Lucky

An aimless young man finds out he's been chosen for a very special destiny. 

Transcript

For the most part, you enjoy having your desk right next to your window. And when you moved to fully remote work, you were grateful for the view. Being next to the window every day puts you in tune with the outside world in a way you haven’t been in a long time. It helps you to feel transported away from your house, if only for brief glances. You watch the blossoming of flowers and the changing of the leaves. You sit right next to every storm, every snowfall, feeling the shake of thunder and gentle intrusion of the cold. But one piece of nature you sorely wish you could avoid is the mangled, one-legged goose that wanders the grassy field outside your apartment building. You watch him nearly every day. You see him attempt to socialize on occasion, only to be hissed at and bitten back by the other geese. You watch him limp along, and sometimes, as you watch him drag his stump across the asphalt of the parking lot, you think about calling the local wildlife center to put him down. But then you see him napping or you see the local kids feeding him scraps, and you hesitate. 

You try not to look at him too much, but it’s hard. Especially at night, when he tries even harder to infiltrate the cozy flock of normal geese that sleep near him. You often catch yourself watching him, hoping that maybe this time they’ll let him in. But they hiss and bite and honk every single time. Then, on a night when the flock is nesting elsewhere, you watch a loose dog begin to walk up to the goose, and you debate whether you should intervene. But you haven’t yet, and so you continue your pattern of letting nature take its course. You do feel compelled to witness the goose’s death, though, since you’ve watched so much of its life. You watch the dog, a scraggly, shepherd, husky-looking thing, walk up. And you watch the goose flail its wings, wings just as cripled as its legs, in a vain attempt to scare the dog away. This does nothing, and the dog barks and growls and crouches closer. And just as it's about to strike, the goose moves first. Its long neck extends out even longer, twice as long as it should. And it sinks its mouth into the dog's neck. The dog yelps and limps away, but it doesn't get far. It stumbles and halts and stops, collapsing on the ground. The goose limps over to it. And then, the goose begins to eat. Before long, there’s nothing left but a crimson puddle on the grass, shining in the streetlight. ONce its done, the goose looks up at you and holds its head perfectly still for a long moment. Long enough to make it clear that you are in its sights. You close the blinds in a rush. But they don’t block out the sound of the quietly threatening honking that comes from just outside. You decide that hearing and not seeing is worse, so you open the blinds. And you gaze out at a long neck, a wide mouth, a distended belly, and intelligent eyes. You’ve just opened your blinds to the true form of: The Podcast Inside Your House. 

It was the start of summer vacation, and I couldn’t sleep. 

My blankets had that warm scratchy feeling that you only get late at night, when everyone else is asleep, and all the lights are off. You have nothing else to focus on besides how that one corner of the blanket keeps making your leg itch, but if you move it, then another part of your leg will start itching just enough to snatch you just back from the edge of sleep. 

My eyes had adjusted to the dark, but with both closets open and barely any floor visible, I found myself staring at nothing. Looking for different shapes and patterns in the piles of dirty shirts and textbooks. 

Everything was a dark grey on darker grey, and I had no idea what time it was.

The window next to my bed felt warm, and there wasn’t a soul in sight out in the parking lot. I got dressed in the dark and grabbed my keys off the hook, leaving my phone on the bed. Pressing my ear to the door, I listened for any signs of my mom being awake, but it was dead silent. I walked through the hall and out the front door all in one breath. That first lungful of summer night air felt like the sweetest thing I’d tasted all year. 

Scattered throughout our complex were a series of lakes that held flocks of ducks and geese. No matter what time of night it was, there were always a few awake, so every few minutes the silence would be broken by what sounded like someone laughing at you from just out of sight. 

The lakes were nice, but they weren’t nearly as interesting as the woods behind our apartment. It was just a small patch, with a path that led to a city park. This far out from downtown, though, it was enough to hold deer, raccoons, and even coyotes. Nothing dangerous, but enough nocturnal animals that you were almost guaranteed to hear something crawling around in the woods. 

The first few steps out of our stairwell were always the darkest, but by the time I hit the path, my eyes were somewhat adjusted to the night.

The sky was completely overcast, and the clouds above mixed together with the tops and ends of branches, making it look like the leaves just melted into the heavens. The foliage, the path, and the dirt all had the same lack of color, but my mind struggled to project the greens and browns that it knew were there in the day. That’s the funny thing about being out at night, especially in the woods; you can see just enough that your mind decides to fill in the gaps for you. You end up with branches that you couldn’t see smacking you in the face, because you were looking ahead at an imaginary face in the brush. 

I loved it. I could never find beauty in the daylight, especially in the summer. There was no potential in a place that you could see. 

On nights when the woods didn’t call to me, I found myself wandering through the neighborhood, seeking out the pockets that brushed up against danger, or isolation as they veered towards crime or lonely industrial buildings. 

