Winter was, of all things, checking her appearance in a mirror. Peter had long ago stopped thinking of her as “Mother” or “Mom” and simply referred to her by her first name at this point. Sometimes she got riled by it, claiming it was disrespectful, but nowadays she seemed to grin and bear it as Peter simply kept on referring to her by it. But why she was looking in a mirror at a time like this defied all reason. However, Peter had no problem conceiving her doing such a thing even in their current circumstances.

“Why are you checking out your appearance at a time like this?” he asked with an ever so slight trace of contempt.

Looking up from her preening, Winter met Peter’s gaze with a stare that was both annoyed and tired. Surprisingly, though, it softened somewhat before she returned her attention back to the handheld mirror. “Because my hair is a mess.”

“That doesn’t answer the question,” Peter responded, “I said why at a time like this?”

This time she didn’t even bother to look up. “Well, Peter, sometimes it isn’t a good time to check one’s appearance, but in my experience it’s never a bad time to do so either.”

Her answer was so absurd and smacked so much of vanity that Peter just snorted and didn’t even bother to refute it. Yeah, he thought*, what about when it’s right after your house has been robbed, or you’ve just been told a family member has died, or you’re suddenly stuck in a wilderness with no idea how you go there and no clue where you are or how to get back.*

Truth be told, it wasn’t a terribly unpleasant place. Between two lofty hill lines about a mile apart from each other there was a valley that could probably be well described as the Garden of Eden; it was that stunning. Already they had come across the most varied and spectacular formations and waterfalls that Peter had ever conceived of, let alone seen. Even the place they were resting at at that moment was basically a football field’s length away from a waterfall that had to be as tall as a thirty story skyscraper, spanning up the rock face majestically and casting a spray that produced a magnificent rainbow arc that seemed so close that Peter could reach out and touch it. Above that in the now burnt orange sky, the clouds for some reason got in on the act too, arching against each other and spiraling into shapes that looked like someone was up there spinning cotton candy. The air too seemed... different, and invigorating too. Everything about this place made it seem like a paradise.

Except that paradise wasn’t supposed to be a prison. They had been on the road to Albuquerque when they made a wrong turn, gotten the vehicle stuck in mud, had to get out... and then suddenly they turned around and their car was just gone, finding themselves stuck here, wherever “here” was.

They had been climbing up the valley ever since they arrived, trying to get higher up so they could see a way out or to simply see if they could find out where they were, though Peter was increasingly becoming skeptical of the latter goal. Naturally, the first attempt they had tried was to climb the ridgeline of the hills that surrounded the valley, but what had lain beyond boggled their minds and had left them no closer to answers. Beyond the hills the vegetation declined sharply and a mere hundred feet beyond the terrain gave way to barren rocks as far as the eye could see. There was nothing, just rocks and some distant mountains that looked far more unwelcoming than the valley they had found themselves in. They had even tried the opposing ridgeline to what Peter figured was the west, based on the direction the sun was heading, but the mile long hike there hadn’t been worth what they saw. The west, if possible, was even more foreboding than the east, for in the distance the rocks started acquiring wicked jagged shapes that looked as though they were watching and waiting to cut up unwary travelers. Not even a Humvee or some other all terrain vehicle would have been able to cross such a rough terrain. Somewhat despairingly, they had decided to see if there was anything else here at all other than a valley and opposing wastes. Hence the trek upriver they were now undertaking.

Now, however they had run up against the mammoth waterfall that stood in front of them; scaling it up would be more an exercise in mountain climbing than hiking, and they were all thoroughly exhausted by their arduous trek as it was. Currently they were taking a break and just resting, although with the sky fading into hues of orange and magenta with the setting of the sun, Peter knew they’d have to prepare for nightfall before long.

Brushing himself off as he stretched his legs, Peter looked around to get better bearings. In so doing he couldn’t help but notice Merar by the edge of the river that pretty much defined the valley, sulking by the water’s edge. Peter rolled his eyes as such behavior pretty much defined his younger brother and was exactly what he expected from him. “Merar,” he yelled, “why don’t you quit moping and do something useful for a change?”

Merar heard his brother’s comment and got up, but merely started to pace up and down the shore of the river as he had been five minutes before. “There’s nothing to do right now,” he responded apathetically.

His comment earned a solid scowl from Peter. “Nothing to do, huh? Well do you see the sky above you?” he pointed up. “Maybe you might happen to notice that the sun’s going down and it’s going to, you know, get dark soon. In which case we’re going to need a little thing called a fire so we don’t freeze our butts off during the night.”

“But we still might find some kind of... I don’t know, some kind of civilization,” Merar pointed out.

Merar’s point was of course stupid as Hell. “Uh, Hello genius, that’s what we’ve been trying to find for the past seven or so hours,” Peter pointed out. “Unless you’ve happened to see a shack or road or something and just neglected to tell us, I really don’t think that we’re going to be finding anything remotely civilized in the next thirty or so minutes of daylight left. So that means a F-I-R-E, FIRE,” he enunciated excessively.

“It is getting late,” Winter chimed in, agreeing with Peter, “and we’re probably not going to find anyone else around here any time soon, so we really should settle ourselves in for the night.”

Satisfied, Peter turned around to head into the brush to get the wood and kindling needed to build a fire, but before he could do so Winter blocked him by extending her arm in his path. “How many times do have to tell you to stop being so negative with your brother?” she demanded.

“He’s asking for it,” he said defensively, “all he’s done this whole time is-“

Winter, however, would have none of his common sense. “You know that we’ve had this discussion before. Really Peter, you’re starting to act like you father. So just stop it now.”

Peter did as he was told, but not out of any respect. It had more to do with stopping himself before he started saying really nasty things to Winter and provoking an argument, because right now he really didn’t want to waste his time. That didn’t mean that he had to like it though. He watched her pull away and head over to Merar to talk about God knew what with him. Whatever it was, it was either some ineffectual speech to motivate him or some ridiculous attempt to cheer him up. Peter knew his mother; as long as you didn’t in any way stand up to her then she would put on a bright and chipper face and act all nice. Scowling, Peter moved off to the edge of the brush to start collecting to the fire.

About a minute later, Winter and Merar came up behind him, claiming they were off to go pick some of the berries they had seen on the way up here. “Hopefully they’ll be enough to offset not having eaten anything since breakfast,” Winter explained. “Keep an eye on Angel.”

