MirrorWorld

The chamber resembles a coliseum with staggered seating, wrapping around two sides, stopping before a second archway on the far side. Dread of all types, including some I’ve never encountered, line the benches. I feel like I’ve just walked onto the field of a football stadium, only no one is clapping and the opposing team is straight out of a nightmare.

Against every instinct, I take another step forward. Then another. By the third step, I’ve managed to insert a little confidence into my stride. I head for the center of the chamber, where Maya is being held. She’s framed by two of the largest Dread I’ve seen, only smaller than the Dread mole. The behemoths look almost elephantine, but where their trunks should be are writhing masses of short, pale tendrils resembling a bull’s tongue. The tendril length tapers up the thing’s head, forming a line between its six eyes and a moving mane along its back. Its massive body pulses with green blood and ripples with muscles. The jaws, which split at the bottom, stretching a translucent sheet of flesh between the sides, are slung open like a baseball catcher’s open mitt. I turn my attention away from the giants—the mammoths—and back to Maya.

She’s conscious and watching me with red, swollen eyes, but her mouth is clamped shut. At first I think they’ve frightened her into silence. Then I see the wriggling tendrils of a Medusa-hands behind her head. It must sense my attention because it skitters out from behind one of the mammoths, slowly wrapping even more tendrils around Maya’s waist.

Behind all of this, a squirming mass of tentacles, each as thick as my thigh and nearly fifteen feet tall, rises into the air. I know they’re connected to a Dread mole hidden beneath the surface, but I can’t help see each of them as a separate living thing. Given the thickness of the tendrils, the beast beneath this chamber must be huge. The word “kaiju” comes to mind. If such a thing got loose in the world of humanity, they’d make movies about it.

I stop halfway between the archway and Maya. I glance back, confirming what I already suspected. The exit is blocked by six bulls, four Medusa-hands, and a pack of wary pugs. I won’t be leaving.

“Don’t be afraid,” Maya says, and her words, clearly those of the Medusa-hands controlling her, make me laugh.

Maya and the Medusa-hands behind her cock their heads to the side in unison. “You are afraid, are you not? This is new to you, Josef Shiloh. We have felt it.”

“What do you want?” I ask, picking targets. My goal right now is to free Maya long enough to beg for her forgiveness.

“Understanding.”

“I understand you well enough,” I say and nearly open fire, but don’t. If there is even a tiny fraction of a hope that Maya can survive this, I need to play along. For now.

“And then what?” I ask.

“Your help.”

I laugh. I can’t help myself. The idea of helping the Dread feels like Hitler asking me to help build a gas chamber. Why on earth would I help these bastards?

“We will free your wife,” Maya says, referring to herself. “We saw your past. This is acceptable to you.”

“Don’t tell me what I think,” I say, but know they’re right. They peeked into my mind and scoured my memories before they’d been returned to me.

The mammoths take two long steps to either side. The thick tendrils behind the Medusa-hands and Maya turn toward me, snaking forward.

“We will help you remember,” Maya says.

“Remember what?”

“Everything.”

“My memory is—”

“Fractured,” she says.

“How do you know?” I ask.

There’s no reply. They don’t need to explain, because I have no choice. I have to do it. Killing a few more Dread won’t bring Simon back, and it would be a fairly hollow revenge. But saving Maya … that is something worth dying for. I have no idea if the Dread can be trusted. Probably not. But picking a fight guarantees her death.

I slide the Desert Eagle into the chest holster, hold out my empty hands, and walk toward the outstretched Dread-mole tendrils. I stop a few feet short. “Fix her.”

Maya and the Medusa-hands cock their heads in the other direction. “Explain.”

“Undo what you did to her mind. Setting her free will do nothing for her if she spends the rest of her life in a hospital bed. Take away her fear.”

Maya twitches suddenly, then stops and says, “It is done.”

“Let me talk to her.”

Maya blinks and then looks around, showing no reaction until her eyes land on me. Then she smiles the way she used to. She reaches out a hand. “Josef. You—” And then she’s gone. Silenced again.

“That’s not enough,” I say, thinking twice about my gun. I’m being played. They’ll never let her go. She could be dead already for all I know. A puppet. Before I can make a choice, it’s made for me.

I turn around at the sound of a scuff. There’s no avoiding the tendril that has snaked around behind me. It springs up like a striking snake, splitting open to reveal a mass of smaller tentacles that open and engulf my face. The twisting limbs cushion my fall, just a fraction of a second before they invade my mind for a second time.





53.