This was how I spent most of my summer nights, wandering through the places and times that held potential. Potential for danger, yes, but other things too. Perhaps wondrous things. 

I was rapidly growing out of any last childish hope that life held some grand adventure for me. But those hopes hadn’t evaporated completely. Not yet. And walking alone at night. Where danger or adventure could be hiding behind every corner, behind every tree, I felt just as connected to that potential as I did as a kid

I was about halfway through my usual route when I heard something in the brush nearby. It sounded big, definitely not a squirrel, maybe a raccoon. Or even better, a coyote. 

I paused, and it paused with me. Then I heard a growl, a low, deep warning. My first instinct was to run. And in my mind, for just an instant, I was already back home, cursing myself for not seeing what it was. For not going out there and flirting with danger. 

I called out a soft “Hello?” that sounded impossibly loud in the night.

The creature moved ahead of me. It got close enough to the path that I could start to see it separate from the trees. It was whining now, and for just a second, I saw the light reflect off its eyes. It was impossible to tell if it was a dog or a coyote, but it certainly wasn’t anything smaller. It stepped onto the path, and the whining got louder. 

I reached out my hand. 

A car pulled into a nearby parking lot, and I realized just how thin the woods were, how close I was to the park on the other side. I felt an odd mixture of relief and disappointment that someone would be around to help if the dog or coyote, whatever it was, did try to attack me. The headlights lazily circled into the lot and lit up the beast before me for just a second. 

In the light, its ambiguity was lost, and I realized just how close I was to a wild animal. The coyote was limping towards me. 

Something was wrong about the way it was moving. Its head was slowly bobbing back and forth like it was trying to shake something off. The headlights cut into the path ahead. They looked smaller than a car, and they were getting closer than the parking lot should have allowed. The beam of light glided closer and closer to the coyote, following it as it followed me. 

The coyote’s whining shifted into a cry. I wanted to run now, but I couldn’t seem to make my legs work. The coyote was just a few steps away. The light caught up with its tail, then quickly traced over the rest of it, stopping just short of me. 

I got a better look at it and realized it was hurt. Blood was dripping from its stomach, and there was a whole trail of red drops over the path behind it. Startled by the light, it jumped the last few feet between us and hit me in the stomach. 

In a second, I was on the ground, and it had me pinned, drooling onto my face. It wasn’t growling, but it was still making that awful keening sound. 

Its face was right up against mine. In the dark, it almost looked like there was something swirling around in the dark pools of its eyes. Claws were pushing into my stomach, and the headlights were gliding closer.

I had never felt so alive.

The whining built up to a loud and sudden halt, and it started coughing, dripping blood and spit onto my face and neck. The blood smelled sharp and metallic, and I got a sudden whiff of something halfway between burning and rotting. The Coyote started shaking, and I shoved it off of me.  

The coyote was retching like it was going to be sick. The headlights near us circled back around, pulling onto the path as I stepped into the woods. 

I crouched down just a few feet into the bushes and watched a four-wheeler bounce along the path to the coyote. It was lying on its side now, but quietly whining and wiggling around. It stayed still as the ATV pulled up right next to it. One large silhouette was driving, with a smaller one clinging onto them, and a large barrel tied to the back. 

My eyes adjusted to the light, and the large silhouette became a man. The smaller one was a girl with a ponytail. They set the barrel on the ground. The coyote was complacent, but still writhing around with increasing speed, and in the stark shadows of the headlights, it looked like it was melting into the ground. 

The man grabbed something off his back that looked a bit like a shotgun and pointed it at the creature, while the girl stepped closer. She was wearing some kind of jumpsuit, and she crinkled while she walked. Her mouth was covered in the kind of mask that doctors use. 

The coyote calmed when she leaned down to it. Its movements became less fevered, but the keening sound was back and even louder. She wrapped her arms around it and hoisted it up into the barrel, leaning up on the tops of her toes to get it over the edge. 

My leg was cramping up. I switched my position ever so slightly and in doing so, snapped a twig under my feet. The girl whipped around, motioning for the man to stay with the barrel. Trying to keep my feet still, I leaned back into the trees, willing the leaves to absorb me into the dark. 

The girl fumbled around her stomach, then extended her arm. Backlit against the glow of the headlights, I could only assume she had pulled out a gun. 

She stepped closer, and I stopped breathing. Once she was off the path, the glow from the headlights faded, and I could start to make out her features. 

She was young, maybe even younger than me. She took another step, then stood perfectly still, looking close to me but not quite at me. My lungs were burning, and I let out a shuddering breath, as quietly as I could, but not quiet enough. Her face snapped up.