Peter was less concerned that berries, or any food right now, would satisfy their hunger than he was about the fact that his mother and brother were the ones picking them. They were liable to pick the berries that were rotten or sour. They didn’t know how to pick ripe berries; they just weren’t the kind who could bear good fruit.

There was no sense dwelling on the problem, though. If they wanted to go off and demonstrate their incompetence, so be it; Peter would stay and do other important things like build their campfire. He started slowly, scrounging around the ground for the right kind of kindling that he needed. Gathering up an armful of the stuff, he turned around and made his way back to the edge of the clearing.

He heard a scuffling noise behind him, but saw that it was just his six year old sister, Angel, who had been keeping close to him since Winter and Merar left for the berries. She was always the quiet one, even as an infant; if you didn’t know you’d hardly even know she was around most of the time. Out of the four of them, Angel was the one that Peter was most worried for. He wasn’t sure exactly how she was taking all of this. Right now though, she was just trudging along quietly, hugging her teddy bear in one hand and a flashlight in the other.

It didn’t take many more trips to gather kindling, but he was having trouble finding the solid wood he was going to need to get the fire roaring. The sun had already dipped below the westward ridgeline and was probably already sinking below the horizon by now. The shadows of night slowly crept over the garden valley, and Angel hugged her teddy bear ever tighter. Every now and then she would hear or see something in the brush and she would snap on the flashlight and wave it around, almost as if she hoped that the light itself would force whatever it was she thought was there to go away. As Peter worked he saw what he thought were bats flying overhead; gazing around he saw a few come by the clearing that he selected to build the fire in. There weren’t too many, but he was worried about his sister’s reaction.

As he watched he saw one of the bats fly onto a bush not two feet from Angel. She of course noticed instantly but to Peter’s surprise she didn’t freak out. She was guarded in her movements, but as the bat climbed around the bush and didn’t act at all threatening slowly Angel started to let go of some of her tension. “Peter, is it going to bite me?” her weak timid voice asked.

Peter stared at the bat as it groped its way along the ins and outs of the bush, wondering that very question. “I don’t think so; he looks like he’s just looking for some bugs in there to eat.”

The answer didn’t entirely satisfy Angel, but it did serve to calm her down somewhat. Their new bat acquaintance, meanwhile, seemed content to putz around the bush eating its fill of bugs, which Peter was personally more than happy to oblige. The bat continued its crawlings, and even to Angel it looked as though it weren’t so bad. Then there was suddenly a great flurry of movement and a sizable swarm of bats swooped into the clearing, leaving Peter to instinctively duck for cover. Belatedly realizing that bats were harmless creatures, he realized that such a fact would be absolutely no concession for Angel, who was now screaming bloody murder. Peter, though not at all convinced that his sister was in any real danger, couldn’t help but jump forward to ward off what she at least was utterly convinced were evil blood sucking monsters. At the very least, they were vicious little scamps that seemed to be here for no other reason than to brutally rob her of her piece of mind, and he was going to do his best to chase them away.

The swarm didn’t last long, only ten seconds at most, though it had to have seemed like an eternity to Angel; they started flocking away in almost an instant. Before they left entirely, Angel managed to snap her flashlight on again and shone it upon her tormentors, catching the last few stragglers as they bolted into the rapidly darkening sky.

Examining his sister, Peter found her petrified against a nearby tree, holding the flashlight as if it were the only thing protecting her, like it was the silver bullet that could vanquish the monsters and she wasn’t going to let go of it anytime soon. Peter stooped down right next to her and hugged her; truth be told he was at a loss for what to say seeing how terrified his sister was, so he just did the best impromptu comforting he could, holding and whispering, “it’s ok, it’s ok, they’re gone now.” Peter knew that when you were younger, time seemed to move so much slower than it did when you grew up; he remembered how long the day was when his father left. Time had ground by like a turtle glued to the floor, and he winced at how long his sister must have been experiencing the uncertainties and now the terrors of this long day.

So deep was he in these thoughts that he almost didn’t notice her begin to sob. Immediately he fully embraced her, trying to rub away the fear she must have been feeling. Damn it, why couldn’t he think of something more to say than just “It’s ok, it’s ok” over and over again? He should have been able to think of at least something more than that to comfort her.

“Peter?”

Moving himself back to look her right in the eyes to console her, Peter didn’t say anything, he just indicated for her to ask him anything she wanted to with a nod of his head. It was something they were both used to; Peter had been thirteen when Angel had been born, and he had always been there for his baby sister. She was one who asked him questions all the time when she was feeling particularly chipper, so much so that that single nod was enough to tell her that her big brother Peter was there for her.

“Are the bats going to come back?”

Peter thought for a moment to find the best thing to say. “They shouldn’t. Bats are little guys, Angel; they’re probably more scared of you then you were of them.”

The look on Angel’s face showed that she was very unconvinced of that, at least in terms of intensity. But it did have the desired effect of calming her down so her face wasn’t so pale and she wasn’t as stiff as a dead fish. Peter smiled warmly at her and looked around. “See? The bats aren’t coming back. And if they do I’ll scare ‘em off, ok?”

Angel looked like she was debating whether that was enough, but with her brother’s warm smile it seemed so, so she nodded.

“Ok,” he whispered gently. “Well, then, I’ve gotta get back to building this fire.” With that he turned around to gather some more wood. Angel was right behind him, teddy bear and flashlight in hand.

As he worked, Angel kept looking around in the woods again, reacting to every perceived movement or noise that issued from the brush. “Don’t worry Angel, I’m right here in front of you.” Again he went back to scouring for more heavy pieces of wood that he was having such a beast of a time trying to find.

“Peter?” Angel’s fragile voice called out again.

“Yeah Angel?”

“... Are there monsters in these trees?”

It was a question that had been lingering in the back of Peter’s mind for some time now. He didn’t know where they were, but as crazy as it sounded he didn’t think they were on Earth anymore. He had never heard of a valley quite like this, hidden in the middle of a wasteland, anywhere in the world, and it was absurd to suggest that civilization had somehow left it undisturbed. True, he wasn’t an expert on geography, but everything he had seen today seemed to tell him they weren’t in Kansas (or New Mexico for that matter) anymore. That of course left the question of the varieties of animal life that might live... wherever here was. True, the bats seemed similar enough to those he was familiar with, but what if there were things here that were a bit more exotic and perhaps had a taste for meat?

