THE INFINITE BEING
“What do you think?” The Broker said.
He lounged in his chair and spoke with his fingertips.
I turned to Violet
but she was already answering.
“We’ve robbed a museum before,
this isn’t our first rodeo.”
She extinguished her cigarette
And took my half-finished one
from its resting place.
The speakeasy was so full of smoke
I was surprised Boston’s finest
Had not yet come to extinguish us.
“That’s good to hear,” the Broker hissed.
I watched as something
Moved beneath his
Crisp pressed shirt
“We are very interested,
the money is good.” I said,
“But this ring is magical,
correct?
Before we go about handling it,
what exactly does it do?”
“It’s not particularly potent,”
the Broker replied coyly,
He leaned over the table
and my eyes fell on his bolo tie
A gold sigil of seven points
Whose middle member bore a gem
Unlike any I had seen before
From a distance it appeared to be black
But was actually Nothing
As though Lachesis had slipped a stitch
In the tapestry of the Universe
“It simply has some
material from another star,
Our interest is purely scientific.”
“Very well.” I nodded.
“Tell the Sorcerer we accept.”
“Excellent,” the Broker cooed,
He took a brown bag full of crisp bills
From his coat,
along with a small gold ring
“Replace it with this replica,
and do not get caught.”
I stood to shake his hand
Only to find it ice cold.
***
When we returned home
Violet instantly threw aside
Her suit jacket and button down
And undid the board
she used to bind her breasts
Before falling backward onto our bed.
She groaned with satisfaction.
“Why do you put yourself through it?”
“Through what?”
“The board,” I gestured,
“they don’t look that different.”
“You’re blind,” Violet laughed.
She straightened up
and looked at herself in the mirror,
pressing her hands into her breasts,
“The shape is completely different.
Without the board
a pig could pick me out of a crowd
a mile away.”
I shrugged.
Violet frowned and fell back into bed, rolling over so her back was to me.
I focused my attention on my fingers
Which intertwined in my lap.
I became suddenly aware
Of the tension I carried
In every fiber of my body
From my hands pressed together
To the force keeping
My back hunched
And my legs tightly clamped.
I was about to speak when Violet cut me off.
“You just like looking at my chest.”
She rolled back over and playfully pulled at my belt.
“I do,” I laid down next to her
“But you should wear it,
Heaven forbid
We run afoul of the pigs.”
Violet giggled
And pressed herself into me.
“I couldn’t imagine what would happen
If we got on the bad side of the law”
I continued,
“and by the way,
any thoughts about the heist?”
“I’ll think of something.”
Violet melted into my arms.
***
“I thought it would be heavier.”
The ring was covered in smooth,
Glowing stones, the crown of which
Was a stone similar to that
On the Broker’s tie.
“Why would it be any different than the replica?”
“The way the Broker carried himself
It was like that little stone was a great weight around his neck.”
“People just slouch sometimes.”
“FREEZE.”
The light of a flashlight fell upon us
Fortunately I was facing away from it
And swallowed the ring
in a single hidden motion
Before we turned around.
Behind us an old guard
fumbled with his revolver.
We simultaneously drew
I shot him four times in the chest
And Violet three.
“I had it handled,” she turned to me,
“Where’s the ring?”
“I swallowed it.”
We both began to sprint to the exit.
“Slick move.”
“I thought so.
The replica is exceptional
They’ll assume he stopped the robbery.”
We sprinted down a flight of stone stairs.
“And for the record, I got him first,”
I said with confidence.
“No you didn’t.”
“Then how did I get off four shots
instead of three?”
We both skipped off the last step
and found ourselves in a windowless hall of armor.
“Because the Luger has a faster action.”
Violet grabbed my wrist and pulled me left.
“No, it’s because you keep your gun
in your trousers
Instead of a proper holster.
I had a hip holster the entire war
And the first thing I did when
I got back was buy an
Armpit holster
They’re just the best.”
“You mean your favorite—”
Violet was cut off by a guard who
rounded a corner in front of us.
I drew and shot him between the eyes
before he could say a single word.
I glanced over at Violet who glared at me,
Her hand is still in her pants.
Before I could open my mouth,
Violet pulled me by my wrist again
Around the corner to a windowed wall.
She held me tightly
And we fell through the wall
As though it wasn’t there
Rolling out onto the wet grass
Outside the museum.
Violet pushed herself up
And pinned me to the ground.
