Prologue











The bath water obediently turned cold as his always icy hand surfaced it, making miniature whirlpools. He climbed into the bath, slowly, making sure the steamy clear liquid didn’t scorch his skin, even though the water was only luke warm. He lay back, a cigarette in one hand, dreams in another. He had words running through his head, not stopping for breath. They taunted him with their awful rhymes and pitiful meaning. He hadn’t written a good poem for months and the bills were waiting sorrowfully on the marble kitchen table. He lay back and took a puff of exuberance. He closed and relaxed his body, almost in a meditated stage. His ears picked up for the caressing sweetness of his sweetheart’s voice he could hear. She was home. He heard her rustling about outside the bathroom door, he could hear the split second the plastic bags that she was carrying had hit the oak table and her soft sigh as she realised she had carelessly forgotten to buy something. The corners of his mouth raised. Emily was all that he was living for. Her and the ability to write some posh words on paper and make them beautiful. Well, he used to have that unique and rewardful ability. His creativity had seemed to be terminated for some time, yet he couldn’t understand why. He had a beautiful girlfriend, his biggest and most powerful muse yet, but he didn’t know how to pour his feelings on paper. He wanted to cut his heart open and let it bleed all over the dove white parchment, yet his heart was dry of emotion. Or maybe his head was. Maybe he was looking to deep into this. Maybe his heart wasn’t connected to his brain. Or maybe his was a poetic mess whose morals didn’t make sense half the time. He was convinced that the world stopped turning when he touched Emily’s hand and soul. He sighed. He was a useless romantic. Poems and flowers weren’t a match to cigarettes and coffee in his eyes, though in Emily’s eyes, it was different. She adored the fact he was a poet, for she herself possessed no creative ability and worked as a lawyer, where creativity ability interfered rarely, as if at all, in her job. They were like wine and water. But, as she always used to remind him, he was the wine, rich, delicate, ingenious, powerful a delicacy and she was the water, timid, drab, common and weak. He never liked to hear her talk so low of herself, but he could never stop it. Never stop the fact that she thought he was higher and herself. Teagan Divine, for that was the poet’s name, secretly liked that she complimented him, yet drowned his sorrows in water after guilt had seized him. He lay down; thinking of idea, of the split second something even half meaningful entered his head. He thought so hard, he gave himself a headache, but a minor annoyance was not going to stop him from thinking up a masterpiece. He puffed again, inhaling deeply, as if the smoke would inspire him. He immersed himself with water, holding his breath, yet unknowledgeable not knowing it would be a while before he would rise from that water. Everything went black...
Part I – Highway To Hell
He gasped for breath and clutched his heart. He was in a state of shock for a second, mouth a gape, wide eyed. He felt his body. It was dry and clothed. He looked around. He was not in a bathtub, neither was he in water any more, quite the opposite. He was in a car, a 1929 Lasalle 328 Sedan in fact. The car was accelerating by itself, moving down a long dirt path in the distance. Teagan had never driven a car in his life, let alone one made in the 1920’s. He pushed, clutched, groped everything in site, yet the car continued to accelerate. Realising he couldn’t do anything; he slouched in his chair, with his head in his hands. Was he dead? he thought, a worrying ache in his heart. Was this some twisted version of heaven? Well, it was more like a highway to hell than the stairway to heaven. He groaned, he head was hurting and he was petrified. Should he jump out of the car? He peered out of the window, only to find the dirt path was floating on mid air and everything else was a pitch ebony black hole. He bellowed, jumping back into his seat. He didn’t know what to think. His cigarettes. He searched himself, yet found no little blue boxes. He panicked. He found himself to be mentally unstable, his head running to fast for him to keep up with. His heart nearly bursting out of his chest, yet even the littlest things can be calming, which in this case, they were. A Siam cat appeared on his seat, if by magic and stared at him intently, its icy blue eyes looking straight into Teagan’s heart. Teagan stared at the cat in disbelief. Things couldn’t possibly get stranger.
“Who are you!?” he screamed at the cat, idiotically, since asking cats questions is a foolish thing to do.
The cat stared at him for a moment longer and answered,
“Lucifer Sam, sir. The witch’s cat.”
Teagan jumped and scurried to the edge of the car, near the window. He gasped, as if for his life and his panic ridden eyes seamed to bounce from his sockets. Talking cats?! Right, he was really dead now.
“Okay, i’m going to jump out of this window and i’ll never know a talking cat existed and I can live a happy life... Uh... Whatever life is down there,” he said, rather calmly, with a hint of panic in his voice.
He was getting ready to perch on the edge of the window, until the cat replied,
“Oh, please don’t, sir.”
Teagan looked at him stupid and cried,
“What is this, Alice In Wonderland?!”
“Oh, no, sir,” the cat corrected him. “This is no fairytale.”
Teagan entered the car and approached the cat, the cat sat still, not moving an inch, in perfect posture.
“Am I dead?” Teagan questioned. He could be dead, if anyone didn’t know better, for his once exuberant eyes were lifeless and his skin was pasty. Not that it was never always pasty, but it never had all the remaining life inside him drained out.