Swallowing, Peter tried to think of something that would allay his sister’s fears. “Well, you’ve gotta remember, Angel, even if there are some weird animals out there, most animals that eat meat don’t attack other animals that they don’t know about. They’ll probably be all ‘what is that thing walking around on two legs? Better not mess with it.’” Peter personally thought his explanation was just a bit convoluted, and Angel didn’t look entirely convinced.

“So, they’re not going to eat us?”

Peter sighed after he hefted a good solid sized log. He wondered if he should just lie to her. “I don’t think so, and even if they do, I’ll scare ‘em off,” he decided, trying to sound more boisterous than he felt.

Angel fell silent for a moment. “I don’t want to get eaten...” she whispered, clutching her teddy bear tightly.

Damn it, Peter thought. He was trying to alleviate her fear, but it seemed he wasn’t making a dent. He turned around to face her. “Do you think I’m strong?” he asked, going for broke.

“...I guess.”

Peter smiled. “Well, if there’s any monster out there that wants to try and eat any of us, they have to get through me first, ok?”

His gamble seemed to pay off, and Angel seemed satisfied.

However, as before his consolations proved to be only temporary.

“Peter?”

A thread of irritation welled up in him, but Peter instantly bit down on himself; there was no way that he was going to be anything but patient and loving with his sister; she, unlike Winter and Merar, was someone who deserved such things. “What is it, Angel?” he asked gently.

“Are we ever going to get home?”

That unfortunately, was something that Peter was less certain about than anything. He sure wanted to get back home and not have to claw his way through tangled brush all day, and he would have given anything for some McDonald’s right about then. He certainly wanted Angel to get back to her life, to go to Kindergarten and learn with all the other kids and just be free to live life as a normal six year old. The thought of her having to scrounge around for food for the rest of her life in a wilderness, no matter how pleasant it might seem, was one that turned his blood to ice.

“Are things going to be the same again?”

Such a question was one Peter wouldn’t have expected from a six year old. Or rather, six years olds shouldn’t have to ask questions like that, ever. “Tell you what, Angel,” he said, setting down the log and squatting down right next to her so they were close to eye level, “A lot of things can happen in life. Some of them aren’t very pleasant. But there are always some things you can count on.”

A glimmer of hope passed her eyes. “What?” she asked anxiously.

“One of them is that no matter what happens, I’m going to look after you, ok?” he moved over to hug her. “Doesn’t matter what happens, I’m always going to be here so you don’t have to be afraid.”

“...Peter?” Angel asked after a moment.

“Yeah Angel?”

“...Thank you.”

It wasn’t an obligatory polite response, it was genuine; she was speaking from her heart. It was all that Peter could do not to well up in tears right at that moment. Sometimes kids said the darndest things. He smiled at her with a warm glow, having to wipe away a tear from his eye. “Well then,” he told her softly, “We’d better get this fire ready for when Mom and Merar get back, ok?” Angel nodded, and followed in step right behind him.

Pushing aside the brush and making their way into the clearing, he first heard and then saw both Merar and Winter come barreling forward panting like they had just finished a boot camp exercise. “Wha...What was wrong?” Winter said between heaves of breath, “We heard screaming.”

“Just a couple bats; they gave Angel a scare, but they flew away,” Peter explained.

“So, we ran all the way back up here for nothing?” Merar asked somewhat annoyed.

Peter shrugged. “You got here quicker, didn’t you? Now you can help me with this fire.”

“We don’t need a fire to eat berries,” Merar declared as he pointed to a pile of berries he had stuffed into a pocket made by bunching up the bottom of his shirt. He also pulled out a handful from his pockets.

Peter could have argued the point but decided it was pointless; the building of the fire was going to happen anyways regardless of whatever stupid crap came out of his brother’s mouth. That said he decided to see what kind of berries they had gotten, although he was somewhat cautious. Knowing his brother he had picked the ones that had stood out and were thus likely to less than appetizing. Looking over what he had brought, even the stuff he had brought in his sweaty pockets (which Peter consequently wouldn’t eat in a million years), it was obvious that Merar had gone after the weirder, more exotic looking berries, including some that didn’t look quite ripe. Against his better judgment he tasted a couple. As he suspected, Merar was, simply put, useless. His berries were hardly ripe at all and had probably been selected because they caught Merar’s eye, the fool that he was.

Grumbling a few unkind words that Merar just rolled his eyes at, Peter found that Winter had gathered some berries of her own in her purse, which she deposited in Peter’s arms as she sat down by the pile of wood to start the fire (at least someone besides himself wasn’t useless). Winter’s berries, however, didn’t look quite right either. Tasting a couple, Peter nearly spat them out. Whereas his brother’s had been under ripe, his mother’s had been way overripe. “Geez, woman,” he said, “what kind of berries were you trying to pick?”

“I tried to get the ripest ones I could get,” Winter said defensively.

You tried a little *too well*, Peter thought bitterly. It was entirely like her, however; she always had absurd standards in just about everything, so high that she often fell flat of her goal. What the Hell was she thinking? These weren’t any berries that any of them were familiar with, so how could they possibly presume to know which ones were the best? Obviously neither if them had thought to actually taste their own fruit.

Peter just grumbled and popped some more berries into his mouth. Horrible as they were, it was food in his belly and none of them had eaten since breakfast. He figured that little Angel must have been starving, so he knelt over and gave her the rest of the berries, as many as she wanted. She ate without any noticeable sign of disgust as she did so, then again kids could eat their own boogers and think they were delicious; Peter was just glad she was filling her belly as he knew that if they didn’t find a way back home food could become a problem.

Meanwhile Winter was crouched down, hunkered over the would be fire rubbing like mad trying to get something to start. It was painfully obvious that she wasn’t applying at all enough kindling in the spot where she was trying to start the flame. It wasn’t a terribly big issue at the moment though, as they still didn’t have enough big wood to really sustain a fire. Moving off into the brush again, in the corner of his eye he saw Merar squirm uncomfortably as he pulled something out of the back of his pants. Peter’s first crude thought was that it was bong or something, but that’s not what it turned out to be.