Her colt and several loose bullets fell onto my belly.
I stared down its barrel for a moment
Before pointing it away from me
While Violet watched,
With a cocky grin.
I glared at her
And flicked on the safety,
just as the museum turned on its spotlights.
We sprung to our feet
And fled into the night.
***
I woke up late the next morning,
Nursing a headache, world spinning.
I almost tripped over an empty bottle
As I pulled on a night gown
and made on my way to the kitchen.
Violet left a note
Saying she was at the range with a friend
Leaving me alone to make a cup of coffee,
The mere thought of which sent me running for the toilet.
I had grown up on a farm
And was not squeamish of such things,
So I quickly found the ring
Only to see, to my horror
The black stone was missing
I promptly threw up.
When I recovered myself
I got dressed
and began making my way to the range
As neither our house or it had a phone.
The spinning sensation had not dissipated
But I was more confused than nauseous.
There was really nothing I could do
So I took my time as I walked,
Enjoying autumn.
I watched with envy
As the leaves left the earth
And vanished in the distance from my view.
The spinning feeling intensified.
I stopped to examine
one leaf in particular
That skirted across the cobble stones.
As I examined it,
The effect became
more and more
Until the leaf
Broke into its component parts.
I screamed and turned to run
But found myself stuck
As my feet became roots
My body a trunk,
And my arms and fingers
Were covered in flowers
Blooming into fresh spring leaves.
They caught the cold of autumn
And changed from yellow to orange and red
Until I soared upon a gale
As free from the earth as the clouds.
The wind carried me for quite some time
Until I felt myself deteriorate
And fell to ground before our house as dirt.
The earth was then kind enough to bloom
And restored my flesh to me.
Naked and freezing
I fled into the house.
***
When Violet returned
She found me in our bed
Finding solace
In the darkness from which I was made.
“Are you alright?”
She ran to me and held me in her arms.
“No. The ring.”
“Did you lose it?”
I held out the ring to her.
“Did you lose one of the stones?
I am not going through your shit!”
“No, Violet, I digested it.
I tried to go to the range to find you
But on the way there I turned into a tree,
Into leaves.
It was beautiful.”
Violet held me close.
“Oh God,” I breathed heavily,
“It’s happening again.”
I held out my hand to see vines
Creeping down my body
From where Violet’s fingers touched my hair
They consumed my whole body
Bloomed and died
Leaving me trembling on the bed.
“Are you alright?”
Violet reached for me in the darkness.
“I’m fine, I’m fine,
the effects are temporary.”
I sat up and caught my breath.
Violet rubbed my back,
Then my hips and my thighs.
“How long have you been a woman?”
I ran my hands down my body.
“I don’t . . . ”
I ran my hands down my body again.
“I guess since just now.”
“Are . . . you okay?”
Violet turned a lamp by the bed on.
“I mean I was a lot of things earlier.
I was a tree which I didn’t like.”
I examined myself in the light,
“I’m not sure if it’s as good
as being a leaf on the wind.
Definitely better than being dirt.”
“Are you sure about that?”
Violet laughed
And looked down at herself.
“Despite popular belief,”
I laughed,
“But I don’t feel that different.
I’m just waiting to change back.”
I drummed my fingers on my thigh.
“I think you’re cute,” Violet took my chin
And examined my face in the lamplight.
I melted into her hand.
“I’m a little scared though,”
She said after a moment.
“About what?”
“The Sorcerer.”
“Why?”
“He’s going to melt our brains
For losing his ring.”
“That sounds bad,”
I said, still lost in the moment.
There was a knock at the door.
“It’s the Broker.” I bolted upright.
“I can sense him.”
“Oh no.”
I pulled my night gown back on
And we went to answer the door
“Hello, where’s the ring?” He cooed.
The Broker cast a long shadow in the twilight.
I handed it to him.
“Where’s the Voidstone?”
“I ate it,” I said quietly. “It’s destroyed.”
“Then why can I still sense it?” He hissed.
I noticed the flesh around his teeth
Was the same color as the stone.
“She said it was gone.”
Violet said with vitriol.
I looked back at her
And she gave me a thumbs up
and a crooked smile.
“If I have to flay you alive to find it I will.”
The Broker’s shirt split open
And several abyssal arms
Sprung forth,
Each holding a snub nose forty-four.