The cat shook its head. “Oh, no, sir. You are not dead, not in the least. You are in a better place that earth, than heaven. We don’t have a name for this place. Many people call it ‘Fantasy’.”
“So, i’m dreaming?”
“No. Just because it is called ‘Fantasy’, doesn’t mean it is not reality, sir.”
Teagan was confused. His head was swimming. Maybe he was having one of those vivid dreams again. Had he fallen asleep in the bath? Probably, but he never had a dream this vivid before. He over active imagination wasn’t this vivid, never. How strange. He sighed. He better humour the cat.
“So, who’s the witch?”
“Emily is, sir. She is the witch.”
He froze. Emily was the witch? Emily could never be a witch. A living angel she was, an angel who was too good in heaven so she had her pure white wings ripped from her back and thrown back down to earth, dirtying her pure white dress, making her no good for heaven any more, but too good for this world. For any world. Wait, maybe he was over-analyzing this. Lucifer Sam? Ah, that’s it. Teagan grinned. This has something to do with Emily blasting Pink Floyd in his ears, surely.
“So, what’s up with his witch then? Is she... Bad or something?”
“No, sir. She is not bad. She is a sorceress. The best around actually. A clever woman, witty, never fails a customer when they are looking for a potion or spell. I’m glad to be of her service, sir. But she’s ill, terminally ill. This is the worst news that anyone could ever ask for. All her spells and potions will were off when she dies, which means her customers, might die, get ill, see a loved one lose a life, lose a job. Millions of people will die, and you are the only one who can stop it, according to the prophecies... Master Teagan.”
Teagan started at the cat intently. How on earth could he stop it? The answer was he couldn’t. He lifted an eyebrow and was going to tell this cat exactly how he felt, but luckily the glanced forwards. The long road was ending and a cliff was at the end, taunting him, whispering in his ear how close he was to death. Teagan jumped at the steering wheel and tried to pull it off course, but the leather wheel came off in his hands. Teagan ducked and put his hands over his heard and let out a wail of desperation. Isn’t this the time when life was supposed to flash before his eyes? All he could see was the inside of the car. He tried to picture Emily’s face for the last time, but all he could see was the Siam cat when he closed his eyes. He slammed the inside of the car with frustration, his fists clenched and his eyes watering. He noticed Lucifer Sam scurry to the back of the car before he felt a pit in his stomach. He was falling, falling into an abyss of the unknown. Of destruction, dissolution of the mind, or to put it bluntly, the end. The end of the world for his soul. His warm blood would soon run cold. He fell and fell and fell...
Part II – Last Of The Wilds
He opened his eyes, flickering them, getting used to the bright spark above him. When his eyes were more focused, he realised the spark above was more like the sun had crashed upon earth and inhabited in the room. It was a chandelier. After nearly gotten blinded by the intensity of the burning lights above his head, he slowly got up and glanced around. He was in a ballroom. He looked down on the marble floor, it reflected himself. He stared at his own reflection for a while. The experience hadn’t changed him much; he still had those beady blue eyes, weary looking expression coming from them, almost if they couldn’t focus properly. If his eyes were red, he would know the devil had got a new disguise. Oh yeah, he thought, he was also in desperate need for a shave. He looked up and people had just come from no where, ballroom dancing with each other, swinging their loved ones around in their arms, grinning, laughing, having the time of their lives. The women had petticoats and corsets, with long, flowing and elaborate gowns on, some even with jewels encrusted. Happiness was etched onto their faces, underneath all that powder. The men wore tuxedos, dark suits with a rose carefully presented in their pockets. He even seen one slip an incrusted diamond onto his lady’s finger, while she giggled and carried on dancing. Teagan was left bewildered, watching all the blatantly aristocratic people waltz in circles. They all looked so distantly familiar. Had he dreamt of them before? Before he knew it, he was being swept in the arms of some woman. They began to waltz. The woman smiled and laughed joyously. She was an elderly lady, her ivory hair neatly cropped on her head. She had a black dress on, incrusted with red and green jewels on the hem. Looking at it now, everyone was wearing black. Her dress was darker than night, pure ebony. She had high cheekbones and a thinning face, a frail old lady. She caressed Teagan’s face. He looked closer and realised it was his mother... His mother than had been dead for the past 10 years.
“Mother?!” he exclaimed, nearly fainting from shock.
