The look of death...

Cassie Ambrose begged for her life as her boyfriend, Alec Lewis held her over the edge of the abyss. She didn’t think he would let go, but she thought wrong. Alec let go. The sweet Alec who shared his lunch with her when she didn’t have one. The boy who fought for her when no one else did, sent her to her death. But she didn’t blame him, because of what she was. None of that mattered now, she was falling to her death. Her terrible life was ending. It felt as if she was falling for centuries, maybe she was. All she could see was darkness and the regret of her life. Cassie closed her eyes as she fell. Who would remember her? No one now. Her parents weren’t parents. They drowned in alcohol years ago. Her brother had an odd death years before that. She was alone. She started to cry. As she cried, her tears didn’t fall down her face they just simply lifted into the air. The farther she fell the hotter the air got, the denser. She landed on the damp floor of a chamber, her bones cracked and echoed on the wet rocks that surrounded her yet felt no pain. 

She wasn’t dead, but how? She had heard her spine break. She opened her eyes, although she was afraid of what she might see. Would she see God, or the devil, or nothing at all? She saw neither. All she saw were trees, trees for miles. She was in a forest. The trees were dark and so tall they grazed the clouds. The grass beneath her was drenched in blood, but not hers. As she stood up her whole body ached with pain. Probably from the fall. The sky was cloudy, with no sun in sight. Only heavy, gray clouds. It was chilly. Her clothes didn’t help, all she had on was blue jeans, a black t-shirt that read ‘lifeline’ in bold cursive and disintegrated blue Converse. Cassie started walking she didn’t know where she would go or end up. She followed the rhythm of the birds. The birds chirped a beautiful melody. It was occasionally interrupted by the crickets or strong gusts of wind, creating a beautiful score of nature. It didn’t compare to the piano scores her father had played when he was drunk. The score sang to her, it led her.  She didn’t know where she was, but she loved this place, this world. It was breathtaking, the plants and wildlife. 

She passed a dozen dead patches of trees and flowers mixed within lively vibrant colored dandelions. The colorful dandelions glowed in the dark, cloudy sky. Cassie spotted something moving in the dandelions. She stepped closer, it moved, it had sensed her. After a standstill, it relieved itself, it ran behind the bushes on the other side of Cassie. She saw that it was a pure white cat, with something strange attached to its back. Cassie called to it, “Here kitty, here!” It crept out from behind the bush. That strange thing attached to its back was wings. Wings? A cat that could fly? How exciting! Cassie reached out a hand, the cat didn’t seem scared anymore, it even purred. “Where’s your owner, buddy?” she asked as she patted it. The only response she got was a sweet meow. She laughed. Cassie wanted to keep walking, but she couldn’t leave the cat here, she decided she’d take the cat with her. She said to the cat as she patted it, “You want to come with me?” The cat acted as if it understood and took off leading her. 

She followed the cat for about an hour. She could hear water rushing. Good, she thought. She needed water, she was parched, being held by the neck is not good for thirst. The source of the water was a fast river descending the landscape. The water was a clear hue of blue. She could see fish of all colors and shapes swimming around. Cassie cupped some water into her hands and took a slip. The taste was clear, she smiled as she felt the water trickling down her throat. Cassie and the cat rested for a moment then continued walking upstream. Instead of going straight, across the river, the cat-headed up the river toward the snowy mountains in the distance.

The sky started to darken. Cassie and the cat had been walking for a long time. She needed to rest but there was no place to go. She had that familiar frightening feeling in the pit of her stomach. She was used to that feeling, her whole childhood was built around that feeling. The score of nature was still there, with occasional meows from the cat. It was soon dark and she could only see that cat’s fluffy tail hanging high in the sky in front of her. As she walked deeper into the night, she felt like she started to hear things. Strange new sounds were being introduced, they were animal sounds. Growls, groans, howls, and rushed crunching of leaves. The cat started to walk faster so Cassie tried to speed her pace up but failed as her legs were starting to give out. She came upon a hollow log, she climbed inside and laid down. Once her head hit the wooden interior she was soundly asleep. The cat slept outside guarding her against the unknown world.