Her eyes met mine, and we stayed like that for a beat. The insects and rustling of the night grew louder in the pressing tension. Then the girl winked and turned away. 

“It’s just a raccoon!” She yelled back. 

“Is it clean?!” a deep voice asked. 

“Yeah, it’s fine.” She double checked the barrel, then hopped up on the ATV. The engine revved, and they were gone just like that. 

I sat down, letting my breath regulate. My eyes started to adjust to the gray light of the clouds, and I looked down at my shirt. The coyote's blood had soaked it, and there was a silvery green strand of something else crusted in. 

Once the noise of the four-wheeler faded, I climbed back up, shaking as I stepped back to the path. I made it home on autopilot. 

I lay in bed for hours before I could go to sleep, and if I had any dreams that night, I don’t remember them. 

The next day was ordinary, and I’m sure I went through the motions, but all I could think about was the girl from last night, the mystery I’d witnessed. I kept the bloodied shirt in a plastic bag, taking it out periodically to make sure it was still there. That I hadn’t dreamed the whole encounter. 

Finally, the sun started to set, and I watched it, willing the golden light to fade faster. Though it wasn’t yet dark, Mom settled into her room, and I walked out into the woods. 

I went back to the spot in the path I’d hid in the night before, and sat down in the brush to wait for something to happen again. I was prepared to wait forever if I had to. 

~~~~~~~~~~

Forever turned out to be just a few minutes. I wasn’t too far off the path, but the underbrush was thick enough that no one could see me. Watching joggers and dog walkers pass by from low down, through thick leaves, felt vaguely voyeuristic.

After the sun had gone down, but before the stars came out, I heard a familiar voice. It was just a little bit scratchy, and though I’d only heard her speak oh so briefly the night before, I’d memorized the way she sounded. 

“Spot!” She yelled. “Here, boy!” As she got closer, I heard her ask in a quieter voice, to a late-night straggler, “You haven’t seen a dog, have you, sir?” And though I couldn’t hear the response, she kept yelling. 

She closed in on me, her cries for her fake dog growing closer and closer. Until I spotted her legs between the leaves of my vantage point. 

She didn’t yell for her imaginary dog. Instead, she crouched down and peered into the undergrowth just as she had the night before. We locked eyes instantly, and I crawled out of the underbrush, stood up, and simply stared. I couldn’t believe she was here. 

“Why did you come back here?” She asked. 

“Why did you?” I countered. 

She reached into a pocket in her sweatpants and pulled out a small device. It was shaped a bit like a stud finder, but it was shiny metal and clicked ominously. She moved it closer to me, holding it up, and the clicks intensified.

She held it right up to my chest and placed it over my heart. “I guess I was looking for you.” She said. 

An engine starting up on the other side of the woods caught my attention on a lag, only registering as she startled. She said, “We need to talk some more, but not right now.”

We hastily made plans to meet at a coffee shop the next day. As she jogged off, she said, “I’m Aubrey, by the way.”

And I yelled back, “I’m Lucky.” She made a face at that, and then she jogged back to the far side of the woods. Back where someone mysterious, someone she didn’t want me to see, was waiting.

That night I didn’t sleep. I stayed up, overjoyed that I’d fallen into something mysterious. Something secretive. Something straight out of the books I read. An adventure, one where I had been chosen, by a cute girl, nonetheless, for something important. 

I felt like a kid again. One who’d just been bitten by a radioactive spider, or gotten a Hogwarts letter in the mail. The universe had recognized me at last. It had chosen me for… Well, for something. And that was better than nothing. 

The next day, I half expected Aubrey to ghost me. But when I walked into the coffee shop, she was already waiting for me. 

When we settled in, I tried to ask about what I’d seen in the woods, but she deflected with small talk and evasive, vague statements that hinted at deep secrecy. 

She asked me, “So, what’s the story with your name?” I was obsessed with the sound of her voice. With the way her dark hair kept falling in her face. 

“No story,” I said. I drank a sip of tea to warm my shaky hands and wet my dry mouth. “There were already two other Lukes in my kindergarten class. So I got a nickname. Lucky me.” I said. 

“I thought maybe you were a killer card player or something.” She said. She took a sip of coffee, and her hands stayed steady.

“Well, if I were a really good card player, I’d probably pretend I wasn’t so I could hustle you.” 

“That’s not what you’re doing right now, is it?” Aubrey asked, “Hustling me?” 

My hands trembled around the warm porcelain. “What do you mean?”

“Like, do you really mean it when you say you want to know more about what I do? That you want to be involved?” She paused, and the rehearsed way she’d been speaking to me made me desperate to prove my worth. Like she’d given this pitch, this speech, this opportunity dozens of times. 