Violet drew her colt
From an appendix holster
shot him six times in the chest,
Before he could get off a single shot
The third shot destroyed his bolo tie
and the Broker twisted into darkness,
Leaving his clothes and shattered jewelry.
“Nice holster.”
I gave her a thumbs up.
Violet crossed her arms.
“If you can sense the Broker,
Can you sense the Sorcerer?”
“I think so, why?”
“I think we should kill him
Before he kills us.”
I closed my eyes.
“I find myself drawn to the East End.”
“That’s where the bar is.”
“I know that’s where the bar is
But the Sorcerer isn’t at the bar.”
“Where is he then?”
“I don’t know yet,”
I growled,
“I was trying to figure that out,
Call a cab.”
Violet sprinted to our neighbors house
While I got dressed.
***
Before long
I found myself face to face
With a cabby
He looked me up
And down quizzically.
I tugged nervously
At my baggy suit.
“Board.”
Whispered Violet from the backseat.
I held my breasts defensively
And gave Violet a sideways look.
“Where’d’ya wanna go?”
The cabby squawked.
“Just bear with me,”
I took out a wad of cash
And closed my eyes.
As night fell across the city,
I slowly directed the cab
Deeper and deeper into Boston
Until we arrived
Before a dilapidated church.
I thanked the cabby
And spent a moment
Staring at the night sky.
It was as dark as in my youth
Before electricity
Had turned the black clouds purple
But unlike in that distant time,
Not a single star filled the sky
As though all of creation was empty.
We hurried into the church
And Violet used the ring
To conjure a floating light.
“It’s in the basement,”
I said softly,
as I collapsed into her arms.
“It’s becoming difficult to control
The sensation
There’s something here
Something below us.”
“What’s happening to you?”
“I am Everything.”
I said slowly,
“Everything I see
I touch
I become it
From its beginning to its end.”
Violet undid my tie
And made me a blind fold
Before carrying me down into the cellar
From there I guided her along the wall.
“It’s here.”
“What?”
“The way down.”
“I don’t—”
Violet tapped her fingers against the wall.
“Wait, it’s hollow here.”
She held me close and fell through the wall
Into what felt like
A comfortable elevator
But I dared not remove my blindfold
As we descended into
The Sorcerer’s lair.
***
The elevator left us
At the entrance to water-carved cave,
Barely tall enough to stand in.
Violet tried to guide me
But I walked across the rough stones with ease.
“I feel like I’ve been in these caves
A thousand times before,”
I said calmly.
“There’s a door
After several splits in the cave.
Follow me.”
I felt Violet conjure light
With the ring behind me
But I was already
Skipping ahead.
“Wait up!”
“We need to keep moving
There’s something alive down—”
I tripped and
Splayed across the rough stones
I felt blood well up
From torn skin on my hands
Buy I dared not remove
My blindfold to look.
“Male, in his thirties.”
I felt Violet put her hand on my shoulder.
“What?”
“The skeleton you tripped on.
It’s been here a while.
Looks like whomever it was
Was torn to pieces prior to death.
These are either claw marks
Or teeth marks and I’m not sure
Which is worse.”
I ran my hand across the bone’s
Marred surface, “these feel
Like dents made from fingernails.”
“That’s not possible.”
I handed Violet a femur
And then focused my attention
At the surrounding tunnels.
“Do you see something
Moving in the third tunnel
From the left?”
“No.”
“Hello!” I said into the darkness.
“Hello.” It whispered back.
“Did you hear that?”
“Hear what? Are you okay?”
Violet poked my shoulder with the femur.
“Im speaking with the darkness,
I said to Violet.
I then turned away.
“Who are you?”
“I do not know. Who are you?”
“I am—”
I ran my hands down my body
“I also have no idea who I am.”
“Before I met you Humans
And your finite space
I thought I was everything
But now I know I am Nothing.”
“I do see something moving.”
I heard Violet draw her gun.
“Is it a person?”
I said with some concern.
“I think it’s two people. I see four arm-”
Violet roughly grabbed me
And pulled me to my feet.
“What is it?”
“Which tunnel?!!?”
She said frantically.
“Go right!”
I regained my footing
And lowered
My blindfold to see
What was chasing us.
At first it looked like an insect;
Some kind of massive millipede,
But then I saw its legs were human arms
And it did not walk forward
But pull itself by its maw towards us,
A gaping hole in the tapestry
From which rows and rows
Of limbs emerged like teeth.