The sky was still dark when she woke up. She sat up and crawled out of the log, she couldn’t help but hit her head. When her eyes adjusted to the light of the street, she didn’t see the trees, the river, or the cat anymore. Now she saw beautiful people intertwined within Victorian-style buildings and architecture. The beautiful people were dressed even more beautifully, more elegantly. The women wore rich colored, complex dresses and the men wore shiny dark tailored suits. The people didn’t notice Cassie though. “Miss?” she asked a woman in red who walked by but didn’t hear her. Cassie was in awe of the architecture and the sound of the tapping of heels on the pavement. Cassie observed the buildings. There was a cafe, library, shoemaker, cigar store, apothecary, post office, and general store. In the middle of the road sat a fountain of glowing water. An older-looking man was sitting on the ledge of the fountain smoking a pipe. Cassie made eye contact with him but quickly looked away. She discreetly made her way around and out of the crowd to where he awaited.

“Hello Cassandra,” he whispered looking up at her. The sound of her name out of his mouth sent shivers down her spine. She looked into his eyes as for a clue for how she’d know him. She found none, he was a stranger, all she saw were eyes as dark as the night sky you could see the stars within them. The man slipped his pipe into his dirty trench coat pocket. How did he know her name? What was this place? Where did the forest go? And where was the fluffy flying cat? 

“How do you know my name?” she asked. The man didn’t answer. He simply sat there staring at nothing. “Hello?” she waved a hand back and forth in front of his face. After no response, Cassie rolled her eyes and started toward the library. He held out a hand, reaching for her. 

He looked uneasy as he begged, “You are cursed, Cassandra,” a pause as he coughed, “Elizabeth Ambrose” Cassie whipped around at her name. The man coughed deeper this time causing him to shake, his eyes rolled into the back of his head. He mumbled, “She who looks into the eyes of death will become death itself,” he tipped over gasping for air. “Run Cassandra and don’t look back for anyone!” 

“What?” she asked firmly. What did he mean? Will she become death itself? Out of nowhere, she heard a loud shriek. The shriek shook the ground. She looked around for the source of the sound, but she saw no one. All those once elegantly dressed people previously woven into the buildings were now knitted into rotting skeletons. The smell stung Cassie’s nose, she could feel bile rise in her throat. When she turned back around the man was gone, as if he had vanished into thin air. Where he sat a piece of paper laid. She grabbed it, shoving it into her pocket. She heard a second shriek. This time it was right in her ear. The words of the man rang in her ears. Run. As she ran the rotting skeletons started after her. Why were they chasing her? What happened to them? She had to get somewhere safe. 

She ran as fast as her short legs would take her. She was back in the forest now. She could hear the stomps of the skeletons behind her. They created a wicked countermelody to nature. Another shriek shook the ground. Cassie quickly glanced behind her to investigate. A few yards behind her a woman was running after her. All Cassie could see was that the woman was surrounded by darkness. The woman was dark. The air was so cold it stung Cassie’s eyes as she ran, passing dozens of trees and flowers.

The sky was becoming a brighter shade of gray. The sun was coming up, behind the clouds. She had been running for that long? She needed a break, or she was going to break! When was this going to be over or was she going to keep running for all eternity? The woman shrieked again causing the ground to shake, along with the trees and the score of nature. Cassie shook, losing her balance, she stumbled to regain it. The woman started to laugh. She heard the clashing of metal against metal and then felt a stab in the back. The woman had thrown a dagger in Cassie’s back. Cassie screamed. A dagger was stuck in her back. What was she going to do now? 

Her pace started to slow. Cassie’s body was slowing but her mind wasn’t. She needed to keep going, the dagger in her back didn’t help. It made it worse. She could feel the woman getting closer as she slowed. She needed to survive. She fought the pain and the exhaustion and pushed. She began to speed up, but she slipped on sudden roots appearing from nowhere. Great, all that work for nothing and where did those roots come from? She laid on her stomach defeated, leaves, and mud in her face. She couldn’t get up, some force confined her. She heard the rustling of leaves and a crescendo of skeletons marching. It was the woman and her slaves. She dug the dagger further into Cassie’s back, twisting and turning it. Cassie screamed in pain! The woman skimmed the back of Cassie’s heart with the dagger then yanked it out and kicked Cassie over. Cassie was on her back now, facing her killer, but was this her killer? Was this her time?

The woman sang with a sigh, “The Cassandra Elizabeth Ambrose.” Her voice was captivating yet unworldly. “I’ve been waiting for a very long time for this day.” The woman laughed. Cassie kept her eyes closed. She thought this was her death and she didn’t want to see her killer nor give them the satisfaction they so longed for. “Cassandra you there?’ the woman asked as she bent down and knocked on Cassie's head. Cassie flinched at the encounter. She kept her eyes tight until she heard a sweet voice she loved dearly.