He tried to hug her, but he couldn’t his feet couldn’t stop moving, stop dancing. They span each other around the room, like all the other guests at this party. He kept calling her name, yet she was oblivious. She just kept grinning at him like a chesere cat. A cat. He groaned. Just then, she swung him out to someone else. He extended his arm, trying to reach for her, as if he was reaching for the last star in the sky. He fell into the arms, of this time a gentleman. While waltzing around, he took a good look at this man’s face. His soft eyes and broad smile, his grey beard with speckles of black in it. It was his Uncle. Teagan’s eyes teared up, with happiness, yet of frustration for not being able to clutch him, to embrace him, he just couldn’t let go of his hand and even if he was able to, desire kept him on. His Uncle, who had passed away just a year ago from natural causes, was a person, he himself, was willing to die for. His Uncle had been the most important part of his life, especially the latter years. He had guided him and carried him through the world, more than his parents ever did. Teagan wanted to call out, but he couldn’t seem to open his mouth. He was still in a state of shock. The friendly eyes of his Uncle winked at him, glittering as his eyelid flickered. Teagan was shocked and ironically fell backwards, falling out of his Uncles grip. He was span into the middle of the ballroom floor. Teagan breathed deeply, looking around at everyone dancing. He finally realised why they all looked so similar, all looked so similar to him. They were all his dead ancestors. Teagan was in a state of panic. Everything was going so fast. Everyone was dancing faster, but he realised his panic was the cause of this illusion. He was grabbed once again, but when he seen the mystery woman who had grabbed him, he was a little more than taken a back. He was holding hands with no other than Emily. She kept laughing, a high pitched drawl. He could barely move his feet, she had to drag him along. Emily? She wasn’t dead. Why was he dancing with her? An omen? No, no that can’t be right. He just stared at her, for the longest of times, yet she still remained joyous, even conceited. He radiant smiled beamed upon him, yet he remained blank, all the emotion drained from his face. Just then the music had stopped and everyone stopped dancing, they all stood there robotically. Teagan managed to let go of her hands and tried to run, pushing statues of stiff figures away, but before he was half way to the door, a tune entered his head. It was fiddles, in an Irish style. All the statues of his ancestors came alive again, this time Irish dancing. Teagan had paused, only for a moment, to see this transformation, but when his thirst of curiosity had been satisfied, he ran again, full speed, pushing past his ancestors, without a care, while they danced to the fiddle. When he had finally run to the balcony, he tried to stop himself running when he had noticed it, scraping his feet on the concrete. He timidly walked up to it and looked over the balcony edge. Much like the car, there was nothing there but a dark abyss, the black hole of the sky. He breathed deeply. Down there was life and death, heaven and hell. It held all the answered, but he had no questions. He held hope, but he wasn’t completely hopeless. It held death, but in retrospect, he was half dead already.
“Dance with me!”
Teagan tumbled back in shock of the voice out of thin air. He grabbed hold of the railings. He looked up intently, only to find Emily standing there with a broad smile. Teagan blinked his eyes repeatedly, while a faint smile climbed onto his face.
“Heaven help you catch me if I fall,” he whispered to her, before reached out to her and letting go of the railing that had kept his life.
Emily knelt down, her hand extended as Teagan plummeted down into the unknown, his hand still reaching out for the girl above him.
Part III – Knights Of Cydonia
Teagan opened his eyes violent and scurried up quickly. He was sitting on dry, golden, scorching sand that burnt his hands. He stood up and held hands up in defence from the blazing sun over his head. It seemed like he had been dropped in the middle of no, the middle of the Sahara dessert. Lord, he hopped not. He collapsed on the sand. It blew all over his feet and hands. He scrunched his eyes up, protecting them from the suns glory and put his hands over his face. After lying there for only a moment, he felt a creature of some sort crawl up his legs. The creature elegantly purred and rested on his chest, a small weight for such an animal. Teagan opened his eyes and laid them upon Lucifer Sam. Lucifer Sam stared at him intently, waiting for Teagan to make the next move. Teagan groaned and lifted the Siam cat off his chest and gently placed him on the sand. Teagan sat up and crossed his legs. He rubbed his eyes and questioned, very tiredly,
“Where am I? What do you want?” he whined.
The cat retorted, in a rather posh manner,
“Sir, this is Cydonia.”
“And is that supposed to explain everything to me?”
“Well, it should, sir.”
Teagan raised an eyebrow. “Well, i’ve never heard of Cydonia. I’m more worried about how I get out of it.”
Teagan stood up and walked into the distance. Lucifer Sam trotted to keep up with him.
“Are you forgetting about Miss. Emily, sir? She needs help, you can’t leave. She needs her one true love to wake her up from this dreadful sleep.”
Teagan abruptly stopped walking and paused. He stood sill for a minute and turned to face the cat.
“What does this place have anything to do with Emily?”
Teagan swore he could see a grin appear on the cat’s face.
“Oh, everything, sir. Here, this will prove your love for Miss. Emily. We all know she heart-wrenchingly loves you. She would bleed her veins for you, dry. But do you love her with so much passion is the question, sir. Here we will find out if your heart beats fierce, just as much as hers.”
Before Teagan could retort, Lucifer Sam scurried out of sight. What was the cat on about? Teagan questioned. How could he prove his love here? Just then, all his questions were answered.
“Early, are we? I’m surprised someone like you turned up at all, you must want that girl’s heart, but i’m telling you boy, I want it more.”
Teagan froze. He was too scared to turn around and face the voice behind him.
“Come on! Face me!”
Teagan gulped and shuffled his feet around. Behind him was a cowboy, to say the least. He was muscularly built, with a white, yet soiled, vest on and denim blue jeans, like any stereotypical cowboy, not forgetting the cowboy hat. He had a tangled beard spouting from his chin and a feeble moustache on his face. He grinned staring at Teagan, who looked upon him so terrified. He laughed and drew a pistol out of his holder and faced it at Teagan.