“Where did you get that from?” Peter asked incredulously, pointing at the crowbar that his brother now held.

“From the car, I figured we might need it for something.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me, you retard, I could have used that earlier!” Peter exclaimed. How on Earth had his brother managed to walk around this whole time with *that *stuck down his pants? But Peter was more concerned with that fact that it was here at all. With a crowbar he could have brought down at least some smaller trees and brush and made his job so much easier. Walking over he snatched the crowbar from his incompetent sibling and headed off to get more wood.

Marching back ten minutes later with a sizable amount of timber, Peter saw that Winter was still unable to get a fire going. “Am I the one who has to do everything around here?” he complained aloud.

Snapping around, Winter glared knives at him. “Peter, unless you have something constructive to say, just shut up, please.”

“I’ve got something better than that,” he replied, “How about I do *something constructive, like make a fire that actually *starts.” Pushing her aside, Peter got to work applying a proper amount of kindling so that when a spark finally came there would be something to actually catch and hold a flame this time. Within five minutes he had it, and the wood pile became a campfire in a matter of moments.

“See?” he leered, “That’s how you’re supposed to build a fire.”

“You can step off the stage, your highness,” Merar sneered back, “You don’t have to act so snobby and high and mighty about it.”

“Well maybe you could learn to actually be useful so that I wouldn’t have to take the glory for everything,” Peter countered.

“Peter!” Winter shouted, “For the love of God, stop being such a-“

Winter stopped suddenly as all four of them heard a loud distinctive rustling of the brush not ten feet behind them. Peter eyed the spot suspiciously but didn’t see anything, but he and it seemed the others too had definitely heard something move nearby. “Shh,” he whispered, straining his ears to catch another sound of their visitor.

Then all Hell broke loose. The woods exploded as a multitude of shapes burst forward and came straight at the group. Angel and Merar screamed and they all instinctively ducked down as two of them came down it what distinctively looked like a predatory swoop, ripping through his shirt and casting a deep claw mark on Peter’s back. Screaming in pain and fury, he snapped his head back to get a look at the creatures.

All in all he guessed that there were probably about six of them in total. They... Peter wasn’t sure what they were. They looked almost like big furry frogs with wings and razor sharp claws. More of their fellows came down for another pass; Peter snatched up the crowbar and swung wildly. Predictably he missed, but it did cause their assailants to swerve wildly in turn to avoid him. Angel’s flashlight shone forth again, swirling about like mad in her desperate attempt to drive away the monsters.

Another pair swooped down and raked Merar on the left arm, and it looked like they got Winter too. Peter ran over to try and cover Angel who was screaming and cowering underneath Winter who was acting as more or less a human shield. Merar screamed in pain but seemed to be trying to hit any of the little devils as they flew past but looked like he wasn’t trying particularly hard. Peter, however, was out for blood and made a hit on one of them that sent it spiraling away into the brush. He clipped another less than five seconds later, but his resistance and posture only seemed instead draw them all to him. The whole lot swooped down nonstop trying to cut him up and gouge out his eyeballs, but he kept swinging even as he kept getting sliced, adrenaline pushing him over the bounds of insanity. He let loose a primal scream and charged them, intent on crushing every single bone in their bodies.

Peter’s berserking seemed though to be paying off. The devils seemed to grow more guarded and less ambitious in their attacks and when Peter clubbed one and from the sound of it broke its leg, they suddenly broke off and retreated into the brush. The wounded one was not far behind its companions; even with its wounded leg it frantically clawed the ground and hovered pathetically with its wings until it disappeared from the clearing. Angel kept the flashlight on them as they retreated, shaking the beam ferociously.

From the sound of things, there didn’t appear to be anymore of the creatures nearby, and the valley again became quiet except for the sounds of the night and the ever present rush of the waterfall nearby. Only then did Peter realize how much he had been cut, and as the adrenaline wore off the pain came kicking and screaming. Each breath became heavy and each step became a marathon in itself as he staggered back to the others and plopped himself next to the fire heaving for breath, the crowbar dropping beside him. The only thing he noticed was Angel still had her flashlight on, keeping guard over the clearing.

They all checked each other out and assessed the damage. Peter had gotten what looked like six different wounds from the little beasts; Merar had gotten attacked three times and Winter two. Angel, miraculously, hadn’t a scrape on her body; the others had taken the brunt of the damage.

Merar headed over to the river nearby to collect some water in a plastic bag Winter had in her purse that she had kept some headache pills in; as they were pain relief pills there wasn’t a better time than the present to take them. Peter received the most with his numerous cuts and gashes. Merar hurried to the river and even though it was less than a hundred yards away, he carried the crowbar just to be on the safe side. He hurried back as fast as he could and Winter used the water to help clean the wounds on all of them, which necessitated that Merar take a couple more trips.

The two of them were quite subdued from that point on, and were mostly intent on getting the wounds cleaned up and staying alert of any more creatures. Peter was still somewhat winded from the encounter and was still catching his breath and bearings. Angel was traumatized, stunned silent, and was curled in a fetal position on the dirt. Winter picked her up and held her beside her, whispering comforting words into her ear. Even as he was, Peter wanted to shake his head. His mother just wasn’t the type who could make much headway on that front.

By this point the sky was totally dark, but miraculously the fire Peter had started before the attack had kept going and was now a respectable campfire that was burning strong, illuminating the clearing and keeping it warm and reasonably comfortable. In addition, Angel still had her flashlight on; she had resisted all of Winter’s urges to turn it off.

Nevertheless, as time wore on the fire started to greatly die down and was in need of more fuel. Peter still ached but he felt well enough to get up and try and scrounge up at least some more wood. Standing up was an exercise in pain as his body protested, but he sucked it up and ignored it as best he could; besides, he couldn’t get to sleep anyway and needed to occupy himself. No one protested as he made his way to get more wood.

In his weakened state Peter mostly trudged along and glanced around for random pieces of wood that caught his eye. He wasn’t terribly worried about getting lost; all he had to be able to do was to see the campfire, so as long as he was close enough to see that, he felt comfortable wandering around. Meandering around somewhat aimlessly, he looked around for a good fifteen minutes before he saw it.