“Honey bear,” a familiar voice said. Cassie recognized her voice immediately. Her mother. Her sweet dead mother, here, talking to her!

“Mom?” Cassie asked keeping her eyes closed.

“Yes, honey,” her mother’s voice quivered. Cassie held her hand up searching for her mother’s face. Her mother’s hand grabbed Cassie’s “Baby girl, can you do me a favor?” she asked.

“Uh-huh,” she replied, squeezing her mother’s hand tight.

“Let me see your emerald eyes shine, I haven't seen them in eight years.” Cassie opened her eyes, but her mother wasn’t there. Cassie wasn’t holding her mother’s head; she was handing a decomposing thin gray hand that belonged to the woman. Darkness hovered around her. She had no defined face only an outline but a distinctive set of eyes. They were blood red. Cassie couldn’t resist, she stared into them. 

When Cassie looked deep into those eyes, she saw all of her victims. Their deaths. Her brother, her mother, Alec’s sister, Mrs. Graham, and Mr. Brown. She first saw her mother’s burnt corpse on the kitchen floor. She started to cry. Then she saw Alec’s sister's bruised, broken body after being thrown into the sky by Cassie’s miraculous wind. Her brother, that she drowned. Mrs. Graham, her favorite teacher, who she suffocated from the inside out. Cassie had filled Mrs. Graham with soil from the Earth. The pain of seeing these deaths made her want to die. She didn’t mean to kill them. They were accidents. After she relived the last death, Mr. Brown, Cassie saw the woman’s darkness once again and her eyes. She and the woman were in the chamber where Cassie hit after Alec dropped her. Cassie shivered; it was freezing. Cassie’s wound wasn’t there anymore, it was gone. Cassie watched as the woman’s darkness started to fade. Underneath the darkness was a breathtaking woman in a sheer burgundy dress. The woman’s eyes were not blood red anymore, they were crystal blue.

She spoke, her voice was still captivating but softer, “Cassandra the Cursed, You looked into my eyes, the eyes of death, now you are death. In 500 years, you will seek out another and they will become the death and you will live eternally with him.” The woman disappeared and Cassie started to ascend. Who was him and what just happened to her?  After a while, floating up, Cassie saw sunlight. When she reached the surface, it was warm on her face. She broke through the surface, from the abyss Alec threw her into, but Alec wasn’t there anymore neither was his car. There were no trees anymore. No wildlife. She landed on the dead stiff grass. She stood and started walking back down the road to town. The road was not even a road, just chunks of asphalt stuck in the ground. It was disintegrated, no other cars or traffic, and the trees were dead. After about fifteen minutes, she came across a car. The car wasn’t of her time period, it looked like something out of Star Trek. How long was she gone and whose car was that? 

She was two miles from town, and she wondered what awaited her there. She walked down Main street. There were some living wildlife and trees, but limited. She saw some people, they wore all white, same pants and shirts but each person had a different color tag on. The main street was different. All the buildings she had known were gone, replaced by new futuristic ones made of white-looking glass. She walked in between the trees, they looked fake, like they were wrapped in plastic. As she walked past them, they started to drop. They started to die. But why were they dying? Was it because of her? A woman with a red tag clipped to her shirt and hazel eyes approached her.

“Ma’am, where are your class classification tag and appropriate attire?” she asked as if commanding an answer.

 Cassie didn’t know what that meant, so she said, “Um, I don’t have it.” The woman gave a frustrated sigh. 

“Follow me,” the woman commanded. Cassie followed. They passed many people, some with green, blue, yellow, and purple tags. What were they for? Classification? But of what?

“Umm, Miss? Can you tell me what year it is?” Cassie asked as they walked towards a gray stone building. 

“2213,” the woman replied. Almost 200 yrs. later? What? How? The woman stopped beside a kiosk that read ‘TAGS’ in bold gray print. The woman asked, “What is your ID number?” When she didn’t get an answer, she grabbed Cassie’s wrist. The woman screamed when she touched Cassie. The woman fell to the ground, not moving. The woman’s eyes were opened, but they weren’t hazel anymore instead they were blood red. Was she dead? Did Cassie kill her? Cassie bent down and checked her pulse. There was none.

She was dead.