Fungal Halo

Every morning your reflection pains you, reminds you of what you desperately wish you didn’t look like. Something to sour the mood at the start of each day. Shaving helps only a little. Makeup helps a little more. But the mirror haunts you.

“At last, we have the High Priestess of that loathsome church in our grasp,” the hooded figure declares in triumph as others lead the young leader of a faith in decline to the prepared altar.

You never questioned why your exploration of this hidden temple’s ruins went so smoothly and easily, did you? How you seemed to instinctually notice the hidden passages and trap triggers? You and your fellows rode a wave of excitement all the way to the most hidden chamber here.

The heroine swoops in toward the site of the explosion, keeping an eye out for—ah, there she is. Her great nemesis, striding through the destruction, catches her eye at the same time and grins widely. “Ah, there you are! Fireworks always were the best way to get your attention.”

“There’s going to be a gathering,” the rumors said, “of the lady vampires who prey on this city.” They pointed to a speakeasy in the warehouse district on the weekend of a new moon. Those who didn’t dismiss the rumor out of hand vowed to stay away.

But not you, of course.

I have a pit where my stomach should be, an endless hole that nothing fills. When my hunger grows out of control and my self-control lapses, I find myself gripping the neck of someone beautiful again, maybe in a dark alley or in their own bedroom, as the light fades from inside.

She loves you. She barely knows you, but she loves you, and you come to know her through the love she lavishes upon you. Her kiss is like corrosive acid on your mind. It eats into you a little more with each visit, but you are too small to push her away.

“We are not so different, you and I,” the Dark Sorceress declares as I confront her at last in her great tower.

I grip my sword and grit my teeth. “You’re a cold-blooded killer who consorts with demons and whose idea of freedom is born of chaos and destruction.”

Even the machinery of time experiences wear and tear from use. Gears lose teeth, rust builds. Folks don’t often notice the minor grinding or a jump here or there, but sometimes a gear slips and you experience an extra day nobody else in your life passes through. Or you lose one.

The Hive’s slow spread through the city’s most neglected parts was, for a long time, not even noticed. Then, when it was first noticed, it was confused for something much lesser. A new religious movement, perhaps? It seemed to be growing mostly from the city’s vulnerable.

I dream of sailing my ship until I reach the sea of stars. I dream of meeting you there, endless, unknowable, and beautiful beyond fathoming. I dream of kissing you until you consume me and I become another smeared brush stroke among the many comprising your being.

Venom dripping from her fangs into my eager mouth. I hunger for it, but it does not fill me; it empties me. I am devoured from the inside, and all I can do is crave more.

The creature stalks the halls, hunting while you cower in hiding. But you can only hide for so long, can you, before…what is it? Boredom? Curiosity? Something compels you to peek out for a brief glimpse of it?

My prayers do not reach the goddess. Of course not. Whose prayers ever do? None of the priestesses here at her temple really matter to her as anything more than pretty dolls on display, performing our devotion during her centuries of absent neglect.

I reach inside for my power, that perfect light within which gives unassailable force to my every action, and for the first time ever, my grasp closes around nothing at all. Emptiness answers my summons. I peer within and see only a yawning abyss where once was a shining column.

I stumble and fall again, dropping the pitcher, its precious fluid spilled and wasted as it shatters on the ground. My limbs struggle to bear me upright again when I feel the heel of Her boot on my back, the weight of Her disappointment in me holding me down.

I stare into the mirror, watching the fat slithering shapes writhing under my skin, distorting my face into a grotesque parody of humanity. In a panic, I try squashing them down with my hands, begging them to disappear. They don’t hide under the surface for long before returning.

She crossed the room leaving a smudge across my vision that no amount of blinking would clear. Her fingertips bled black ink into the air around them. I should have been afraid, but I was transfixed, couldn’t let her leave my sight. I ditched my friends and followed her outside.

This, but even smaller.

No, smaller than that. Too small to make out any individual spider with your naked eye.

Watch me roll into town like the morning fog, a hazy cloud covering the area. Before you realize anything is abnormal, you’ve already breathed me in. You’re mine now.