At first he thought it was his eyes playing tricks on him. He stared and focused for a moment, trying to clear his mind, but it wasn’t going away; something was glowing up ahead. Peter cursed himself for forgetting to bring the crowbar, this garden was proving to be more and more alien by the minute, and he wasn’t sure if this time would be dangerous or not. Cautiously, he stepped forward though, unable to control his curiosity.

The source of the phosphorescence turned out to be a spring of some sort, about the size of a mudhole, the water bubbling up from underneath glowing a deep violet. Peter instantly thought about radioactivity; anything radioactive enough to glow like this stuff was doing had to be able to cause cancer with a single drop. Then again, this whole garden seemed almost to be otherworldly, so perhaps there could be another reason why it was glowing purple? Unable to figure out if it was one or the other, Peter inched forward. He didn’t feel anything out of the ordinary, but then again you weren’t actually supposed to feel radiation until it had already royally screwed up your body from the inside.

Experimentally he grabbed a stick that he poked in the water. Peter’s rational side asked just how he expected to learn anything about the spring’s radioactivity with a stick, but he did it anyway, stirring up the water as he did so. He wasn’t quite prepared, though, when the spring spontaneously flash boiled and exploded outward, spraying the luminescent water all over Peter and everything within twenty feet.

His first thought upon regaining his bearing was why he wasn’t seared to the bone. If that had been a flash boil then shouldn’t the water have been at or near boiling? Eying himself he found that his skin wasn’t burned in the slightest, he was just soaking wet, head to toe. Belatedly he realized that that could be a problem in and of itself; he was liable to get very cold as the night wore on and he could get hypothermia if he wasn’t careful. He was more worried about what exactly had been making the water glow purple; if it was indeed radioactivity, it was now all over him and soaking into his skin. Sure enough looking closely he could see the water on him not only shimmering in the moonlight but was glowing as well. Well, that’s just peachy.

Suddenly the air above the spring started glowing itself. At first Peter feared that whatever it was that was making the water glow had gotten into his brain and was now screwing with everything, but as he watched the glow seemed to glow brighter and actually looked like it was starting to swirl. Then there was a great crash like thunder and the glowing air coalesced quickly into a cloud formation right in front of him.

The noise must have attracted the others, for at that moment Winter, Merar, and Angel all came running, Merar with the crowbar and Angel using her flashlight to navigate the dark woods. They saw Peter sitting on the ground all wet and... glowing, but they didn’t miss the giant glowing whatever-it-was swirling about above them. Its swirling candescence was hypnotizing in its own way.

“And who would this be?” a soft voice mysteriously echoed.

Peter knew where it had come from, but he didn’t quite believe it at first. He could have looked around, but his gut told him that the swirling cloud had just said something. The only thing he checked was to see if the others had heard it and he just wasn’t hearing things. They were looking around, though, and it was plain to see that they’d heard it too.

“Holy crap,” Merar said amazed.

“What are you?” Angel asked in that manner only a six year old can.

The swirling cloud twisted and became almost a vortex of sorts, twisting itself into funnel. “I am one who is familiar with this place, and know that you are from elsewhere. So I may ask who you are just as well as you may ask me.”

If Peter didn’t know any better he’d classify that as a wiseass comment, but thought better of it. What the... cloud thing asked really wasn’t entirely unreasonable. Peter stopped for a moment to consider again the absurdity of a cloud asking anything, but right now he was willing to bear surprises as this all seemed a little too real to be a dream.

“We, uh,” Peter began, “We got lost. Ended up taking a wrong road, and then found it was gone; both in front of us and behind us.” Belatedly he realized he was babbling like an idiot trying to explain (to a cloud!) their situation. “But, uh, yeah, basically, we were someplace... else...”

“Look,” Winter interrupted, cutting short Peter’s rambling, “You just couldn’t, well, tell us which way to get back to Albuquerque, could you?”

Peter shook his head at the absurdity of his mother’s question. “Winter,” he said exasperatedly, “You really think this... whatever, in the middle of a garden in the middle of a place that can’t possibly exist on Earth knows where *Albuquerque *is?”

“I must confess,” the voiced echoed again, “I am unfamiliar with this ‘Albuquerque’ that you speak of.”

Peter shot his mother a told you so look which she glared back knives.

“Though it is quite apparent that you are lost with no... physical way of returning to your place of origin.”

“Well, that’s really great to hear,” Merar muttered. Peter rolled his eyes, although his brother didn’t hit far from the truth. No physical way of returning home sounded a lot like a dead end.

“Ok, ok, then,” Peter held his hands up, “we’ve started on all this but we’ve still got one question; just... what are you? Are you some sort of, I don’t know, some sort of guardian spirit or whatnot?” He then remembered something else. “And... that water, it wasn’t radio...” he paused, realizing that the cloud might not be familiar with that word either. “It wasn’t poisonous or anything, was it?”

The cloud shifted again, and looked like a pulsing wave that moved back and forth above the spring. “The answers to both your questions are in fact related. The water... will not harm you directly as a venom does, if that is your inquiry, but it is related to what I am.”

The... entity, as Peter figured it was better to think of it than just a cloud, stayed silent creating a moment of tense anxiousness. “Well? And that would be how?” Winter asked.

“I am a mirror,” the entity declared, “I take and reflect back what is written in the deepest recesses of all manner of entities that pass through and make them manifest.”

“Make manifest,” Merar repeated, “And by that you mean what, exactly?”

The entity seemed to expand as two what looked like appendages formed and pointed outward. “This garden, this valley you see around you is one such manifestation.”

Merar shook his head in confusion, and Peter had to admit he wasn’t able to figure this out anymore than his brother was. “Manifestations of what?” Peter asked. “Like... what was being ‘reflected’ off of?”

“Many things,” the entity replied cryptically. “In your own case, I would reflect back a manifestation based on what you would call the heart.”

It took a moment for the words to sink into Peter’s skull before he realized what the cloud meant.

Winter, however beat him to the punch. “You mean... you mean to tell us that you grant wishes?”

“Such phrasing is crude, but not far from the truth.”

“So wait, wait,” Peter said, “You mean to tell us that someone or... something wished for this valley and you just made it snap into existence or something?”

“Indeed.”

“Is that all you do?” Angel suddenly asked, “Don’t you get bored?”

