Like I haven’t asked myself that question. Look what it led to. Exiled from home, leaving what was left of my family in the care of Alex and Vivian, who I selfishly assumed would take care of her. Running away with my tail between my legs. No contact with anyone for fifteen years.
I still don’t know the answer. And then the world snaps around me like a rubber band.
I’m standing outside a San Pedro warehouse at night, a smoking hole of twisted metal in its side from a burning car that’s been run straight through. One man is on the ground, the other is slumped over the hood.
I’d loaded the car with a bunch of propane tanks and opened the taps, wrapped the whole mess in detcord. And then, when the man who killed my parents came outside, I stuck a brick on the accelerator. A small fire spell, once the car hit the warehouse, took care of the rest.
This time I’m not reliving the memory, I’m watching it. I can see myself walking across the parking lot from behind a shipping container, full of piss and vinegar and unending rage. Younger me grabs the man on the hood, Jean Boudreau. Punches and kicks him.
This is different from Canter’s or at the house fire. This is watching myself instead of being in the middle of it. The actions might feel distant, but the rage is white hot and present. Even now I’m getting a sick sort of glee out of watching myself beat the living fuck out of Boudreau.
I remember every one of those blows. How my hand kept creeping toward the Browning in my waistband. I wanted to drag it out, make him hurt. How I eventually decided that I could do something so much worse than shoot him.
I remember being glad I hadn’t killed him, that he was conscious. I wanted him to be awake. I wanted him to know what was happening to him. I watch myself slap him hard and his eyes jerk open. He tries to go for a gun, but it’s kicked out of his hand to go skittering across the pavement.
Boudreau’s weak, disoriented. Broken bones for sure. If he’d been any more aware of his surroundings he’d have killed me. I gave him the mother of all sucker punches, and it didn’t even occur to me that I had no idea what the hell I was doing. I knew a handful of spells. He could have wiped the floor with me.
Younger me drags Boudreau away from the wreckage, bunches his fists in the man’s shirt collar. I remember that moment. The spell I’d only tried a few times before. I knew it was possible the way I knew I could tie my shoes when I was a toddler, but I still had trouble doing it.
But that’s how most magic works. We don’t write much shit down. There’s no point. We learn from experimentation, picking up tips from other mages, doing what feels natural.
And much as it strained me and took forever to cast as I tried to get it right, I remember it feeling like the most natural thing in the world.
Then they’re gone. No flash of light or weird noises. Just there one second and gone the next. I took him over to the ghost’s side. Took him there and called to any ghost who cared to listen.
And then I fed him to them like I was chumming sharks.
“I’d do it again,” I say. And I would. Hell, I did. When I came back to L.A. a shred of Boudreau’s soul had somehow reconstituted itself, sucking ghosts in to rebuild. I put him down pretty much the same way. Only I’m the one who ate his soul.
“No regrets?” says the voice. It’s changing. Becoming more feminine. Out to the side of the warehouse, standing among the shipping containers I can see someone. Blurry, like the woman who got out of the car.
“Not a one,” I say. “Why do you care, anyway? If you’re trying to make me feel remorse about this, that’s not happening.”
“Not even for the consequences?”
“Me leaving L.A.? Small price to pay to protect Lucy and my friends.”
“But it didn’t. What do you have left, Eric? You got a short-term gain for a long-term loss. You won the battle, but you lost the war.”
I can’t take my eyes off the figure in the distance. It’s becoming more distinct, more solid, but I still can’t make out enough detail to know who it is.
“Is that you over there?” I start walking toward the figure. She, he, it’s hard to tell, is standing in the shadows, watching me, not moving. I pull the obsidian blade from its sheath in my pocket. This whole thing is bullshit and I’m tired of it. I’m tired of gods and afterlives and getting dicked around. I’m tired of cryptic non-clues.
“Actions have consequences, Eric,” says the voice. It’s all around me. Louder now. Definitely a woman, but there’s a distortion to it.
“Yeah, like my boot up your ass.” The figure still hasn’t moved. If I shank this observer, or concierge, or whatever the hell it is, maybe it’ll pop me out of this place.
The scene shifts again, shimmering around me like water rippling after a stone thrown in. The warehouse, the parking lot, the figure in the distance, they all fade away to be replaced with a brightly lit house. White walls, white carpet, modern lines. The art on the wall a series of black and white photos, the decor modern and minimalist. I can smell sea air wafting in through an open window and the slight sewer scent of the canals off Venice Beach.