“Ready to battle this out like men?”
Teagan felt himself up. He didn’t have a pistol or any weapon in fact. A rush of anxiousness filled his soul.
“I..I don’t have a gun.”
The cowboy sighed.
“How pathetic are you? We are cowboys, knights! And you don’t bring your weapon! Hey, Curly, give him yours. It doesn’t matter if it is full, I expect to win.”
Teagan hadn’t noticed a crowd had gathered to watch them battle it out. A curly haired male in the audience grabbed his gun and reluctantly handed it over to the cowboy, or knight as he had vainly called himself. He threw the pistol at Teagan.
“Catch.”
Teagan caught it clumsily. He had never fired a firearm before. He was a poet, not a policeman.
“I suppose you know the rules of the game and the prize, of course.”
“So it is kind of like The Quick And The Dead?” Teagan asked nervously, trying to maybe lighten the mood.
The cowboy laughed. “I guess. So we walk three paces, we draw and one of us gets a hole in our body. Simple as. And the prize is we get the lovely barman’s daughter.” He grinned.
Teagan looked petrified. He was going to get shot for sure, if he didn’t do anything about it. He looked at the eager crowd. He could even see a man placing bets, putting the money in his hat and smiling smugly.
“Right, Curly! Tell us when to shoot!” shouted the cowboy over his shoulder to the mop of curly hair behind him.
Teagan turned around timidly, hoping that some dumb luck would save him, since at the moment, death was clutching him and wasn’t quite ready to let him go. He walked three paces and turned around. The cowboy-knight had already turned around. He stood there confidently, his pistol already drawn. He winked at him and cocked his head. Teagan gulped and also drew his pistol, but with no where near the confidence of the cowboy-knight. Curly flickered his eyes from one to the other, before shouting the fatal words.
“Shoot!”
The cowboy-knight squeezed the trigger. The second he did so, Teagan had ducked, dropped his pistol and ran for his life and had just dodged the bullet. The crowd was roaring in displeasure. The man who had been taken bets was mobbed by angry customers, demanding their money back. Teagan carried on running into nowhere, followed by the angry knight, shooting randomly and shouting obscenities at him. Teagan, luckily, was small and agile and was a very fast runner. He finally came to a bar, which he hastily entered. He ran through it looking for a place to hide, followed by remarks such as,
“Hey, aren’t you supposed to be dead?”
“You’ve won! Yay! I get a tenner!”
“You break it, you pay for it, sweetheart!”
Teagan finally dived under a wooden table in the corner. He rolled up into a ball and tried to make himself unnoticeable. He watched as the cowboy-knight came into the bar, calling out loudly,
“Where is that Teagan fellow!?”
He noticeably drunk slurred and threw a half empty glass at the cowboy-knight. The cowboy-knight became furious and pulled the trigger, which led the bullet to go through the roof. He was mobbed my angry bartenders wanted him to pay for the damage and glasses were thrown by the delinquents who just wanted an excuse to fight. While Teagan watched this all play out, someone tapped him on the shoulder. He turned around, half shocked; half scared, only to find it was a beautiful girl who looked upon him timidly and naively. It was Emily.
“Follow me,” she whispered and crawled to the stairs that led to a room upstairs. Teagan followed her obediently.
They finally got up to a musty smelt room. She hurried over to the crimson velvet curtains and drew them shut, dust spraying and scattering off them. She hurried around her room, her scarlet dress rustling, her brown hair tumbling out of her tightly tied bun. She lifted her dress up slightly so she could move quicker, revealing her healed shoes squeezed tightly on her too big feet. Panic was written across her face, which held way to much make-up, blood red lipstick and to much powder. She looked like death warmed up, yet was still the most beautiful creature of earth in Teagan’s eyes. She grabbed his shoulder and pushed him towards her bed.
“Hide under there!” she ordered quietly, in a stern whisper.
He did what he was told and climbed under the bed. The wooden floor was creaking. He noticed how unstable the wood was where he lay and guessed that is why the bed was protecting anyone from walking over it. He heard someone slam the door open. He saw Emily’s feet move awkwardly. The cowboy-knight had entered, beer running down his face and his body patched with bruises. He grinned when he saw Emily.
“Hi Jennifer,” the cowboy-knight said, slyly.
Jennifer? thought Teagan. Why did he call her Jennifer? That was Emily that stood before him, it had to be, it looked just like her. Unless, Emily had a twin, he was pretty positive it was her. No-one could be as beautiful. No-one.
“Jennifer, I have claimed you, you soon shall be mine, but first I need to kill that skinny, six foot coward for you to be rightly mine. Where is he?”
The girl stepped back, nearly tumbling onto her bed, looking onto the cowboy-knight with cold, frightened, anxious eyes. He grabbed her by the shoulders and bellowed,
“Where is he?!”