Silence hung over for a moment, before the entity started flashing into colors of blue and green; briefly Peter worried that his sister’s spontaneous question had somehow upset or miffed it, but the silence was replaced by a strange sound that Peter could only describe as laughter. “That is not a question I can say I have ever been asked before. It is most refreshing one in its own way. But no, you only see me here in one role; I posses others.”

“But why do you make wishes come true?” Angel asked insistently.

If the entity had a face Peter swore it had to be smiling at that moment. “I find it intriguing and enlightening to observe what is the deepest desire of souls. Whatever is written on the most solemn reaches of the heart, what is most dear, that is what shall be.”

“So, just to be clear here,” Peter tried to clarify, “You take whatever someone wants the absolute most and... makes it reality?”

“Correct.”

The implications that hit Peter’s mind were... staggering. Quite literally, they could have anything they wished. Even the impossible though?

Such implications weren’t lost on Angel either. “Could you take us home? Even though you don’t know where it is?”

“If that is what is desired most, than you would indeed be sent to your home,” was the reply.

Instantly Merar stepped forward. “Well what are we waiting for?” he demanded, “Let’s do this and get home!”

“You don’t have to get all Power Rangers about it, Merar,” Peter said.

“So, what’s your problem then, Peter? We can go home!”

“Yes, yes we can,” Peter agreed, “But we don’t have to just go rushing in with it.”

Merar was growing impatient with his brother, however. “To Hell with taking things slow, let’s get this over with now Peter!” He marched forward with a purpose.

Instinctively Peter moved to block his brother moving forward. “Merar, I said calm down. Whoever does this needs to be calm and relaxed, ok?”

What Peter had just said was actually insulting by a wide margin, and it didn’t take long for Merar to figure that out. “Calm, eh? Come on Peter, quit being patronizing with me, why not just say what you’re really thinking? Is there a little bit lack of trust I detect here?” he said dangerously.

Apparently even Winter caught on and put a hand on Merar’s shoulder. “Merar, just relax, we’re going to get home regardless at this point; getting all heated up about things won’t make a difference.”

Merar looked liked he wanted to argue the point more, but Winter shook her head. “Oh, that’s how it is, huh?” Merar said. “Neither of you trust me to make the right choice? What the Hell do you think I’m going to do with a golden opportunity to get home? You think I wanna stay in this dump the rest of my life?”

“Merar,” Peter spat, “For the love of God, shut up already.”

It became obvious to Merar that he wasn’t going to have his way on this one, so he slumped his shoulders in defeat but still glared bitterly at Peter and Winter; he trudged off to a nearby tree and leaned against it pouting like a five year old.

Winter glared irritated at her youngest son and marched forward to the spring herself. But Peter moved to block her too.

“Peter,” she began, “Really this isn’t the time for this sort of nonsense.”

“It seems to me the completely proper time for this sort of ‘nonsense,’” Peter responded. “You heard... it,” he said, pointing at the ever swirling ever changing entity which did not interrupt the bickering that was taking place before it, “That thing’ll take whatever is the absolute deepest desire of whoever uses it and makes it reality. This isn’t some simple make a wish crap. This is way deeper than that and we can’t afford to take any chances.”

Winter folded her arms in mounting anger. “And you think that my making this choice is taking a chance?” she demanded.

Peter didn’t reply, he really didn’t want to head into this argument, but he couldn’t keep his eyes from saying everything that he felt.

“It is, however strong feelings you may have on the subject, an academic discussion of who is reflected upon,” the entity suddenly declared, returning everyone’s attention to it once again. “The one who is to do this has already been chosen by the waters.”

That comment had everyone confused, and despite the recent argument they all looked at each other strangely. Peter felt the need to ask, but then his mind suddenly put two and two together. “The waters,” he repeated the entity’s phrasing, “By that do you mean the glowing water that just drenched me a few minutes ago?”

“Indeed,” the entity responded, “The water is part of the process of reflection. It is the conduit upon which the echo must travel in order to become manifest. Without it there can be no reflection. When you came, you awakened the waters, and you have become immersed in them. And its awakening awakened me.”

The others weren’t entirely pleased with the proclamation, and Peter couldn’t help but feel a little justified in himself. “So I’m the only one that can do this?”

“Correct,” the entity pronounced.

That seemed enough for Peter, who at least tried to soothe the feelings of his mother and brother by looking at them apologetically. He didn’t want them to think he was a heartless jerk after all. Gingerly he stepped forward to the entity. “Do I have to do something special then? Or what? What’s the drill?”

“Drink.”

“That’s it?” Peter asked. “Just drink some of that water?”

“Drink,” the entity repeated.

Part of Peter suspected that there had to be more to it than that, but another part wondered whether it might just be as simple as he was being told it was. Figuring there was no better way to find out than by actually doing it, Peter approached the edge of the spring, which despite its previous explosion was nearly filled to the brim once again with the same eerie glowing water. Turning back, he saw Angel hugging her teddy bear tightly. But unlike what he had seen in her for most of the day there was something new this time; hope. She knew that they were going home, and he could see her fear and apprehension melting away. Smiling at her, he winked, and gave her their special nod. “We’ll be back home in a flash.” Returning his attention to the spring, he lowered himself to the side and scooped up a handful of water. He let it drip and then fall back into the pool; it seemed normal enough excepting that it glowed and possessed the mysterious power to transport them all home in the blink of an eye. Shrugging, Peter scooped up some of it with both hands and took a big, long drink.

It didn’t begin as Peter thought it would. Then again, he wasn’t sure just how he thought something like this would begin either. It was just... strange, like a slow floating sensation. His mind started wandering, and slowly but surely he could see things; it took him a moment to realize that he was visualizing what he was thinking about. Not simply visualizing it, but experiencing it, like he was actually there. A torrent of thoughts cascaded in on him, but he pushed them aside; he had known this was coming and now that he was here he recognized it. That water was supposed to reflect back what was in his heart, and right at that very moment it was searching, penetrating his being to find his deepest desire. He had known that it was coming, and he had known that Merar or Winter would have been so easily lead off track by it. Shaking his head, he cleared his thoughts to focus.