“I’ve been waiting for something like this my whole life,” I told her. And my voice stayed steady. My hands stopped shaking. The statement was so true it hurt. 

She took a long sip from her coffee, and she looked around the cafe. It was closing in on closing time, and there were only a few other people. But they were all far enough away that we could exchange secrets safely. 

“I’m part of an organization that does very important things.” She began. And in my mind, I shifted my expectations from fantasy and adventure to espionage and thriller. Secret missions, close calls, conspiracies. 

“And we’ve hit a bit of a wall with something we’re trying to do.” She stirred her coffee and paused as a couple walked past to leave. 

“I think we need to bring in someone new, some fresh blood. But no one agrees with me.” She looked at me, her eyes boring into mine, burrowing to my very soul. “I think you might have exactly what I need. What we need. But they don’t know it yet.”

“What do you need me to do?” I asked. I was on the edge of my seat, literally. I was taking short, shallow breaths, like if I inhaled too loudly, she’d change her mind. She’d decide I didn’t have what it took after all, that I wasn’t anything, or anyone special. 

“Two nights ago, you saw something you weren’t supposed to see. And you also came into contact with something that you weren’t supposed to.”

My rapid heartbeat went from excited to nervous. 

“What do you mean, like a disease or something?” I asked

“No, nothing like that.” She said quickly. “It’s a good thing, but it’s just a bit hard to explain.”

“What’s going to happen, like am I contagious? I’m still in school, so I live with my mom, and I don’t want to -”

She cut me off. “You’re not contagious, and like I said, it’s a good thing. But as for what exactly is going to happen, I can’t tell you. It’s different for everyone.”

I moved my voice to a whisper, “Am I gonna get like, superpowers?”

She laughed at that. “It’s not exactly like that.” She said. “But you might start to notice some changes happening.”

“What am I gonna turn into a werewolf or something? What do you mean?” I asked. 

“Like I said, what’s about to happen is different for everyone.” She smiled. “But we have to be kind of sneaky, because the rest of my organization would not be happy if they found out you’d been chosen. There’s a process for these things, normally.” Aubrey leaned in close, “But if you ask me, I think it was fate that you were waiting in the woods for us. I think you’re special.”

She leaned away. “But I mean, if you don’t think you’re up for it…”

“No!” I said quickly, too quickly, “I’m ready for whatever it is.” I reached out and touched her hand, grabbing her full attention. “I’m up to the task. I’m the person for the job. Whatever it is, I promise you, I’m ready.”

Aubrey smiled again, and I caught myself admiring the curve of her lips, the little gap in her teeth near the edge of her smile. She was beautiful. But more than that, she was everything I’d been waiting for. She had given me a sense of purpose. 

She looked behind me, up at the counter. “Looks like they’re closing up soon, and I should be getting back.” Aubrey downed the rest of her coffee. “Meet me back here in a week, and we’ll talk some more.” 

She stood up, and I followed her lead. “And if you notice anything… Weird happening, don’t worry, it’s all part of the process.”

I wanted to ask more questions, but I didn’t want to do anything that might annoy her. Anything that might take away whatever it was I had been inadvertently given. So I just bid her goodnight, and I walked home. 

Over the next week, I watched my body closely for any changes, and I found myself consulting all the books I used to read as a kid. I watched for an aversion to sunlight. I watched for sudden cravings for human flesh. I watched for new body hair, heightened strength, anything at all to signal some kind of fantastic change. I felt like I was waiting for a second, much more exciting puberty. But by the time I met up with Aubrey again, I didn’t feel any different. 

I told her as much, and she assured me that sometimes it just takes time. But she still didn’t give me answers about what exactly it was that I was waiting for. She said she just needed to keep monitoring me for changes, and she would slowly try to convince her people, the rest of her organization, that doing things a little differently could be good. 

It was more of the same a few days after that. More cryptic, non-answers. And I began to embrace the mystery of the whole thing. 

We’d go on long walks around town or in the woods. And Aubrey would pry about my life. A lot of her questions were abstract and vague. Sometimes it felt like we were going on dates; other times, it felt like I was constantly interviewing for a job. 

She’d ask me things like “Would you give up your life for the greater good?” And I’d say, “I hope I would.”

She’d ask me if I’d be willing to sacrifice someone else’s life, if the cause were worthy enough. And I said yes. 

She’d ask me if I thought the world was worth saving. And I’d tell her that there were a lot of times in my life I would have said no. But right now, I was in one of those brief phases where I said yes. 

