Chapter 56: Chapter 56

Maya Maya wasn’t in the forest any more. She looked around and realised she was in the psychiatric hospital, in the body of her mirror. The last thing she had heard on Eden was a loud noise, before waking up there.

“Oh crap,” she sighed, trying to shift the sense of foreboding she felt about her sudden transition to the other body. She couldn’t place it, there was just something really not right.

“Get the doctor!” shouted a nurse to Maya’s right. “Hey, nice to see you,” she greeted Maya warmly.

“I wouldn’t bother, I’m not sticking around,” Maya told her flippantly, bracing herself for migration back to her body.

She braced and braced, but nothing happened, she wasn’t returning to her body. She went up to the astral plane no problem, returning to being prodded by an unimpressed nurse who thought she’s slipped back into her coma.

“There you are,” breathed the nurse, “thought we’d lost you.”

“Something’s not right,” said Maya, more to herself than to the nurse.

“Don’t you worry, the doctor will be here in a moment,” the nurse breezed cheerfully.

“They took Ellie,” Maya looked at the nurse, needing her to know for some reason. Maya started with the wiggling of the digits and limbs, but they were in worse condition than the last time she had inhabited that body. It did answer her question as to whether the body dies with the soul. This body was still going while she knew for certain its soul had passed on.

“What do you mean, how do you know that?” the nurse was suddenly far more receptive, as of course Ellie went missing from that world.

“She came with me in the other body. We’ve been jumping between dimensions, I don’t know where she is,” Maya was earnest but the nurse clearly lost interest in any idea of sanity coming from her.

“Of course, of course,” she cooed condescendingly. If Maya could have reached her she might have strangled her, while the need to hit out at something grew as the panic increased exponentially.

“Gotta go,” Maya told the nurse hurriedly, as she engulfed and appeared in the forest clearing.

Whatever she was expecting, what she found wasn’t it. Maya was lying in her hospital gown on the soft moss of the forest floor, looking upwards into the canopy. Disorientated, she turned her head and found herself inches from Rob. She looked at the moss and wondered why it was red. At the level she was at, she could only see the side of Rob’s body. She knew it was him because of the clothes, the blue jeans and black shirt.

He wasn’t moving, she couldn’t understand why he would be sleeping there.

“Hey,” Joe’s voice came from her left “Ka, it’s Maya, look!” he called out. She was so relieved, normality would resume soon, she had to be confident of that.

Suddenly she was scooped up into Ka’s arms, his face soaking wet, and holding her far too tightly for her fragile frame. She couldn’t push him away, so she had to wait what felt like an age to escape his apparently overzealous clutches.

“No don’t put me down,” she requested, wanting to look around. “Please hold me up.”

Maya looked down to see Rob riddled with bullet holes. Gasping, she couldn’t escape, was at the mercy of the one holding her. She saw the other side and realised Joe has been shot in the leg, before seeing Ke was dead too.

Then she saw her own dead body, and realised why she couldn’t portal back into it. A head shot, clean in the middle of her forehead had terminated her and the gift had taken her soul to safety.

There wasn’t time to think, she had to hope the gift would take them where they needed to go.

It was white, all white. There was no beginning and no end. Realising she could, Maya got up, looking at the others.

Xhisara was there, grabbing Maya into a bear hug as soon as she saw her. It was strange because Maya couldn’t actually feel her touching her. Ke was alive, looking absolutely terrified, staring at his hands and chest and shaking his head. Rob was only conspicuous by his absence. Les wasn’t there either, though there had been no body, perhaps there was hope.

Maya sat back down again. She felt like she should be shaking but her body failed to join in.

“Why?” Ke breathed, still patting his chest.

Joe was inspecting his leg, which was no longer shot, poking at it and shaking his head.

“Okay,” began Xhisara. “There is a lot of explaining to do.”

“These aren’t our bodies, and the dead aren’t here but the injured are,” Maya summed up, not needing a sermon.

“Okay, not that much explaining then,” Xhisara conceded. “This is what we refer to as hospital world. Our bodies are being worked on, and these are projections. I came here directly after being shot, and I couldn’t go back. Try it, there is no portalling out of here.”

Maya tried, failed and understood. They were prisoners, and Xhisara would not have been able to go back and get the others.

She must have looked a little panicked, because Xhisara clarified.

“It is only while our bodies are being worked on. We will be released as soon as we are ready. I have been here many times, as one anti-ageing treatment lasts only ten years or so. However I never saw it like this.”

Maya just wanted her to shut up so she could try and take control of the storm that was raging through her skull. She put her hands over her ears to block out Xhisara’s speech, closing her eyes and existing only in her head, but the noise continued unabated.

, thought Maya miserably as she started rocking to try and ease the need to just explode.

She rocked harder, making noises just to fill her mind with anything but what was in there. She would have thrown up but whatever body or state she was in wouldn’t allow it.

Ka came and wrapped his arms around her, but she struggled away, still unable to feel his skin. She walked away from Ka and the group down the never ending whiteness.

Maya stopped without looking back, she just needed to be alone. She sat with her knees to her chin, unable to cry. She didn’t know whether that was the body she was in, or just that she was too messed up to let it out.

Ellie was gone, Rob was dead, Les was gone, Syrhahn was gone, April was gone, Josh the green dude; everyone was either dead or gone. It was just the five of them left out of all those people.

“Maya,” Xhisara’s voice came from behind her. “My body is ready, meet me where the shipwreck is, I will bring the survivors from Eden.”

“Okay,” Maya’s voice wavered as she turned to look at her gratefully. She wondered what they were doing with her body, it wasn’t shot.

“I’m going with her,” Ka looked at Maya, concern etched across his beautiful features.

“I understand,” she replied softly. They had to look for Les, they were better as a pair. Once they had left, it occurred to Maya that the gunmen might have returned and be waiting for them. They would die too.

Maya curled into a ball and tried to evict the images of Ka being shot from her mind.