It wasn’t easy to think clearly when the slightest thing you thought about suddenly appeared as if before your eyes, but Peter summoned all his strength to think about one thing: home. He centered all his energy and focus on that one thought. He thought of that stupid gnarled tree in the front yard, the flower beds next to the front door, the beige carpet lining the living room, the smell of the lived in kitchen. It all clicked into place, and for some reason he felt more in touch with his home than he had ever felt before. The entire experience was so vivid, even the annoying things seemed glorious. He thought of being back home, of just being able to drive around town in his car, of going back to college and studying under Prof. Henry again, of pepperoni pizza, of what he was going to do with his life, what he was going to make himself. A well renowned...

Millionaire? He thought about it for a moment. If he really was going back, couldn’t he change things too? Couldn’t he make things better as well as returning himself and his family home? It seemed a dangerous path, and he knew beforehand that something like this might happen to whoever made the wish, but still, now that he was here, he could see everything so clearly, he could taste the potential realities that could come to fruit at his command. They were all so vivid! But really, why not just go back and make himself, say taller, more attractive, why not make himself and some friends richer?

He stopped, suddenly perplexed by his own thoughts. Why stop there? He was only thinking about things that he normally considered possible. What about... other things, things that were otherwise impossible. Randomly, the image of him flying about through the sky flashed in his head. With delight he realized that even such a thing as that could be his if he wanted it. All he had to do was think about it. No! No, he tried to put the brakes on, he was here to send himself and everyone home, not to get sidetracked, not to let their normal human failings get...

Why did he have to even accept that? Why couldn’t he be something other than human? Seriously, what was stopping him? And in that instant he knew. He could see it; it was calling to him, beckoning him to make them reality. It was the thing that he had always thought about, something that was incomparable to anything he had ever imagined before. The thought of his own skin, different, feeling the coiled power in his bones, his muscles enough to pulverize boulders, his tail... unlike anything he had ever experienced; it was his for the taking! The new, expanded sensations, he could be something more than he was, something greater than what he was trapped in. He could free himself, make himself into something the human mind couldn’t comprehend. It was exhilarating! He could see it, taste it, hear, feel it; it was coming and all he had to do was reach out and grab it. It was his if he wanted it.

And he knew that nothing else in the universe could compare to it.

So he reached out and grabbed it.

The universe felt as though it was beat like a drum. The reverberation spread out, echoing in what felt like every corner of creation, resounding with the sound, being subtly reshaped by the desire that was now pushing it. The desire that surged forward from Peter’s very being, and that now bounced back and reverberated within him now.

It didn’t happen like Peter thought it would. It actually felt tangible, like a blanket that he could wrap himself in, bathing in its warmth, absorbing it. Rapturously it caught him up, sifting through him, exposing all the portions of his body and soul within, revealing places he never even thought of before, casting them into the light. His world exploded into color, into the bright, swirling patterns of the universe, swarming around him and casting him higher and higher until he felt the sun! Its energies churned through him, stirring him from the inside out as a chef takes the ingredients to make a sensational taste for the tongue. And what a taste it was!

With a great gust his body was filled, not just his lungs but his whole body. It seemed to inflate and expand, the old making way for the new. His very bones felt it and the command it carried; it commanded them to move according to its will, and move they did. The Red Sea could not have parted more obediently; every cell, every fiber of his body took up the command like a grand call to arms with the utmost fervor, and with a great rallying cry they sallied forth to carry out their work.

His very skin began to reweave itself; his bones reoriented themselves, his heart sturdying itself to handle the demand that was soon to be required of it. The call to arms could not be ignored, and all joined in like a chorus of angels to push forward in their great task.

In another place gasps of alarm ushered forth. “Peter?” someone called Winter asked nervously. Such outside happenings were drowned out by the chorus as it marched forth. He felt his entire spine caught up in it, as its constituents heaved and hoed, tugging it outward and bid it to expand, and expand it did. Even as it breached his skin and exposed itself to the outside, its comrades of sinew, muscle, fiber and skin rushed out as well to meet it and construct the new addition to the body that was now forming. As its muscle fattened and the skin hardened, the rest of the body continued forward to match its pace and rewrite the body, clothing it in its new armor. And it felt... alive! He felt alive! But it wasn’t even over yet, it was just beginning! The call even came to his face rewriting him into what he was to become.

Somewhere in the back, currently forgotten corners of his mind, something screamed. He wasn’t sure what it was screaming about, he was transfiguring into something more, something more than a human being could ever hope to be! He was...

The voice, soft, or muted perhaps, rampaged forward as it would not be silenced. Like an old silent movie its mouth raved and practically foamed at the mouth. Straining to hear, even though his transfiguration was here and its chorus was at its full glorious height, he tried to make out what it was saying. It sounded like...

With a shock Peter heard again, and the alarm it raised was enough to temporarily push him from his reverie; he struggled to turn his eye to his side to see. He was greeted with the sight of them seeing him.

Straining desperately, he tried to say something, but the chorus surged again, wrapping his body and it strengthened his chest, filled his lungs, broadened his shoulders, filling him with the song. They were all working to bring his dream into reality, to make him into something more. They were doing this all for him, why wouldn’t he want that?

Someone stepped back from him. He fought to even see who it was, but even this proved to be impossible. But no! He had to see, he had to at least... The multitude within lifted his shoulders, creating new throngs to reshape themselves. With a glorious surge he felt as new limbs, wings, sprouted from his back, fueling the chorus.

But he...

His hands and feet fused together in new patterns, joining and separating at new angles, creating insight that he never experienced before. Now that he thought about it, why did he resist? The chorus was strong, it was uplifting, it was for him! It was transfiguring him into something more! A multitude of angels filled him, breathing new life into!...

Through the corner of his eyes, he saw another Angel dart to her mother’s legs, clutching them in fear.

NO! No, he wouldn’t let...

The divine gust poured into his skull, uttering its commands...

He tried to focus on her, tried to at least say something!...

The tongue obeyed and lengthened, the teeth conformed and sharpened.

He fought to keep his gaze, but couldn’t. Straining between the breaths of his expanding form, he fought tooth and nail to...

His skin heeded the call and did away with the old features of his scalp and ears and made way for the new. It was so rapturous, he closed his eyes in contentment, he...

Felt his eyes hear the chorus, felt them heed as well. Gasping, he pushed with all his might to open them.

Tears formed from the sheer joy of it all...

Tears flew when he snapped open his eyes and locked his gaze on Angel. But it was so wonderful, it was so embracing, so...

Alienating...

Ecstatic!

An abomination to their eyes...

Invigorating!

Damn you!