She asked me lots and lots of questions about death. How I thought the best way to die would be. How I thought the worst way would be. How often I thought about death. And when I told her often, she asked me if I’d ever thought about taking matters into my own hands. And feeling like we had an honesty between us, one I didn’t want to disrupt I told her, “More times than I could count.” 

But as we got to know each other, as we spent more time together. As I began to acclimate to my current state of finally having found the adventure, the purpose I wanted so badly, I’d been thinking about death less and less. 

By myself, I seldom went for walks during the daytime. The daylight left nothing to the imagination. But walking around town with Aubrey, I found myself able to appreciate the sun at long last. I found myself admiring the trees and buildings around town for what they were rather than what they might be hiding. 

More and more, I found myself just enjoying Aubrey’s company in the moment, even more so than the potential of whatever she was keeping from me. I felt myself acclimating to being almost sort of happy. For the first time in so long. 

Before long, Aubrey and I were seeing each other nearly every day, and I began to notice some changes happening to me at long last. My eyes, normally a slightly mossy brown, began to lighten. Little white flecks appeared in a ring around my pupils. I smashed my hand in my mom's car door by accident, and I barely felt it. And the next day, the bruise that had bloomed had vanished. I also noticed my heartbeat felt fast all the time. But I didn’t feel nervous or scared. It was like it was simply working differently. And though I didn’t get any specific cravings, I also gained a ravenous appetite. But no matter how much I ate, my weight only ever dropped. 

Aubrey noted all of these things with great interest. And every now and then, she’d scan me with a more elaborate version of the scanner she’d used when we first met. And even though I doubted I’d know what the readings meant, she always kept the little screen angled away from me. But whatever the readings were, she looked pleased. 

Mom finally started noting my extended absences, but she thought it was a good thing. She said she was happy I was getting out of the house so much. She also tried to pry and ask if I had a girlfriend. I told her no, not exactly. But maybe soon. 

As July passed us by, and summer vacation was coming to a close, I found myself coming out of the state of mystery and euphoria I’d been in. School was looming, and the real world with it. And I wanted to know what my place in it was now. 

Was I even going to go back to school? Was I about to be whisked away on some globe-trotting adventure? When was Aubrey going to convince the rest of the people in her “organization” that I was worthy, that I could be let in on the secrets they’d been keeping from me? On the secrets that were literally inside of me. 

She brushed me off anytime I tried to ask questions. But as the last week of summer vacation loomed, I decided I should pry once again. 

We were sipping iced tea at the same little coffee shop we’d first talked at. And despite the AC blasting loudly, the heatwave that had taken over our city was melting its way inside. Keeping us both lightly sweaty as summer gave its final death throes. 

I waited for a lull in the conversation, and I asked her, “So I’m supposed to just go back to school and act like nothing is wrong, right?”

Her face crinkled in the disapproving way I’d become intimately familiar with. I had a feeling she did it instinctively anytime I tried to pry. And usually it worked to discourage me. But I needed to know something now that summer was ending. 

“Yeah, that’s the plan,” Aubrey said, “It usually doesn’t take this long.” 

She stared at me, making it clear she’d be vaguely annoyed if I asked anymore questions. I was about to muster up the courage to do just that, but her eyes darted behind me and widened. 

“Oh no,” she whispered. 

“What is it?” I asked. I didn’t turn around. 

“Wait here,” she said, and she got up. But I wasn’t having that. I grabbed her arm. 

“Tell me what’s going on,” I said. I surprised even myself with my tone. 

“Someone is watching us,” she said, eyes unblinking and fixed behind us. “Someone from my Organization.” She dug her nails into my hand, and I let her go. I stayed with my back to the exit, conditioned not to look for the answers that I wasn’t supposed to know just yet. 

I heard the door open and close, and I waited with bated breath, sweating not just from the heat, but the nerves now too. 

When a few minutes passed and she hadn’t come over, I finally turned around. I didn’t see her in the parking lot at all. I waited another ten minutes, and then I left too, walking home. 

Despite the heat, it was a lovely day, and I didn’t rush. I watched the clouds drift by overhead. And I watched the bees flit around on the roadside bushes and flowers. And I pondered once again just how happy this mysterious transformation was making me. 

Just as I came in sight of the lakes at the start of my apartment complex, I heard the screeching of brakes. Before I could even finish turning around, I felt hands grabbing my arms. Something sharp jabbed me in the shoulder, and I watched the sun above vanish behind a van ceiling. 

Then that too disappeared as I fell into a dreamless sleep. 

