Redlisted (3 page)

What does it mean?

Suddenly the
forest goes silent. Moments later, I hear footsteps approaching in
the distance, accompanied by flickering bursts of flashlight, and,
soon, voices.

“We’re
close,” a woman says.

“How far is
she now?” Adam’s voice, familiar even from hundreds of
feet away. “Is she hurt?”

“I don’t
know,” the woman says.

I pull myself to
my feet and stumble towards them a few paces. I step on the knife,
cutting my foot on the blade. Gritting my teeth, I pull my foot away
from the ground. The knife sticks in my flesh.

Their conversation
continues. “You shouldn’t have revived her, Adam.”
A new voice, also female, but higher in pitch than the first. “I
know you think you did her a favor, but...”

“You have a
right to your opinion,” Adam says.

Slowly, carefully,
I pull the knife out of my foot, provoking a gush of blood. I clutch
it, wincing, and draw my fingers across the incision. It’s not
wide, but it’s deep, penetrating right through the arch.

“I know you
don’t agree with me, but there’s a reason it’s
forbidden,” the girl with the high voice replies. “After
what you did to her, now she’s... stuck in between. I’ve
heard it’s awful.”

“Is it worse
than being dead?”

She doesn’t
respond.

They’ve
started pointing their flashlight in the wrong direction. They’re
going to pass me by. The three of them may have kidnapped me, but I’d
much rather go with them then be stuck out here to die alone.

I lunge forward,
throwing myself towards them. Stinging tears fill my eyes as I step
on my injured foot.
No,
come back!
I call to them silently, like I called to the deer.
I’m
over here—please don’t leave me—please don’t
leave me out here alone—

“Huh,”
the first woman says. “She’s trying to manifest.”

She turns and
points her flashlight at me. I stumble backwards, attempting to
shield my eyes from the light. I hit my side against the trunk of a
tree and fall to the ground.

A minute later,
the woman is standing over me, scanning me with her flashlight. “You
look awful,” she says. “What did you do to yourself?”

She helps me sit
up. Slowly my eyes adjust, allowing me to make out her face. Her hair
and eyes are black; she looks like she might be Japanese. She’s
tall—about the same height as me.

“What are
you doing out here?” she asks.

“She was
probably looking for blood,” the other girl says. In the shadow
of the trees, I can see only a vague outline of her petite form. “She
doesn’t understand what happened.”

Adam approaches
last. He kneels by my feet, placing a square black lockbox down in
the leaves. He takes a look at the sole of my injured foot and shakes
his head.

“Is she all
right?” the Japanese woman asks.

“Her wound
isn’t bad, but we can’t risk her getting an infection,”
he says in a monotone. “I’ll need to take care of it
now.”

“Is that
wise?”

“It’s
fine,” he says. “My memory hasn’t started to go
yet.”

He reaches into
the back pocket of his jeans and takes out a folding knife. “We’re
going to have to do this the old-fashioned way. I apologize.”

He flips open the
knife and, without hesitation, slices into his neck, piercing his
jugular. His blood starts flowing in an even trickle. In the dimness
it looks black.

Unable to restrain
myself, I throw myself at him and place my lips around the cut,
sucking at it. Immediately I can feel the wound on my foot start to
knit itself shut. I close my eyes, sighing with relief, but then my
ears close as well, and I begin to feel a strange floating sensation,
a disconnect from my body, and then I’m no longer sitting on
the forest floor with my lips pressed to this stranger’s neck,
I’m swimming in a pitch-dark well, just barely treading water,
and then my head goes under, and then I’m drowning...

...and then I’m
back in the main building in Atlanta, back in the elevator, staring
up at my reflection as I sink down towards the third sub-basement. I
grit my teeth, anxious for the descent to finish. My mouth waters. A
chime sounds, the door slides open, and I step out into the hallway.

No! This is where
I got shot! I have to turn back!

But I can’t
control myself. My feet take me down the hallway at a regular pace,
slow and even, carefully placed so as not to slip on the slick
concrete. I fidget, swallow, adjust my purse strap. My mind races,
anticipating the attack to come; meanwhile I nibble idly on my
chapped lower lip.

A door slams. A
whispered conversation echoes in from around the corner. It sounds
like an argument.

There. Finally.
Now I start running. I turn back towards the elevator—and
walk—I start walking back towards the elevator. Why can’t
I run? Why won’t I run for my life?

They’ve
heard me. I can hear their footsteps behind me, closing in.

“Mirabel?”

Adam’s
voice.

I stop dead in my
tracks and turn to face him. I catch a split-second glimpse of his
face before he raises the gun and pulls the trigger. I stagger
backwards, deafened, my vision failing—

—
and snap
back into myself to find my lips still pressed to his neck.

I shove him away
and haul myself up to my feet, preparing to run.

“Don’t,”
he says. “You’re still weak.” He grabs for my
wrist.

I recoil and try
to limp away. The smaller girl darts from the shadows, grabs my waist
and hefts me over her shoulder. I struggle, but she’s absurdly
strong, despite being only a fraction of my size.