She began to cry, tears cascading from her eyes. She tried to tell him, she didn’t know, terrified he would hurt her. Teagan was so heartbroken to see the woman before him, who he was sure was Emily, break down. He wanted to help her, but decided to keep his own life in tact. If he moved, he would get shot and he knew that. The cow-boy continued to shake the girl, getting even more aggressive. He screamed at her, asking where Teagan was, but she said she swore she didn’t know. He couldn’t just leave this Teagan fellow go, it was a disgrace. An embarrassment he could never let down. The wooden floor beneath Teagan was creaking terribly now and Teagan feared the cow-boy would hear. His fears had come true as the cowboy-knight’s grip loosened on the girl’s shoulders and he stared over at the bed. Without a second of hesitation or doubt, he charged towards it. Teagan panicked and slammed with all his might at the wood. Droplets of sweat were catching on his forehead, as the cowboy-knight tried to find his pistol. Teagan pushed at the wood. Another life or death situation was happening. This was the third time today and Teagan wasn’t in the least getting used to it. Out of pure and sheer dumb lucky, Teagan managed to break a hole in the floor before the cowboy-knight got that gun anywhere near his body. Teagan came tumbling down into blackness, like an unconscious state. It engulfed his body and warped his mind. He could feel his soul slip out of his body once again, unknowingly, rentering very soon.
Part IV – David Watts
Teagan clutched his head. He had never felt so dizzy, all he could see was lights flashing and burning his eyes, which weren’t adjusted to the light yet. Violet, emerald, cerulean, teal, indigo, ivory made him temporally blind. He groaned and shielded his eyes. He felt the cold floor underneath. He slowly opened and seen blurry images before him. He stood up and rubbed his head. His surroundings looked awfully familiar, to familiar. He had defiantly been in this, what was it, club? Disco? A party of some sort? He looked around and recognised all the young faces before him, giggling, drinking and having fun. Then, it hit him. He knew these people, of course he did. He went to school with them for a good couple of years. They were his old classmates and this was his prom. The prom he didn’t attend, because of the dateless status he was in. What was he doing that night anyway? Lying in bed, staring emotionlessly at the ceiling thinking about how much fun David Watts was having. He stopped suddenly. His clenched his fists. David Watts... He was the head boy, the captain of the football team, the highest score of the final exams in the school. Everyone loved David Watts, everyone wanted to be him. He was rich, smart, good looking, he was perfect, yet Teagan hated him. So perfect, it showed off everyone else’s weaknesses, which Teagan had a lot of. He was in the same class as David Watts, sitting at the back of the class, while David sat at the front, surrounded my pretty girls, the teacher complimenting him on the fantastic piece of class work he had handed in. Teagan sat at the back glaring at him, snapping his pencil in frustration. Why couldn’t he be surrounded by so many girls? Why couldn’t he ace every test, every paper he was given? Teagan was blatantly jealous, so jealous. On many occasion he tried to trip David up in sports, or in the hallway, but never succeeded and only ended up making a fool of himself. David would go up to him and grin, showing a sparkling mouth of pearl white teeth.
“Oh, never mind Teagan! Just watch yourself next time, eh?” David would wink and move on.
Oh, how Teagan hated it he was so nice and polite. Oh, how Teagan hated he was the opposite of David Watts, shy, lonely, spiteful, dull, and simple. He would lay his head on his pillow and dream of how he could succeed. Maybe that his why he turned to poetry, the chance to vent his anger through words, instead of actions. He knew he wasn’t a brilliant poet, but the chance to express himself was too good of a chance to ignore.
He snapped out of his reverie, to find himself standing in the middle of the dance floor. All the girls in multicolour prom gowns and the boys in tuxedos, pulling at their ties. Again, they didn’t notice him, didn’t give him any recognition. Not a lot different from school, Teagan thought. He walked through all the ignoring school kids, to find David Watts who, surprise surprise, looked dashing in his ebony tuxedo. His hair was slicked back and his smile was plastered onto his face. He stood in front of a girl, who Teagan assumed was his prom date. David was laughing, gently putting his hand on the girl’s bare shoulders. She blushed and rustled her dress and hid her face, peeping out from the gaps in her hand, making David chuckle. Teagan walked around to get a better look at the girl. The girl who had finally won the heart of the pure, Nobel-bred, fancy free David Watts. Boy, she must be special. When he looked her straight on, he realised she was more special than he had given her credit for. It was Emily. Emily? With David Watts? Wait, Emily didn’t even go to the same school as he did, so she obviously couldn’t have been David Watts date. It left Teagan bewildered, until something hit him. He remembered what happened to David Watts after that prom. It was all over the news, everyone knew his name. Well, not like they didn’t already. He could see David gesturing towards Emily. She giggled and held his hand and they headed towards the door. He panicked, a rush of anxiety flowed over his body. He darted out in front of them and held out of his hands. They walked straight through him, like spectres walking through the graveyards. Teagan then walked straight into another prom guest, who didn’t even acknowledge his existence. Why could he walk through Emily and David? As crazy as it sounds, he knew it was too late. He knew fate would