Violet tugged me again
And we flew down a tunnel
Like the water that had carved it,
Until we came to a vast iron door
Similar to that of a bank vault.
Violet swore and slammed on the door.
I had removed my blindfold at this point
And was staring calmly at the
Complex locking mechanism.
“The pattern is
Top
Bottom left
Middle right
Upper left
Upper right
Middle left
Bottom right”
“How do you know?”
“Because I watched this door be made
And it was also
the pattern on the Broker’s tie.”
The door swung open upwards
On a great hinge
And Violet and I stumbled into a library.
My eyes were filled with
This strange wonder;
A roaring fire and rows and rows
Of books, a balcony
That overlooked
The carpeted and luxurious
Sitting area we now tracked dust into,
And most catching of all
A pool in the center of the floor
Filled with Nothing.
I turned to watch Violet shoot
The monster several times
Before leaping to the side
As it reared through the door.
But the bullets did nothing
To its bulk.
I recovered myself
And pulled a lever,
Slamming the door upon the creature
And slicing it in twain.
I squatted and touched one of the arms
For now I saw this thing
Was a child of Prometheus
An amalgam of a thousand cut-down men
Woven together with strange
Black thread that receded
As its blood spilled forth.
“Why is my body different from yours?”
The Void asked, it’s voice failing.
“Why are you warm?
Why . . . am I cold?”
I watched as the last darkness
Slipped from its form
And I cried a bitter tear.
My mourning was cut short
By a shrill scream.
I saw Violet collapse
And felt something
Approaching from the balcony.
I closed my eyes
And rather than hiding in darkness
I became it.
I opened my eyes and found
To my delight I found I was invisible.
A man drifted down from above
His body appeared to be
Suspended by his head
As though an invisible hand
Held his limbs aloft
“Look who it is,
First you ruin my ring
Then you take both
Of my sons from me?”
The Sorcerer growled.
He lifted Violet like a doll
And dangled her above
The pool of shadows.
I tip-toed forward
As quietly as I could
And picked up her colt
Which, to my relief
had two bullets left in its cylinder.
“What do you think, Void?
A new body for you?”
The Sorcerer took the ring
From Violet’s finger
It glowed like a star in his palm,
“I am sorry you will have to settle
For another discarded human form;
And that we will never know,
What I could have made with this.”
Anger flashed across his face
And he threw the ring aside like wastepaper.
“I want to be.”
The Void said quietly.
“Yes, yes, yes,”
The Sorcerer cooed,
“I think she’d be more useful
With a few more holes in her.”
I pulled the trigger
And turned the Sorcerer’s
Intelligence into red mist.
I then leapt forward
And tried to catch Violet
But I was too slow
Too late
And we both fell
Into the Void together.
***
In winter we slumbered,
Like running water
Beneath the frigid earth
From a source upon her face
And into her darkest chasm.
In spring I stood on a rooftop,
Having grown anew
From her womb of shadows.
I savored the fresh air
And enjoying the company
Of several crows,
Whose feathers were as dark
As the abyss
Just like the cloak
I wore around my shoulders
And the gown that wrapped my hips.
“I don’t know if I thanked you
For saving Violet and I from the pit.
I wasn’t sure if you would understand
What was happening to us.”
“It was you who taught us to fly
And to fall,” the Void responded.
“Let’s do more of the former
And less of the latter.”
I watched the crows hop up on the
Parapet, and follow my gaze to the sky.
“What do you think of starlight?”
I asked the Void.
“It’s my favorite light.”
The crows looked up to me
“What are they?” they asked.
“When I was little
My mother told me
There was a great light
Beyond, and the Earth
Was shrouded in a black cloth
Called the firmament
That was full of holes
Meaning that the stars
Were windows into heaven itself.
To be honest with you,
I do not know what to think.
The only thing everyone
Can agree upon
Is that they are beautiful.”
I looked down to see
the crows had speckled their feathers with stars
whose light danced and played
just like their heavenly counterparts
I giggled and raised my ring
transforming my cloak
And gown in the same way.
I spun around,
Admiring it catch on the breeze When I saw three men
In pinstripe suits
Had joined us on the roof.
“What do you want?”
I spat.
“Are you the sorcerer Violet?”
They drew guns.
“No, that’s my husband,”
I held up my ring
Which glowed
brighter and brighter
First like the stars
Then the moon
Then the sun.
“Who are you?”
The men cowered
And shielded their eyes before me.
“I am Infinite.”