Evelyn Earth Part 38

“Evie I don’t know what to do, what do I do? Tell me what to do goddammit!”

“I don’t…arghh!” The searing pain ripped through my shoulder and I tasted blood as I bit my tongue.

“Hold on okay, just hold on. Hey you! Yeah you mate, get water. WATER!” Owen yelled at someone behind me. A familiar voice yelled back in panic and Manoel’s face appeared above Owens. His eyes widened in horror before he stepped out of my line of vision. All I could see now were the orange and ochre spots. They were multiplying all around me as if they wanted to smother me in their warmth.

                “You’re on fire, you’re on fire Evie and I don’t know what to do, its burning two holes right through you and I don’t know how to stop it” he said frantically. I felt his hands touch my face and I tried desperately to focus on his yellow eyes, but everything was so blinding.

               

               “Put me back on the ground” I choked out, “Owen please, on the dirt.” If I was going to die I wanted to die feeling her soft crumbling body beneath me. He picked me up and lowered me onto the soft patch of land again.

Manoel’s panicked voice penetrating my reverie. I was falling in and out of consciousness. Owen’s face was upside down above me. A cold sensation splashed over my body. Droplets of water touched my lips. More frantic yelling and then…

“ARGHHH” I screamed.

“Hold her down!” Owen commanded. I felt cool hands grip my head and torso.

“What are you doing?!” I screamed as the searing pain surged through my shoulder and thigh once again.

“It’s the only thing I could think of, just hold on and focus on my voice.”

“Jesus fucking CHRIST” I shrieked. Flecks of mud fell into my mouth and I spluttered.

“Focus on me, look at me! Don’t close your eyes!”

“I’m trying” I blubbered, “I’m, oh fuck, I can’t it feels like I’m being fucking tortured.” I clawed my hands into the dirt and felt myself being drawn into Her. For a moment it felt as if her cool arms had drawn me into an embrace and the pain eased. I squeezed my eyes shut tight and honed in on that feeling of tenderness, a feeling that allowed no room for burning agony.

“Evie can you hear me?” Owen’s voice echoed around me.

“It’s okay whatever you’re doing is working. Its okay…” I opened my eyes and found myself lying in a damp chamber. All the walls were made of soft brown dirt. I reached out with my hand and watched as my fingertips left four small trails in the wall beside me. Do not fear this is the place of birth for all things.

 I turned my head to the side and saw a woman sitting in an alcove within the chamber walls. The roots of a tree supported her feet and hands whilst her hair; long and thick fanned out around her and disappeared into the earth. In the gloom her features were indistinguishable, but her figure resembled ancient figurines of mother goddesses—voluptuous and soft. She looked so familiar.

You, my child, have been the most promising and most disappointing of my children. Her voice blew past me like a soft sigh. I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out. You possess so much of my will, but lack the strength to use it. I shook my head in disagreement. I was ready to use all of her vengeful power, I was! Your body is only a vessel. Remember that once you die you will return here to me and your bones will make my flesh thicker—until then you will deliver to me my former state of being. I knew that, why was she telling me something I already knew? I am immovable, a force of the cosmos that can give life; never have I been able to take it away selectively.

 Selectively? As if she read my thoughts her words rolled on. Hurricanes, storms, diseases and plagues effect all of my creatures to maintain balance, but mankind has spread like the locust plagues of old devouring every innocent life form that comes before it. All of your kind can die and I will still remain immovable, but if my state of being is altered you and every other living thing will all die with me. I stared at her, sitting, embedded into the earth around her. That is why I have given you my bitter hate, to stop the destruction of everything I have ever given birth to, if it is at the sake of man’s survival then so be it. Never forget that. You are a vessel. Never forget the insignificance of humanity. Remember the power of the immovable beings…

  I sucked in a mouthful of air. It tasted like summer; warm and dry and sweet.

“Help me get her out” Owen’s voice floated up above me. I felt hands grazing my body and a weight being shifted off my limbs. I moved my hand to my eyes and brushed dirt off my eyelids.