take his toll and would take lives without a thought and death already was stalking them. He had no choice than to let it happen, because to mess with fate was to mess with death and death held all the cards. Oh, he was such a romantic. By the time he had snapped out of this warp of imagination, David and Emily had already got into the limo, smiling, laughing, climbing into the limo with a very bored and slightly drunk looking driver in the front, swaying his head back and forth and resting into in his hands. Teagan had witnessed this through a near by window and rushed outside, but he couldn’t run properly. It was like fate was holding him back. He tripped and made his way back on his feet, the limo racing off into the distance. Teagan brutally wiped the dirt off his hands, scarping the cuts and scars that stained his hands. He put his hand on his forehead and squinted his eyes, trying to spot the limo in the distance. He lowered his head in defeat and turned around on an axel, only to find himself in a living room. He recognised the living room straight away, as it was his parent’s living room and he had found himself in this room many times during his lifetime. He noticed the big TV in the corner on, blasting the 6 o’clock news. He rushed over to the leather three-piece sofa and sat down, without moving his eyes off the screen. He knew what he was about to see, why, it was obvious. The news reader, who always looked this solemn, announced the death of a teenage prodigy, whose driver had crashed the car and killed himself and the two passengers. The young, teenage prodigy that the driver had killed was... David Watts and the girl that was in the car with him. Teagan had forgotten the name of the girl who had died on that day, but it wasn’t Emily, that was for sure. Why had she been the one who had died now? It didn’t make any sense. A picture of David Watts flashed onto the screen. David was smiling, like usual. A waste of a young life, especially one that was meant for good. The driver’s face flashed up on the screen too. A girl’s face also flashed up on screen, yet it was blurry. Teagan went up to the TV to have a better look, yet it was still blurry, yet to his eyes only. His eyes started to water, tears droplets forming in the side of them. He fell on his knees and slammed his fists onto the TV. The glass smashed and shades flew everywhere, yet Teagan didn’t get hurt, cut, broken. Maybe his heart, sure, but not physically. He continued to cry and punched the TV. He managed to punch a whole in the TV and stopped what he was doing, completely. He stared at the TV in wonder, looking at the mess he made. He dried with eyes with his hands, which only had a little blood over them, surprisingly. He stood up, but luck had it, slipped on a shade of the TV. He fell face first into the TV screen and plunged into darkness. Teagan knew he was entering a new world again and closed his eyes and let it happen, reminding himself time and time again not to look down.
Part V – Hounds Of Love
Teagan was now used to this violent and abrupt passing of places and was used to the side effects. He didn’t even groan this time. He lay on the floor with his eyes closed, a rather comfy floor actually. Four pairs of feet strutted on top of him and clawed at his face. He knew who it was and rolled over, ignoring the clawing.
“Stop that, cat.”
“Please, refer to me by my name, sir.”
It was Lucifer Sam. He hissed at Teagan to open his eyes, but Teagan just dismissed him. Lucifer Sam’s patience was put to the limit and scratched Teagan’s face with all his might, leaving a scar. Teagan finally took this as his cue to pay attention to what Lucifer Sam had to say.
“What do you want?!”
Lucifer Sam strutted around him and said, in a rather calm manner,
“Look around you, sir. We are in a cottage, a bedroom to be exact and your sweetheart is dying on the bed over there.” Lucifer Sam looked over at Emily in the bed, where Teagan looked on with horror. She was so pale, so week, so fragile. Like a china doll, like she could break any second.
“What do I have to do to make her better, to save her life, for I would even give my own life for her?”
Lucifer Sam looked at him, in thought.
“You know the fairytale Sleeping Beauty, right sir? Well, it is a lot like that, you kiss her, she lives, for she can be awaken my a true loves kiss. Try it, sir. For you’re her one and only.”
Teagan looked upon the dying Emily lying on the bed. He stood up and walked straight pass Lucifer Sam and bowed down towards her, tears forming in his eyes again. He sat down on the bed next to her, staring at her, scared he might break her if he touched her. It was now or never and he knew he had to save her, for only he could. Just before he leaned into kiss her, the wooden door flew open and at least half a dozen dogs ran into the room, tried to ambush Lucifer Sam. Lucifer Sam hurried to a table top, where the dogs couldn’t get him. He hissed while the dogs barked at him. Teagan looked behind him and all the commotion and spied a very beautiful woman entering the room, after the dogs. She was very tall for a woman and very thin, even appearing quite lanky. She wore a violet cape, etched with silver and pearl coloured fur. She had snow running down her back, like she had come through a winter storm. Her storm whipped hair flew behind her, inked with snow on a coal black surface. Her skin was pale, deathly pale and her eyes matched her complexion, an icy opal. She moved very gracefully, gliding across the floor towards Teagan. The dogs stopped barking at Lucifer Sam and gazed at her. She beckoned the dogs with one gesture of her long, thin fingers, pointed fingernails at the end of each finger. They came to her lay at her feet, not looking her in the eye. The Ice Queen as such, concentrated on Teagan before turning to Lucifer Sam. The scowled, screwing up her pretty face.
“You evil cat! What have you done now?”