~~~~~~~~~~

When I woke up, my senses were assaulted. 

There was screaming, frantic and unbearably loud. There was cold all over me, seeping into my bones from something wet, and a cold floor beneath me. I opened my eyes and struggled to process the blinding fluorescent lights above me. I blinked away the waking world until my eyes could properly adjust to the light. 

Once they did, I looked first at my body. I was covered in water, or sweat, perhaps both, and the stone floor around me was soaked with mineral-scented puddles. Above me, the lights were even brighter to my left. And looking in that direction, following the light, I registered the bars in front of me at the same time as the person beyond. 

Just yards away, there was a man who lay in the center of a large, round room. A man who was the source of the screaming. He was completely naked and chained up in the center of something akin to an auditorium. And in a hoarse voice, one that sounded like it had been yelling for some time, he pleaded with anyone who would listen. He begged them not to do whatever it was they were about to do. 

Across from me, all the way around the round room, were other cells. Some were empty. Some were not. And the occupants of the cells all dealt with their predicament differently. Directly across from me, a woman clung to the bars, eyes fixed on the man between us. She didn’t look scared or curious. She looked like she was watching something she’d seen many times before, but something she couldn’t look away from. In other cells, some people sat in the farthest corner from the light, avoiding whatever was about to happen. A few of the prisoners joined in on the screaming. But none were as loud as the man in the middle of the circle. 

As my eyes grew accustomed to the light, and my ears to the sounds, I gathered my wits enough to study the rest of the room. Above all of the cages were rows and rows of seats. Like we were in a stadium. Or a coliseum. 

The seats were sparsely populated. I expected the spectators to be wearing cultish robes or army fatigues. Something appropriate for whatever this was. But they all dressed as if they’d come from work. Some were in stained work uniforms, some in suits, and some in simple jeans and t-shirts.

I stood up, and I took stock of my cell. It was small, barely big enough to lie down in. I shook the bars, and they didn’t budge. But I had to try, didn’t I?

A dizzy spell put me instantly on the ground, but nothing hurt when I fell. I crawled over to the bars and decided I would plan my next move once I could walk around again properly. I held the iron in front of me, and I watched the man before us. He screamed and screamed, but no threat appeared. I scanned the other cells, seeing if any held a wild animal, hell, maybe some kind of modern gladiator. But every cell around us appeared to be occupied by other prisoners. 

Then I had a terrible thought. What if we were the ones meant to do something to this man? 

But those fears were quickly put aside for others as the man's voice changed. It became raspier, his cries grew wet, like his lungs were beginning to drown. Black and red spurted from his mouth, his nose, and he stopped screaming completely. But he didn't stop writhing. 

Shackled to the floor, there was only so much he could move. But he did his best. He heaved upwards, torso first, his spine straining. He contorted so violently that I expected to hear bones snapping, ligaments popping. But there was only ever squishing and sloshing. 

I could smell the blood all the way in my cell, alongside something else. A smell somewhere between smoke and sulphur.

I was watching the man before me in profile, as he thrashed with all his might. And something strange began to happen with his eyes. They started bulging out, bug-eyed to the point I thought they’d pop right out of his skull. Then they began to poke even further out. They reached up, two long, delicate white stalks, like the eyes of a snail. Red veins grew redder at the base, where they connected to his head. And then, with two loud pops, the worm-like stalks fell out of his skull altogether. 

And then all at once the man in the center of the colosseum ceased to be one living, breathing thing. And instead, he melted into dozens of tiny, squirming, worm-like things. They wriggled out from between his ribs, from his hands, from his legs. Boring holes to freedom and deflating him as they left. They were red and white and black and bile yellow, all glistening with a fresh layer of newborn blood. 

As the worms crawled and squirmed to the edges of the cells, they slowed. They held up their front ends in the air as if they were looking at us or sniffing us with invisible sensory organs. But whatever they smelled or saw, they were left wanting, because they all stopped near the edge of the circle. 

A red and yellow one stopped near me; it was fleshy and about the size of a garter snake. It looked at me with a face devoid of anything save for two hollows near the front, where one might expect eyes to be. 

The man in the center of the stage was little more than a hollow carcass. His skin, what was left of it, draped over bones that bent just a little, as if he’d suddenly become cartilaginous. 

I stared back into the hollow eyes of the worm that had crawled up to me, and I understood why it didn’t crawl closer. Because I was already infected. I had been all summer. 

One of the gates of a cell near me, one I couldn’t see into, swung open. Five people came out in hazmat suits and began to scoop up the infantile monsters. The worms latched and tried to suckle on them, but the thick plastic kept them at bay. The people loaded them up, unceremoniously, into plastic buckets, and took them somewhere deeper into this foul place. 

When the blood and the worms had been mostly cleaned up, and the carcass hauled off, quiet discussions sprang up around me. Some of these people had been here for quite some time. Some knew each other's names. I faced the wall, not yet ready to accept my fate. And I listened to the voices around me whisper and shout to each other about plans for escape. They shared regrets, hopes for rescue. And they discussed how their symptoms were progressing and who might be next. 

As the voices began to taper off for the night, I heard a new one from right outside my cell. Well, not new to me. 

“Come with me,” Aubrey said. I turned around, and she unlocked my cell door as silently as she could. 

The other prisoners, the ones still awake, showed no reaction to one of us being taken away. And I said nothing as she led me out of the cell and next door, to the one with an exit. I couldn’t see down the dark hallway where it led, but anywhere was better than here. I’d seen what happened in this room, and I’d take whatever dark possibilities lay beyond.

