I’m fucking weird because I don’t want to flail about like a twat at some shitty party.”

“That doesn’t make you terrible…” he told me, looking almost disgusted. Well, that’s how I read the look on his face, the way his brow crumpled.

“Alex,” Dakota spoke loudly before I could respond, “talk to me.”

“No, fuck you!” I shouted at her. “Fuck you and your stupid film that makes you cry like that’s a fucking good thing, and your thinking that I’m a good person because you don’t know who the hell I am!”

She reeled back a little, confused.

“This is about me liking Titanic…?”

“See?! What kind of arsehole has a problem with that?! But it fucking infuriates me because it’s what practically everyone says and I’ve got this stupid idea in my head that you’re different, you’re special, you’re not like anybody else. Because you’re beautiful and perfect and fucking-”

The words jammed in my brain, and I hit myself again, twice.

Dakota lunged forward, grabbing my arms.

“Stop hitting yourself!”

“Why should I?!” I yelled out, writhing against her grasp.

“Because it’s not helping!” she shouted, just before I managed to pull myself away.

“So what?! Why do I deserve help?!”

There it was.

“Why the fuck do any of you care about me, anyway?!”

Like Melody said all that time ago.

“I wouldn’t even be friends with you lot if it wasn’t for Harmony picking us all!”

Now they would see me for who I really was.

“And you’re going out with me and you don’t even know who I am!”

“Don’t you dare!” Dakota roared back at me. “I know exactly who you are!”

Harriet took a step hesitant step forward.

“Alex, just calm down-”

“Shut up! Just shut up and leave me alone!” I screamed out. “Go and do whatever fucking shit you want and forget about me! I’ve had enough of this! I’ve had enough of being like this!”

An urge, an impulse, played in the back of my head. Thinking back on it, it was probably Harmony pushing me forward, but at the time, I was too consumed in my pain to consider that. I reached out slightly with my right hand, bringing my Lokon sword forth from its home in the loft of Dakota’s place; and with a furious swipe of my arm, I brought it in front of my body and willed it to generate my Painter costume.

Dakota took a defensive stance and summoned her spear. It must have looked like I was about to attack. Luckily for them, the only person I really wanted to lash out at was myself.

I spun the sword around in my hand, holding it in reverse grip, and placed my other hand around the first. Arms outstretched, blade angled towards my gut, or a little higher, at my diaphragm.

Again… I don’t know how much of this was really me, and how much of it might have been Harmony interfering with my head. Even if I knew the pain would only last for mere moments, I’m not sure if I could ever inflict it upon myself.

But that’s what I did.

I didn’t even take the time to think it over. I simply thrust the weapon through my body, piercing through the front and running straight out the back; through fabric, skin, flesh, organs, and grazing my spine on the way out.

The sound of Dakota screaming out hit me just before the pain – physical pain, now – burnt through every nerve in my body. My own scream erupted from my throat, and I collapsed to my knees, senses blurring, heartbeat threatening to tear my body apart.

Hazy as my vision was growing, I noticed a pool of neon blue forming around my knees. I think Dakota – maybe the others, too – began to run towards me, but I’m not even sure of that much.

Naturally, the pain disappeared after a moment, and as soon as it did, another sensation took hold of me, something altogether foreign. My spilt blue blood seemed to form a barrier, if not a tower, around me, keeping everyone else out; and my body, overtaken and overwhelmed by the new feeling, completely conceded to it. I shut my eyes tight.

All of my thoughts were on how much of a monster I was, and how I deserved whatever was happening to me. Enough of vilifying everyone in the world because they weren’t like me.

If this was death…

I was terrified.

I didn’t want to die. I just wanted to not be me.

But that was something that could never be changed…

The bubbling sensation through my body subsided like the tide receding, washing out of me. I opened my eyes just in time to see the barrier of blue liquid collapse and retreat back inside of me.

Back inside of… my body.

My transformed, monstrous body.

Bare skin head to toe, almost white if not for an abundant blue undertone, texture undefined, hands and feet ending in razor-sharp talons. The sword had vanished, with only a scar clearly marked into my body indicating it had ever been there.

And this bizarre sight was me. I was inhabiting this form.