Lucifer Sam stood still and calm, with his head risen.
“Nothing, Madame. Nothing at all.”
The Ice Queen glanced over at Teagan.
“Who’s this then?”
You could see droplets of sweat clinging on the cat’s fur.
“That’s Teagan. He’s Jennifer’s one true love, Madame.”
Teagan’s eyes widened.
“You know Jennifer didn’t have a true lo...,” The Ice Queen was interrupted by Teagan’s call.
“Jennifer?!”
The Ice Queen looked over at Teagan with a puzzled look on her face.
“Who did you think it was then?” she questioned.
“Uhh... Emily?”
The Ice Queen pushed passed him and headed towards the bed. She sighed when she seen Emily lying soundlessly in the bed.
“Oh, Lucifer Sam. Stop using such spells,” she groaned and took an object from her long pocket which Teagan could only describe as a small pure silver bar with an opal globe at the top of it. Patterns were carved in the silver. She held in over the sleeping girl at the opal globe misted lavender.
Right before Teagan’s eyes, Emily had turned into someone else. Teagan’s head was swimming. The Ice Queen smiled.
“Ah, Jennifer Grentle, the witch. Back to what she actually looks like.”
“So, that was never Emily?” asked Teagan with wide eyes.
“No,” grinned The Ice Queen. “It was Jennifer all the time, because some selfish cat wanted to live forever!” she turned attention to Lucifer Sam.
Teagan gave her a very confused. He looked bewildered, all the character drained from his eyes.
The Ice Queen looked on with concerned sympathy. “Oh, darling, you have no clue what i’m talking about do you? Well, no bother, i’ll tell you.”
Lucifer Sam glared at The Ice Queen while she sat on a near by chair.
“You see, there was a witch called Jennifer Grentle and she had a loyal cat, well, not any more...” she glared at Lucifer Sam. “Well, the witch was kind, helping everyone who came to her house, her cat picked up on her potions and spells and finally came nearly as talented as her, but you see, the cat was made. It wasn’t born. Yes, it’s an it...” Lucifer Sam’s normally beady dark eyes, sharpened with anger, yet moistened with a tint of sadness. The Ice Queen continued. “The witch made the cat and would live with her the rest of its life and would die with her. Yes, when the witch dies, the cat dies too, but this cat wasn’t loyal, wasn’t dedicated to its master, it was greedy and selfish. It found a week fool in love...” (Teagan frowned at that bit) “... And made him believe Jennifer, or Emily, was his one true love and a kiss, yes a single kiss, could awaken the witch, but it’s the witch’s time to die, you see!” The Ice Queen stood up abruptly and cackled, while waving her arms in the air. “It’s her time to die, but the cat wants to live, you see! Poor Lucifer Sam wants to live, you see!” she cackled and headed towards Jennifer’s bed. Lucifer Sam’s eyes widened.
“Don’t, Madame! Don’t! You’ll regret this one day, Madame! You’ll regret for destroying Jennifer Grentle’s only successful creation, which she named Lucifer Sam! Don’t rip out pages of a fairytale which has already been written!”
The Ice Queen held his trophy over Jennifer’s head, turning the crystal lavender again.
“Good bye, Lucifer Sam!” The Ice Queen cackled. “The Siam cat! The witch’s cat! Your something I can’t explain... Sir!”
Jennifer’s muscles relaxed and the clockworks in her body stopped moving, the slowed down and halted to a stop. Lucifer Sam let out one more desperate meow, before evaporating into thin air, as if he had only ever been nothing more than an illusion. Teagan had been dumbfounded through this whole experience, having gone a little mad, insane. He knew he was insane, for a sane never will see such a thing in their lives. He looked over at The Ice Queen, his mouth agape. Her dogs were still at her heal. She twisted around and looked and him, breathing heavily. Teagan walked slowly away from her, without taking his eyes off her. She walked calmly towards and until he had backed into a wall, genuinely terrified. She gave him a soft look and smile, opposite of the manic look she had plastered on her face earlier and walked to the side of him. She clutched his shoulder and whispered in his ear,
“Sorry, lad.”
Without a second thought, she brandished her trophy and plummeted it towards his head. He was knocked out and travelled through the strange dimension of entering a different world. He was fed up with the feeling of emptiness he got every time he headed towards a new location, for he knew nothing there was going to make him feel whole again, especially after that turn of events.
Part VI – Plug In Baby
The moment he hit the ground, he felt satisfactory warmth run through his body like a circuit. He opened his eyes barely, to see a site familiar to him. He clutched at the carpet beneath him, water forming in the corners of his eyes. He was in his own bathroom again. For some, seeing their bathroom brings no joy, but for Teagan, it snapped him back to reality. Some, like Teagan, think living in a dream would improve their dull and monotonous existence and make them feel like warriors, like courageous adventure seeking dare-devils, where nothing can touch and they can never bleed to their death, but Teagan realised maybe death was better than living in a dream. He rested his head on the floor and closed his eyes slowly, taking in the atmosphere and aroma of the stuffy bathroom. He dreamed he was at the feet of a crystal lake, the waterfall running, making his spine shiver. The lake was so still, so delicate. He blinked and widened his eyes to see the lake freeze, ice spread across the lake instantly and the icy fingers of the air clutched Teagan in their hands. He watched in awe as the large waterfall over the lake had stopped the cascading water and it froze in place, its ice sickles stood frailly, waiting to be snapped. It had stopped running, much like Teagan himself. Stopped running to place to place, from realm, to realm, stopped running from reality, real-life.
