Chapter three Deep Earth

Chapter Three
Deep Earth

Abby lived twenty miles away in small one bedroom house. Gail was probably already there. Images of Abby's bloody insides dangling from Gail's mouth exploded in his mind. There was no time to think. She had forced his hand. She had gotten her way. And now she was after Abby!
Shivering with desperation and new found energy, Trace unclenched his body reared back and released his will. He whipped through the sagging green canopy like a human tornado uprooting trees with thoughtless ease instantly scalping a fifty foot swathe of forest and absorbing it's mass in an eye blink of intent.
Streaking skyward he split the sky ripping into the Gail's unseen home realm called The Crown. He did not notice. He did not care. Time and space sloughed away like dead skin.
A wall of red brick slammed into view. It swirled past him like vapor. Suddenly he was standing in Abby's living room. She was balled up on her couch like a frightened kitten. Her eyes were perfect circles of shock.
Her scream skewered his ears but flooded his heart with relief.
"You're all right," Trace did not know if he was asking a question or stating a fact.
Of course she could no more recognize his voice than she could recognize him in his newly minted seven foot mass of chimeran muscle.
He rushed to her. She screamed pushing herself deep into the couch's over stuffed cushions.
Lifting his huge hands as if he were surrendering he jerked back. And before he could stop his tongue he told her the truth. "It's me Abby, Trace!"
She dug deeper into couch, shaking her head so violently her long black whipped across her face so furiously he feared it would slice her tear soaked cheeks.
"You're all right Abby, you're all right! She lied, Gail lied." He crumpled to the floor wonderfully crushed by relief so much so that his new body began to relax and shrink like a balloon with a slow leak.
Wiping wet hair out of her eyes, she slowly leaned forward. "What the-who is Gail," she exhaled the words on a cautious sigh of relief.
"You don't know her. Wish I didn't."
She licked her lips, then pressed her fingers against them. Her eyes narrowed as they bore deep into his. His old body was returning. "Trace? What, are you?"
His name and a nervous giggle tickled his ears. She snorted and snickered, drunk on incredulity. A bubble of snot ballooned out her left nostril.
He tried not to notice. But he couldn't look away until he collapsed on the floor laughing like a crazy man. He needed some sort of release, her booger bubble was as good as any.
She slid down beside him with outstretched hands. But as she drew near she found she couldn't bring herself to touch him.
"I'm sorry Trace."
He sat up lifting his hands to his face, wiping away the silliness. "I'm changed Abby. I'm not human anymore, guess I never was. You don't have to touch me. You don't want to touch me. I get it."
Abby shook her head and threw her arms around him. "No Trace, you tried to tell me. But this is so big, bigger than words, bigger than the world. You're, You're what, something out of a comic book, some sort of mutant maybe. This changes everything." She slid away from him and looked into his face.
"I thought she was going to hurt you," he said as much to himself as to her.
"Gail?"
He nodded and got to his feet. "She still might, they still might. I have to get you somewhere safe."
"They?"
"My," He looked around as if he could see them, "my people-my kind. They live in the sky- The Crown, yeah that's what they call it. Funny that just poppped into my head, like a memory. I was there, but just for a millisecond, but it was like I was always there! Then I was here. It's all a blur. Everything happened so fast."
"You, it, came right through the wall Trace. You scared the snot out of me!"
"Yeah so I saw. It? I was an it? Was I a monster it?"
She shook her head, "No, you were a kind of a cute it, but a big seven foot tall 'it' with huge muscles all covered in black leotard head to toe."
"That's a relief. Leotard? Really?"
"You're worried about your clothes? Trace!"
"Sorry Abby, you're right, that's dumb. But I have to know what I can do. Like dress myself to fit my mood. I was in a very dark state of mind. Weird power but I'll take it. They can do whatever I can do and a lot more I bet. If they wanted you dead."
"I'd be dead. Then what do they want?"
"Me. They are my family, sort of, According to Gail we were genectically engineered thousands of years ago by..."
"Cave men?"
"Don't think there were any cave men Abby, I don't know, aliens, ancient wise men, I don't know. All I knows is this world was never what we thought it was. All the smarty pants got it totally wrong. One things for sure knuckle dragging ape men did not cobble together a whole new species of super people from rocks and bones."
"So you are human."
"Abby we're all human, on the inside. We just have act human. She called you slag-worthless trash."
"Well that's not nice!"
"That's why I thought she was coming here to kill you, she still might. She lied once. She'll lie again."
"But if they can pass through walls and..."
"Shapeshift and a boat load of other scary stuff, then I have to find a way to make peace with the them. You're still in jeopardy, everyone is. They don't see you as human. You are worthless in their eyes. She told me so herself. She said a bunch of other stuff too, really bad stuff. But maybe she lying about that too, just can't risk it!"
"Well I'm not dead," said Abby.
"We'll cling to that, but you're still at their mercy."
"You know you don't have be superhuman to kill someone."
"I know but I wasn't suppose to tell you about us. She forced me. I wouldn't change. She manipulated me, forced me..."
"And tested you." Gail's scottish accent spun him around as he instinctively grab Abby.
"Leave her alone." He yelled, shielding and backing Abby away from their unpredictable intruder. "Get out of here!"
"I lied Trace. Your fear and disgust are perfectly understandable. But I had to discover your true nature. You saw them, their hearts, their darkness, their threat. That is why we feared you might be one of them. No one has ever seen them clearly as you."
"Them?"
"The sewage snakes you saw as an infant. They are the dark ones predators. The unchanged greatest threat. They mean to overrun this world, graze off it's populace. All that rubbish I told you before. That is who they are."
"So you've never eaten a child?" Trace asked.
Abby jumped behind Trace. "What! Trace what kind of beasts are these people."
Gail sighed and casually took a seat in a recliner on the far side of the room.
"You've nothing to fear from me Abby. I regret I had to go to such lengths to
trigger Trace's transformation. But I had to make him change. I had to see what he would do after his change. Reading his thoughts was not enough. I had to see his choices. He chose you. He chose the weak, the vulnerable. He does not care about being a god. He just wants you safe. There's no monster in him. We can use him."
"Hey! Maybe I don't want to be used!"
"Trace dear boy, we're using you right now. Look at her."
Abby stepped out from under his protective arm.
"What you are doing right now is all we want you to do."
Trace smiled down at Abby. "I, I can do that." Trace said flatly, "I will do that."