Chapter 7: Wormwood

Hello reader!

This chapter is dedicated to @somerandomer2 who's writing a wonderfully thrilling novel about internet anonymity called TOR. It's really reminiscent of Cory Doctorow's work. You might enjoy. He's a super friendly dude as well. Send him a PM and he might even play some GTA V with you. 

And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter. 

-Revelation 8:11 


I ran after him (it) him (it don't argue eye you know).

I found him, his feet pattering, his eyes wild with fear and frenzy. The tiniest strand of tuna clung to one of his whiskers.

That was what I focused on when I smashed his head in with my foot.

I stomped. I danced.

Nostradamus was limp in twenty seconds.

I stood tall, splattered in blood and salt, resplendent in the sunshine.

Cats scratched at me, furious, violent. I felt their rage. I revelled in it.

The cats began to claw at my feet. My dress was tattered. My feet were bleeding.

I kicked whichever ones I could kicked. I did not run. I waited.

"...AH THE MEWLING THING HAS BEGUN TO FULFILL WHAT WAS PROMISED TO ME YES YES THE COIN DID NOT FALL FALSE HAUNT HAUNT OH YES OH HAUNT YES..."

I closed my ears, on my knees, my heart pounding. The cats began to scratch my face.

Then, one of them bit me.

(swift and silent it came the little one its little heart proud with the pride of species and family eye had no eye)

Pain (har har).

"...AH HAUNT A PROPHESY THEY EYE OF THE BEHOLDER NOW RIPPED APART OH LOOK OH LOOK AT IT BLOOD AND MUCOUS CONGEALS AND DRIPS ON THE COBBLESTONES ON THE PROPHET'S CORPSE AH SWEET HAUNT SWEET IRONY I LIKE THIS I LIKE THIS YES SHE IS A MASTER CARPET SMITH THIS ONE A FINE WEAVER OF PRETTY THINGS..."

I screamed. Not because of the pain from my eye. That was bearable. The pain in my ear.

"Oh shit, what've you done?"

I turn around. Laura from the wolf-hall. She's holding a carton-load of books.

"Shit, you've taken the commitment. You can't kill a cat."

The cats were still scratching and clawing at me. Soundlessly. They did not speak.

"Get up! Come with me!"

I looked up at her. I saw her repulse. I could almost taste the bile rising up her throat.

"Your eye...get up! Now! Come with me."

I got up. I went with her.

The cats chased us for a while. But we were quicker.

"...I LOVE THIS I LOVE IT SO MUCH HAUNT OH HAUNT FATE HANGING AND JUDDERING ON A WIRE WAITING TO TOPPLE AND YOU HAVE BEEN A MOST EXCELLENT TOPPLER DARLING GIRL YOU..."

"Can you hear that?" I shouted over the din.

"Just keep running." she said.

We arrived at the Wolf Hall soon enough. The cats had straggled off by then. I pulled the door open and the two of us got in. She barred it shut.

The voice had stopped. The pain in my eye had not. I could not see with it. I sat on the floor, my back to the bookshelf.

Laura fell with her back to the door and sank straight down. She was crying.

"You have no idea what you've done, have you. No bloody idea."

I didn't say anything. It was true. I didn't have any idea what I had done.

"You killed a bloody prophet, you idiot." she said. "You sent him into the second death. They're going to revolt now. Shit, we're all screwed."

I touched my eye. I winced.

"No, don't touch it. Just wait for a moment. Let me get some bandages and things."

She left, her tail curled up into the air. I looked around the place with my good eye. It was the same. That book of poems was still there, right where I'd been sitting.

I tried to get up, but my legs smarted from all the scratches and tears. I sat back down.

Laura came back after a while, a brown package in her hand.

"Why'd you do it? Why did you kill that cat?"

I breathed in and out. I tried to think through the pain.

"Because...because it's my job...to end the world."

She looked into my eyes (eye), the package wobbling in her hands. "You're not joking, are you? You really did come to kill us all."

She put some sort of green salve on all the cuts and covered them with cotton and some cloth. She raised the little jar of salve up and stretched her fingers up to my eye.

"This is going to sting."

It did sting. Very much.

"But why? And how did you know?" she asked.

I looked at my clenched fist. I unclenched it. The cat's tail fell out. Black as sin.

Laura scrambled back. "Put it away. Now. Put it away now." She was quiet.

I put it away.

She said nothing for a while, her eyes on the floor, hands pale.

Then she looked up at me.

"You need to leave. You can't stay here any longer. Do whatever you need to do. Just never come back here."

She tied the bandage around my eye with a deft, light grace. She tried not to touch my skin.

"Go. Go away and don't come back."

I stood and I opened the door. It was dusk now. Something icy cold alighted on my forehead.

I looked at the sky.

It was snowing.

I walked, my hands wrapped around my body to stay warm. There were no cats anymore. The streetlights were on again, but they gave no warmth.

It was just cold now.

Nostradamus was dead. I killed him. And now the cats would revolt, or so it seemed.

I knew nothing about anything. Except that I was going to die and that I might end the world while I'm at it.

I walked.

It took me some time to notice the soft patter behind me. I kept walking, trying not to listen.

The patter grew louder.

Whatever it was, it was getting closer.

I did not peek. I kept walking...I...(eye walked towards my destiny as my destiny crept behind me).

I turned.

A thin, angular looking cat snarled (perhaps smiled) at me.

"Voltaire. We've met before." he said.

I nodded.

"Going somewhere special?" he asked.

"What's it to you?"

"Nothing much. Do you mind coming with me?"

"What do you want?"

We walk together, the cat nimble weaving through the alleyways and side-roads.

He was humming something.

I asked again. "What do you want."

"In my line of work, it pays to be well informed."

"Does it?"

"Oh yes."

He went back to humming. Wagner. Ride of the Valkyries.

He stopped in front of a big metal door and looked up at me, his eyes glinting in the moonlight.

"So, what do you want to be informed about?" I asked him.

"When you start a revolution," he said, his claw between his teeth. "You really should pick a side. I want to know what side you picked. Come in."

He opened the door.

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Pretty intense, right? Thank you for your continued support, dear reader. You can give me a vote if you enjoyed it maybe? But I'd really appreciate your comments. 

Thanks again!  

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