He lifted himself from the floor abruptly, being short of breath. He let himself fall asleep again. Oh, how he never wanted to dream again. He sighed with relief and lay on his back, gazing up at the bathroom ceiling. He had never been so happy to be home. A slight grin appeared on his face. He heard water running from the bath tap nearby. He didn’t want to get up and turn it off, he wanted to wallow in the moment for a while, but he didn’t want to wallow in a flooded bathroom, he decided to go with his better judgement. He got up slowly and stalked towards the bath. He bent down and turned the tap, too interrupt the flowing water. He looked over to see a foot by the tap, hanging out of the bath, twitching and jolting, golden sparks flowing off it. He looked over in horror as he seen the woman in the bath jerking and jolting all over, sparks violently flying off her body. Teagan jumped up, horrified by the image before him. The female was Emily, his sweet Emily. She was now a robot. She was now his Plug In Baby. He stepped back in terror, his mouth a gape, watching his love of his life spark like a machine. He was not back in reality, or was he? Had any of it had been a dream? He didn’t know what to think any more as he looked helplessly onto Emily’s dead, yet alive, body. All this drove him mad, he stepped back, clutching his head in frustration. The hot sparks flew off her and burned his skin, bringing out blisters. If this was reality, he didn’t want to live in it either. Emily turned her head, mouthing words at him that she couldn’t possibly get out, her hand twitched towards him, yearned for him to hold it. Teagan just looked horrified and fell back in surprise, crashing into the huge elaborate mirror standing behind him. The shades of soared out into the bathroom, colliding with the sparks ejected out of Emily. Teagan let out a high pitched shriek, loud enough to wake the dead. He aggressively flung his hands in the air, while scarring them with glass during the progress of doing so, trying to grab hold of something, but he was plunging into the dark abyss of the mirror. He was travelling through the mirror, into another realm. It would never end. He would never stop running from reality, only to find he was running straight into it. He was trying to escape, but he could never escape reality, it would always creep up on him in the harshest of ways. This was no dream, this was reality. As he plummeted down into wherever the mirror was taking him, the last thing he seen was Emily. He swore he could see a little tear fall from her eye. She was broken, much like his very own heart.
Epilogue
He opened his eyes and blinked the water away. He was back in the bathtub he was in at the beginning. He felt reborn. He breathed heavily and looked around the bathroom. Was he in another realm again? He hoped not. The water was icy, making him shiver, but he couldn’t get it, he didn’t want to, in case he was not back home. He looked at his hands, wrinkled from the bathwater. They were scarred all over. From the glass of the mirror? He turned his head abruptly to find the elaborate mirror still intact, its golden rims polished and the fake jewels still incrusted on the rims. What he had just experienced wasn’t a dream. An out of body experience? He didn’t know. He looked at his own reflection, dreading what he saw. A man who was past his years, a frightened coward who was confused about the world and its mysteries, who would break down at a drop of a feather, who suffered for his work. He was a true poet. God, that poem. He remembered he needed to write one, to live; to pay for food would be a good start. It hit him. Why not write a poem about the harshest slap to reality he had ever been giving. For he was a dreamer, but not anymore. He would write a poem about his experiences through time and space. Or wherever they were. About the cat, the witch, the cowboy, the queen and the most important thing, the plug in baby. It all flashed before him. He needed a pen before he forgot, like he ever would. This was now etched in his brain and nothing could be done to carve it out. Just then, he heard a rap on the door. He turned his head.
“Yes?”
“Teagan, you have been in then for at least two hours! What have you been doing?!” a familiar voice groaned with worry. It was Emily. She was alive, fine and not electrocuting.
Teagan give out a broad grin. Maybe he is back home after all.
“I’m thinking about my poem.”
“You must be a useless poet to think about a poem for two hours and get nothing.”
Teagan smiled, Emily’s quite sarcastic yet meaningful and considerate nature was back. Just the way he liked her nature to be.
“I’ve got something now, though.”
She sighed. “Oh, I worry about you Teagan sometimes. I still love you though.”
She and Teagan both chuckled unanimously and she moved away from the door, while Teagan got out of the freezing water, ready to search for that pen.













***
Teagan sat on the sofa, still in his dressing gown and with a pen and paper in his hand and was ready for his imagination to pour out onto the plain, pale paper. As the blood and the tales came rushing to his head, he clutched the pen with his lanky, long hand and wrote the words in his head, though he swore that the pen was moving on its own and his hand just followed. All he had time to write was,
“Lucifer Sam, the Siam cat,
Always sitting by your side.”
Before falling asleep, for the first time today, on the plush sofa.