It all felt familiar, and it took me a few seconds to register how similar it looked to that very first monster I fought all those months ago. The realisation quickly followed: that monster was based on me. Gangly, wild-haired, hideous. My new form wasn’t a 1:1 match to that entity, but it was enough to make the connection blindingly obvious. The moment I touched the Lokon sword, Harmony had dragged my self-image out of my head and amplified it into a monster for me to fight.

“… Alex…?”

At the sound of Dakota’s scared voice, I slowly looked up at her and the others.

“… there. See? I’m a monster.”

I said only that, and then turned and walked away from them. Away from everything.

I don’t know if anyone went to follow me, or even if they called after me. I certainly wasn’t aware of anything, but somewhere between my emotional state and my new form, I could barely focus on anything but moving.

I walked away and I kept on walking. Lost to my thoughts and my pain, I walked on and on, directionless, wondering what the hell was going to become of me now. My rage quickly crashed into a deep urge to just curl up and cry my eyes out, but I didn’t allow myself to. Tears wound up falling all the same, but I stayed quiet.

Nobody seemed to notice me. No screaming or running. I was invisible to the world.

I wandered further and further, out of town, down quiet tree-shrouded roads and then into the woods. Even surrounded by peace and tranquillity, I didn’t stop moving. I had to get as far away from everything as possible.

I began thinking about what would happen now. Was this what I was now? Had I completely forfeited my life? Had I abandoned my friends and my family forever? … was that the right thing to do, considering who I was…? I didn’t want this, but I probably deserved it.

“Well well well… would you look at that!”

An American accent. A perfect Hollywood accent.

I turned in the direction of the voice – to my right, and upwards – to find a figure sat up in a tree. Like me, they were an off-white monster, gangly and clawed with long hair past their shoulders. While I was hued blue, they were purple.

“And here I thought I was the only one…”

They leapt from their vantage point, landing down gracefully and then reeling upright like a marionette, shoulders slouched and head tilting down as they smiled. I couldn’t tell if they were male or female, or get any sense of age. They were a complete enigma.

“Y’know,” they continued. “A monster.”

It suddenly dawned on me that this was the monster people had spotted recently. Someone just like me, or at least that’s how it seemed.

“In a word,” I nodded back lightly.

“How delightful to meet you…” my fellow monster purred, leaning forward a little with a gaze that seemed to be gobbling me up. “I’m Nightmare. What d’you call yourself?”

… Nightmare. Interesting choice of name.

“I’m Alex-”

“No no no, forget that, forget humanity, forget everything,” I was scolded by the cringing purple-hued being. They almost seemed to shudder at the prospect of my identity. “You’re something new now. Something beautiful. You deserve a new name.”

I pondered that idea. Perhaps they were right, that this was an opportunity to abandon everything – to really let go – and become someone new. Only… that terrified me. Even if I’d thrown it all away, part of me still hoped I could fix it all. That I could go back tomorrow and everything would carry on as normal.

Besides… I didn’t need a new name. This was the real me. It was my inner self fully unveiled. Hideous and dangerous.

“No. My name is Alex Matthews. I’m a monster.”

“You’re boring, is what you are,” Nightmare pouted at me. “And to think, I was gonna make you an offer…”

“Yeah…?” I enquired lightly.

“Nah, I don’t think you’re worth it,” they remarked airily, turning away and waving a hand. “You’re not half the monster I am…”

“Maybe. Maybe you’ve done terrible things. Maybe you’ve killed people.”

They stopped in their tracks.

“If you were going to offer to kill people? Not interested,” I told them. “If all those missing teens are because of you, or even if you’re one of them-”

“Alex, please…” they sighed, turning back to me. “I’m not that kind of monster. Give me… give me an ounce of credit.”

They held up a finger and thumb, an inch apart if that.

“I don’t kill. I do something much, much better. And I’d like to think of myself as principled, but I’m not principled enough to resist getting you involved. I get the feeling you don’t have anywhere to be… or anywhere to go… so why don’t you come with me?”

They flashed me a sharp-toothed grin, and then gestured with their head before again turning to leave. I watched my new monstrous kin head off through the trees, and considered my options. If it was wandering aimlessly for the rest of my life, or joining Nightmare… the choice was obvious.

I began the first step of a new journey.