Only when we left the round room did I realize I’d been holding my breath. I inhaled as quietly as I could. I didn’t dare break the silence with any words, any questions. Aubrey was walking as quietly as she could, too, and though I didn’t trust her, I trusted that it hadn’t been her plan for me to end up here. 

We walked down a hallway that had the same stone floor as the round room, but the walls were modern, muted drywall painted in neutral colors. A few yards in, yellow strips of light lined the floor, letting me see just bits of what this place was. We passed doors that looked more modern than the frames that held them. Like this was an ancient place, but one frequently updated. I peered inside the rooms that were open and saw the kind of set-ups one might expect in a church or a school: cheap chairs and podiums, and occasional bookshelves. 

I took note of the paintings that hung in the hallways, alcoves, and classrooms. They were all vaguely Christian in nature. Depicting Jesus suffering, angels descending from heaven. And other things I didn’t recognize but felt cut from a similar cloth. Giant serpents, dragons, and huge beasts that resembled monstrous elephants. 

We twisted and turned, and before long, we were at the cusp of another great room. There were strange sounds coming from it, slaps and hisses and grumbles that echoed and reverberated. The room's entrance bore such a resemblance to the coliseum that I was petrified Aubrey had just brought me back, dangling freedom in front of me in some sick little game. 

I stopped, and she tugged at my arm. But when I made it clear I wouldn’t budge, she leaned in close and whispered in my ear, “This is the only way out. We have to hurry.” 

I stepped forward then. Trusting her over certain death. 

As we drew closer, I realized this room was bigger. Much bigger. And the stone floor dropped off at the entrance. The room held only a narrow walkway above a colossal pit in the ground.

We stepped over the threshold and onto the catwalk, and I was grateful it had railings. Because what I saw beneath made my already trembling body even more unsteady. 

Below us were what I can only describe as monsters. They moved slowly, titanically as they slithered and hissed and squabbled. They writhed over each other, all snakelike, but all different in their own horrible ways. And all enormous. 

One was white and bulbous, like a fat caterpillar, but on each of its segments were unblinking irises. Another looked to be made of sinewy, stringy muscle, like a snake that had been freshly flayed. One had legs that jutted out, white and stiff, as if it were one long rib cage that its skin couldn’t quite cover. The glimpses I got of their faces showed the same hollow eye sockets I’d seen on the smaller ones. On those that hissed or bit, I saw mouths filled with all manner of teeth, some blunt and humanoid, others sharp and in circular rows like a lamprey. 

I realized I’d stopped in my tracks when Aubrey broke the silence, feeling safe enough to talk amidst the sounds of the beasts below. 

“None of them are coming out quite how we need.” She said, “We’ve got some formidable ones, sure, but none that fit the way the scripture describes the most important one.” She brushed her hair out of her face, and though she’d led me to this horrible place, I couldn’t help but feel a fondness in watching the familiar gesture. 

“We’ve been trying to breed the Leviathan.” She said, “The World Eater.”

At this point, I didn’t care about answers. I didn’t care about her fucked up little cult. Survival was the only thing that mattered. I cut off whatever other bullshit she was about to say. “Aubrey.” I grabbed her arm. “How do I get cured? How do I get these things out of me? You came back to help me, right?”

She smiled, for once greeting my question with warmth rather than annoyance. “Didn’t you tell me that you’d be willing to give up your life for the greater good? Well, this is it.”

“You brought me here just to kill me?” 

“No.” She said, “I didn’t bring you here. I think we’ve been going about this all wrong. I think they can’t breed the Leviathan in captivity. It needs to be free to properly form. It needs someone special to incubate it.”

She touched my chest, gently rubbing the spot above my heart. “I think that someone is you. I think what you've got in here is exactly what we need.” 

She asked me, “Didn’t you tell me you always wanted to be someone important, to be part of something great?” 

“This is sick,” I snapped back. “This isn’t what I wanted,” I stepped past her, moving towards the alleged exit.

“Isn’t it?” She asked. 

Any response I had was cut off by voices coming from further inside the building. She grabbed my arm and said, “Hurry!”

I followed her across the catwalk, over the monsters writhing in the dark below. She unlocked a steel door. And on the other side I was shocked to see it was daylight. 

It was blinding, but my eyes adjusted fast. We were in the middle of a forest. Aubrey ran with me for a beat, just far enough into the trees to be out of sight. 

“They’re going to come after you.” She said, “Don’t let that happen. Don’t let them ruin this beautiful thing growing inside of you.” 

I didn’t know what to say to that. Then she pulled me in for a kiss, and just as quickly shoved me away. “Run!”

