And this one was bad.
Anyone could have been forgiven for believing that where they were was, literally, hell. Or, at the very least, some acid trip or horror movie version of hell. All the worst bits of Revelation and Dante’s Inferno, with even scarier stuff added in for horror fun.
The air was full of a horrible smell and choking ash, and as Reno stood there looking around, trying to tell herself that this was no worse than other visions had been, it became worse.
It became a lot worse.
The ash in the air thinned out enough to allow her to see more of her surroundings. Unfortunately.
The heat was searing, the rotten-egg smell of brimstone acrid, and the ash from unseen but roaring fires drifted down—and drifted up—and drifted sideways. The alien landscape, as far as the eye could see, was a sickly reddish brown, with jagged rocks that looked razor-sharp and thick, muddy streams slopping between the rocks, and here and there a stunted, twisted tree, bare limbs charred and bent downward in defeated submission.
And . . . the creatures. Dozens of them, more, dotting the raw landscape as far as she could see. Crouched and standing, still or swaying back and forth, with a few curled up on the rocky ground making pitiful soft noises that were awful to hear and impossible to ever forget.
They might once have been human but looked deformed now, bodies twisted, limbs partially missing, their faces skewed, almost melted, the features blunted or open or missing. Some of them looked skeletal but with burned flesh clinging to bones, crackling sounds audible as they shifted and turned.
To stare at Reno and her forgotten companion, or to listen if they had no eyes, or maybe just obeying the blind and deaf but primitive sense of an unusual presence and possible threat in their horrific reality.
“What is this place?” she demanded of the nearest . . . creature.
It did not answer, but cringed away as a shadow detached itself from a towering, jagged rock and stepped forward, toward Reno. She recognized it only because she had heard of Shadow People, beings from the spirit realm, or even deeper and much farther away, that might have once been human in some distant past.
But now, from everything she had heard whispered on what some wryly or mockingly called the psychic grapevine, the current thinking was that they were simply the human-shaped utter blackness of everything wrong, twisted, sick, perverted, and evil—the psychic spillover of horrors poured into a creepily recognizable shape. Pure negative energy. As if they had been feeding for eons on the evil emotions and evil acts committed by humans.
And maybe they had.
Some people had called them demons.
This one made itself taller, elongated, towering over Reno and the stunned, terrified date she had completely forgotten about.
“Neat trick,” she said to the Shadow creature, tilting her head slightly to look up, but not otherwise moving. “Now answer my question. What is this place?”
“Hell,” it answered in a croak.
“No, this isn’t hell,” she countered immediately. “Been there.”
A laugh like dry kindling scraping together came from the Shadow. “This is your earth, Reno,” it said in that scratchy, unused voice.
She had been holding fear at bay, most of a lifetime of practice allowing her to keep it out of her voice and expression, because she knew that whatever and wherever this place was, she was here only in spirit. It was a vision. And in her visions, she had discovered, the bad ones at least, any fear from her gave the various . . . beings . . . she confronted power over her. And sometimes made it more difficult for her to escape the vision if things got dicey. But when the towering Shadow said this was earth, she felt a genuine jolt of horror.
“What are you talking about? Some kind of war is going to do this?” The ugly landscape all around her certainly could have been the seared devastation of some insane nuclear conflict.
Without the creatures, at least.
Or maybe with them too.
“Not that kind of war. Not soldiers in uniform fighting for flag and country, dying on battlefields.” The Shadow creature’s voice was still inhuman, yet managed to be mocking as well. “A different struggle. Too much evil building unchecked for too long. Darkness. Hunger. Need. Gathering. Growing stronger. Upsetting the natural balance.”
Trying to think clearly, Reno said, “I would have thought you . . . creatures . . . would love that. Why show me? I’m shown things I can change, always.”
The Shadow laughed again, weirdly both scornful and anxious. “This is something you need to change. Need to stop . . . if you can. To prevent if you can. Hold the line. Better for all if the boundaries between our worlds, our realities, are . . . maintained. An occasional portal or door opened here and there is one thing, releasing pressure, easing the strain. Natural. Normal. The way things are supposed to be.
“This . . . is something else. A dead and burning earth is no more use to us than it is to you. And if you die, if you are destroyed, so are we. We need the chaos of humanity, the destructive fear and evil you create. The negative energy. We need to . . . feed. To exist. We balance you. The universe demands balance. Go to Prosperity, Reno. The very earth there is ready to heave itself open. To spill out evil even we can’t absorb. Can’t control. You must stop it.”
“What, alone?”
“There will be others. Those who need to be there with you are being called. Some already on their way. Balance, Reno. We all need balance if we’re to survive.”
Reno had more questions than she could count, but as quickly as the vision had begun, it was over. And she was sitting at a small table at a sidewalk café on a cool Chicago morning, breathing in fresh air, the weak October sunshine making her blink.
She felt the death grip on her hand abruptly released, and looked up to see her date lurching to his feet. His face was pasty white, and though he tried several times, he was clearly unable to say a word.
Dammit, there goes another potential boyfriend.
“It’s okay, Jake,” she said wryly. “I don’t expect to hear from you again. As for this little . . . adventure . . . I’m sure you’ll be able to explain it away somehow.”
“You’re crazy!” he finally yelped.
“I expect that’ll do,” she murmured.
And, as he hurried away without a backward look, almost running, she called after him, “No, really, I’ll take care of the check.” And then her worser self reared its head, and she shouted, “And don’t forget your mother’s birthday next week!”
By then, he was definitely running.
The shout made the pain in her head worse, but she decided it had been worth it.
She was being stared at by others at the café. She could feel it. But Reno ignored them all. After most of a lifetime, she’d gotten pretty good at that. No use trying to control what she couldn’t.
She summoned a waiter with a glance, asked for the check, then asked, “Can you give me the time?” She wasn’t wearing a watch.
The young waiter looked at the large watch on his own wrist and replied, “It’s eleven forty-five, ma’am.”
“Exactly?”
“Yes, ma’am. Your check, ma’am.” He looked after her hastily departed date, clearly somewhat indignant on her behalf.
Reno didn’t notice. She glanced at the total printed on the check and placed several bills in the folder, covering the meal and adding a generous tip, then closed it and returned it to him. “Keep the change.”
“Thank you, ma’am. More coffee?”