She carries me
back to Adam. He places his hand against my forehead. “I’m
sorry,” he says, “but it’s for the best...”

I lose
consciousness.

{Adam}

I began to drift
into something like sleep, but instead of dreaming, I found myself
transported into a vision—something like a drug flashback, but
clearer and more vivid. A memory. Somehow I knew it belonged in the
timeline of someone else’s life, not my own.

This someone was
named Aya.

She was lying in
the same spot as me on the bed, underneath the sheets. They were cold
against her bare skin. Beside her was a young man with blonde hair,
staring up at the ceiling with terror in his eyes.

He started to
speak. I couldn’t understand what he was saying—it
sounded like German, maybe—nor could I understand what Aya said
to him in response as she stroked the tears off his cheeks, but I
could feel the resignation building in her chest as she slowly sat
up, left his side, and put her clothes back on. She had to help him
dress himself; his hands were shaking so violently he couldn’t
fit the buttons through the buttonholes.

She took his hand
and led him out of the room, out of the suite, up a wide staircase
and out into the gardens behind the estate. The night air was cool
and full of the music of insects. The sky in the east was beginning
to fade to blue, heralding the coming of dawn.

She let him pull
her against his chest, let him squeeze her shoulders nearly hard
enough to crush her, let him kiss her and run his hands through her
hair. His tongue was cold in her mouth and only slightly moist.

After a minute or
so she placed her hands on his chest and pushed him away, turned from
him and walked back to the mansion. He called out to her, calling her
name, but she didn’t turn back or respond.

As she shut and
locked the door behind her, she sighed with relief.
It’s
over now,
she thought.
We’ll
try again next year.

His cries stopped
a few moments later.

Farewell,
Markus.

///

A knock on the
door woke me up, snapping me out of the vision. I got out of bed. It
took me a minute to find my way back to the door to the suite.

Aya was waiting on
the other side. She smiled at me brightly. “How are you
feeling?” she asked.

I brought a hand
to my mouth. The honest answer to her question seemed obscene: I felt
almost nothing. My mind was full of distress and regret, but my body
was placid, unresponsive. I didn’t want to cry or scream. I
wasn’t tired, hungry or nervous. The only thing I felt was a
peculiar sensation in the chest, like my ribcage was being
simultaneously compressed and pulled apart. It worsened as the
minutes passed.

“I can’t
say,” was all I said.

She nodded.

I stood aside,
allowing her into the room. She sat down on one of the couches,
crossing her legs at the ankles, and gestured to the space next to
her. I sat down on the edge of the lounge, spine straight, feet ready
to take off for the exit.

“Is there
anything I can get you?” she asked. “Anything I can do to
help?” Her delicate, symmetrical features were fixed in a mask
of polite concern.

“Why am I
here?”

“I’m
sure Master Radcliffe would be happy to answer that question for
you.”

“You can’t
tell me yourself?”

“No,”
she said. “If you’re asking why you specifically were
selected, I don’t know.”

“Selected?”

“For the
initiation.”

“You mean
the... resurrection?” I could feel my face twitch as I said the
last word.

“Dr.
Fletcher... well, it’s not quite like that, I’m afraid.”

“What do you
mean? I’m conscious, I can walk around...”

“I think
it’s best if you meet with Master Radcliffe as soon as
possible. He can answer these questions far better than I can.”

I didn’t
reply.

“Besides,”
she continued, “you’ll need to eat soon.”

Not eat—feed.

“Eat what?”
I asked.

“He’ll
have something ready for you.”

Human blood.

“What?”
I asked, my voice thin. “What am I supposed to eat?”

“Well, it’d
be more accurate to say ‘drink’. Now that you’ve
been initiated, you’ll need to drink, well...” She
grimaced. “Human blood.”

I bit down on the
inside of my cheek.

“Do you
understand what I’m saying, Dr. Fletcher?” She held my
gaze with surprising intensity. “Do you understand what you are
now? What we both are?” She didn’t blink. Her nostrils
didn’t flare. Her little breasts were still under her prim
cardigan. She was like a photograph, like a doll.

Then she took a
breath. “You must understand that my master didn’t kill
you,” she said. “Just a few hours ago, you were dead. All
he did was revive you.”

I pretended to
reflect on her statement. Those words—
human
blood
—went
through my head again, made me contemplate what it would be like to
consume it. I already knew how it tasted, but not in quantity. What
would it be like on the tongue? Would it be slightly viscous, like
heavy cream?

Aya cleared her
throat. “Dr. Fletcher? Would you be ready to meet with him
now?”

I tried to shove
the thought to the back of my mind.

“Sure,”
I said, slowly rising from the lounge. “Of course.”

{Anonymous}

I wake up back in
the cabin, in the living room, lying on my back on a musty-smelling
couch that creaks underneath me as I sit up. Adam and the tall
Japanese woman from the woods stand in the kitchen near the front
door, talking in low voices. I can hear a car running outside.