“Here, sit up.” His arm slipped around my shoulders and gently lifted me up. I blinked away the rest of the dirt and saw a plastic water bottle being held up before my mouth. I opened my lips and let the slick liquid trickle down my throat.

“What happened?” I coughed.

“We buried you.”

“For how long?”

“The sun’s almost down.” I looked at the horizon and saw the familiar tinge of pink and baby blue washing over my wreck of a city. I used to love how the sun set over the sky scrapers. How each ray of light was reflected off of the millions of windows creating mirror images of the setting golden orb. Remember the power of the immovable beings…beings…beings. I also used to wonder what stood there before, what Melbourne used to look like. Was it a forest? Or bush land?

“Ow” I reached out to my thigh. It was caked in mud, so was my shoulder. I picked at the thick layer brown layer until the pieces came crumbling off. A circular welt stared back at me. It smelt like burnt meat and looked like over-cooked pork skin; black and charred, but covered in cracks. The pink flesh of my thigh peaked through the cracks, oozing blood and puss. I turned away sharply and dry retched until green bile burned the back of my throat.

“It looks a lot better than it did earlier” Owen said before handing me the bottle of water again, “we managed to scrounge up some food for you, even though you probably don’t feel like eating right now”. I turned to him and studied his face. I needed to forget about the monstrous burns on my body for just a second so that I could collect my thoughts. You are just a vessel.

His face hadn’t changed one bit, but then again the last time I had seen him was only a few days ago. It felt like years. So much had happened.  

“We?” I managed to ask after a few more gulps of the water.

“Yeah me and this kid of yours” he nodded at Manoel who was crouching down on his hunches behind me. He looked worried and said something in Portuguese.

“He keeps talking, even though I’m pretty sure he knows I’ve got no idea what he’s saying” Owen frowned.

“It would be weirder if he said nothing” I smiled at Manoel, “where’s Toya?”

“She’s waiting for me somewhere safe” he replied cautiously. I hated the way he said it, as if I were some sort of criminal waiting to get my hands on her. The familiar tingle of anger stirred at the base of my stomach. Some of the clarity returned to my vision and I dared another look at my burned leg. If I could concentrate some of my energy onto it…

“Where’s your new lover?” Owen’s bitter words snapped me out of my thought process.

“You should have left the city” I answered coldly.

“And done what? We have no idea what’s out there.”

“Better the devil you know huh” I said sarcastically.

“I just saved your devil ass. I could at least get a thank you.”

“I’m grateful, don’t get me wrong” I shot him a penetrating look knowing full well that my iris’s had turned black, “but why did you do it?”

“Should I have just left you on the ground screaming?” He looked intently back at me, “I know you Evelyn, no matter how out of control your insane supernatural powers get you can’t stop yourself from caring about people that matter to you. You saved that kid and all of his friends, I don’t know why, but they must have meant something to you.”

“They were innocent” I cut in.

 “You tried to stop Marla from shooting Snow, and I know that you didn’t mean to…to kill her like that. You can control whatever’s inside you and use it to help people! People like us!” he pointed at himself and Manoel.

“You don’t understand. People are the problem. I am me, but I am also Her” I slapped the ground, “I have a job to do! If that involves killing people I have to be okay with that. I have to be better than okay, I have to be ruthless about it because at the end of the day humanity is insignificant! If I don’t do my job then no one will survive. It might take hundreds of years, we might not see it, but at the rate mankind is going the Earth will die. Can’t you understand that?!”

“So you’re telling me that you would rather kill millions of innocent people than help them?”

“Help them do what? Build more pollution machines, more nuclear weapons, more cars, more jets? Do you want me to use my powers to help them get back on their feet, to get the electricity back up and running so that we can all contribute to the destruction of our atmosphere? I’ll tell you what I’m going to do” I stood up and looked down at Owen, “I will wipe out all manmade things, starting with this city. Then I will make sure that no one tries to re-build it, or anything else.”

“That’s ridiculous. Don’t look at me like that, it’s ridiculous and you know it! How in the hell will you be able to do all that?”

“I never said I was going to do it alone.”