And I did. I ran until my lungs burned and then felt cold. Until my legs were jelly, until I knew I had to stop or I’d be crawling. And then I walked as fast as I could. 

Once my adrenaline started waning, I began to feel the heat of the sun overhead. I felt the thirst that was building from running and sweating. 

Before long, I spotted a lifeline, a cabin in the middle of the woods. It was small, and the logs that made up its walls looked well-worn, but it looked inhabited. I knocked on the door, and when that didn’t produce any results, I broke the small window that ran alongside it, and opened the lock. 

I was disappointed there was no one home, no one who might be able to help me. But as I felt something shift in my chest, as I realized just how far gone I was, I understood that that was probably a good thing. 

I gorged myself on sink water, and I collapsed on the couch. The cabin was so small that the bed was only a stone's throw away. But I didn’t feel right sullying someone's bed with my sweat. Or with my infection. 

Once I caught my breath, I took inventory of the cabin. I ate a cold can of soup. I dug through all the drawers and cabinets. There were a handful of guns locked in a decorative display box. I picked the least antique-looking one, and guessed at which ammo might fit it. 

There was a mirror in the bathroom, and I studied my reflection in it. My face looked normal, though I’d been losing weight. But my eyes, they had those strange little rings around them. Rings I now recognized as tiny teeth, floating just beneath the surfaces of my irises. 

In one corner of the cabin, there was a small desk with drawing paper and colored pencils. I sat at it for a minute and contemplated trying to write some kind of note. Trying to leave some evidence of what had happened to me.

I thought of all the times in my youth that I’d sat down and drafted my own suicide note. And I had a little chuckle imagining writing one in all different colors for someone to find. A rainbow of death. A record of self-destruction with little flowers and hearts doodled in the margins. 

But this note, it wouldn’t be like the others. Because this time, I wasn’t the one trying to end my life. 

In the end, all I wrote was “This cabin isn’t safe anymore. Leave it, or die.” I didn’t trust Aubrey’s promises that I wasn’t contagious. 

I waited out the worst heat of the day, and then I knew I had to keep moving. I couldn’t let the cult find me. If I were going to die, it wouldn’t be naked and chained to the floor. It wouldn‘t be in service of hatching some apocalyptic monster. 

I took the gun and fired a test round through the floor, and was pleased to see I’d picked the right ammo. Then I guzzled some more water and set back out into the woods. 

The sun started to grow low, and for once, I desperately didn’t want it to. Shadows loomed, and the forest began to feel sinister.  A feeling I’d loved when I didn’t understand the full scope of the horrible things that lurked in the dark.

My heartbeat, that had never quite gone back to its usual rhythm, quickened even further when something jumped out of the brush in front of me. 

It froze, and stared at me, and once I recognized the form of a deer, I calmed down. It watched me, waiting for me to leave, but I didn’t. Finally, it stepped away, into the shadows. Its form began to melt into the trees. I realized it might very well be the last animal I would ever see. 

As I watched the deer walk away, climbing against the rays of the setting sun, I tried to understand why I’d wanted to leave this world so badly. 

I thought about all of the experiences I’ll never have, what I’ll never see. The life I could have had, if I’d only wanted to. And I think that if I’d lived a little bit longer, I could have learned to find beauty in the places that people are meant to. 

I walked until it was too dark to keep going. And I sat down on a fallen log, one soft with moss and decay. I set the gun I’d stolen on my lap and looked at it in the twilight. 

I could almost pretend it was something else in the dark. 

More than once in my short life, I’d gone online and searched those dark corners of the web for things I shouldn’t. Discussions focused on the least painful way to kill yourself. And I’d wished enviously that my mother owned a gun. 

Those forums were always rife with do-gooders. The people who reminded you about those who survive. Those who’ve jumped from a bridge and said the second they were in the air, they regretted jumping. And I’d always thought that I would be the exception. 

But sitting here now, I knew I wasn’t. 

The night grew later, and I played my old game of looking into the dark, of puzzling shapes out of gray on darker gray. Of waiting for something to emerge. Only now I was desperately hoping it would be help. Some miracle coming to save my life. 

Only when I heard voices and dogs baying in the distance did I know that my time was up. And I took some small measure of comfort in knowing that I’d be taking something from the people who were hunting me. 

I joined the ranks of those who’d realized only in freefall, or with a stomach full of pills, that they’d made a horrible mistake. But it was too late to stop it. 

At long last, I did what I’d fantasized about for so many years. I put the gun to my chest, right above whatever monstrosity was growing in my heart. And I pulled the trigger. 

Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the Podcast inside your House! To hear every tale of terror as they are released, subscribe to our show on your podcast app or on Youtube or follow us on Instagram, Tumblr and Bluesky. Until next time, remember that the greatest journeys begin on the inside.