They couldn’t see this, they weren’t supposed to...

He felt alive!

Horrified...

He could see it in her eyes, he could see it! He saw the horror, the absolute fear, it was...

She cried aloud, and his vision suddenly shifted. The old colors fell away and made way for the new, the colors that showed the vibrancy of life, that showed both when it was full of energy and devoid of it, sensing its warmth...

She saw it! She saw him! She saw his old face fall away! They were all watching him feel so...

Rejuvenated... It was inevitable! It was the culmination! Within the chorus reached its resounding climax, punching forward to a thunderous crescendo, shaking the heavens and reverberating across the Earth. It was so all encompassing, all so wonderful, he at last joined his voice in with it. His voice, transformed by the chorus itself, roared and thundered along with the chorus, quaking the Earth and skies as much as the rest of the chorus combined. It was complete! He was a dragon, he was powerful! He was king of all he surveyed. The flood of his new and improved senses gushed in, filling his mind with a new dominating awareness of all that surrounded him. He stood at the apex of creation and crowed!

And with that the chorus was complete, its singers flowing back, settling down, and the world became quiet again. It came down gently, and the lights only came up gradually as the moment of the chorus faded. Its electrifying presence, however, didn’t fade quickly. Peter still felt it, like he had been plugged into a high voltage power line, his body still tingling from it.

A soft whirring of the air above announced that the entity had coalesced back into visibility. “The reflection is complete. That which was written on this one’s soul has been made manifest into the world. Now my duty here has passed; having fulfilled my task I will slumber for some time until new travelers come across me. I bid you farewell.” And with that, the entity swirled out of existence, and the grove darkened. Even the spring water that had been glowing a most magnificent violet become subdued and faded into nothing, leaving the only source of light in the dark woods the shining beam of Angel’s flashlight. Peter, however, could see his family clearly. He must have been seeing the heat that their bodies gave off, and he knew that in all likelihood his eyes didn’t even look human anymore; they were in all certainty the sort of slit eyes that one found on a snake.

The following silence was as succinct as the darkness, with the only sound that of Peter’s now substantially larger body breathing in and out. He was now on all fours, standing on elongated, clawed feet that could probably shred a tree into pieces with one blow. Standing just a little shorter on four feet than he did on two, he made up for it by extending over twelve feet long, and that was probably without adding all there was in his new elongated neck and tail. His skin from what he could make out from the flashlight’s ambiance was a deep rust color and presumably lighter on his wide scales from his neck to his belly to his tail. Above and behind him he felt his folded pair of new limbs, his wings.

His tail, by far, was the most intriguing. It just... responded to him like he had been born with it, it felt so alien yet so familiar at the same time. Experimentally he swished it back and forth, watching it trancelike as his tail moved; feeling it as it rubbed over the ground and the brush, sensing every prick on it as it passed.

His newfound fascination, however, was quickly brought back down to Earth as the flashlight was brought to bear on his eyes. He could see now that it was Winter, not Angel, who now wielded it. Her face, all of their faces, was a study in shock. Squirming uncomfortably, Peter tried to say something. His throat at least felt familiar enough, he instinctively knew that he could speak, but... he didn’t know what to say. What could he say? What could possibly do this moment justice? They had watched him transform into a massive monster while he *enjoyed *it...

“Guys, I...” He finally managed to mouth, but that was it. There was literally nothing that he could think of. That’s not to say he didn’t try; he desperately needed to say something to them, but all he got was “I...” over and over again, except that instead of his normal tenor voice even his softly spoken words were boomed out in a resonating heavy draconic voice.

The deafening silence was broken when Merar started chuckling. “You know, should of seen this coming. I just should of seen this coming. I have no idea why I didn’t,” he chortled ruefully.

Swallowing, Peter looked his brother right in the eye. “Lo...look, Merar, this-“

“Oh, this what, Peter?” his brother interrupted. “Leave it to you, Peter; leave it to you to just royally screw us over.”

In spite of his own shock Peter felt his anger rise to the fore. “Maybe you should just keep your own mouth shut Merar,” he said defensively.

“Really, now why the Hell should I do that?” Merar suddenly burst out in anger, “It seems pretty obvious to all of us that you just had your deepest wish granted, and whoa, gee whiz, you didn’t send us back to Kansas, Toto!”

Fuming, Peter narrowed his eyes. “You think it was easy in there?” he demanded, “You think it was easy keeping track of my mind in there? Cause I’d hate to see what sort of crap that cloud thing would’ve dredged up from your mind.”

The words stung just as much as Peter hoped they would have, but the argument was picked up by Winter instead. “Peter...” she began softly. “How...?” she gazed at him pleadingly. “How could you do this?”

Her ugly question silenced Peter, who let out an uncomfortable sigh, which of course was now as loud as a car engine. “I...” he began. “I’m sorry, I screwed up. I-“

“SORRY!?” Winter screeched. “You pull off a goddamn stunt like that and all you can say is sorry!!? *How the Hell do you do you think saying *sorry is going to fix anything!?” she spat. “I really expected better, Peter. I really did. Instead you go off and spite us; you ended up spiting the rest of us just like your good for nothing father.”

It took a surprising amount of sudden resolve not to take a step back from that comment. It was a line she had approached many times before, but never crossed. Until now. Peter clenched his elongated jaw in anger. “You leave Dad out of this, Winter, and don’t bring him up again.”

“You aren’t the parent, Peter,” Winter snapped, “You don’t get to make any rules. If I see the need to bring him up I sure as Hell will. You want to know why? Because he always cut everyone short, even you.”

“That’s not how I remember it,” Peter retorted. “I remember a Dad that was there for us and would give his kidneys for us, something you always seem to want to forget.”

“Forget!?” Winter demanded, “Do you even remember who your father was? He was a drunk, spiteful bastard who always took out his problems on everyone else. Your father was a failure at everything and he couldn’t handle the responsibility, that’s why he left us.”

“Liar!” Peter boomed with his draconic voice. “Dad never had anything to do with it; you want to know why he left? Maybe you should pull out that mirror you’ve carried with you this whole way.”

Winter’s face became flushed, and with Peter’s new vision it was clearer than ever, with all the heat making her face a beacon of hate. “You take that back, Peter, because you don’t know anything about wha-“

“I know enough!” Peter snapped back. “You’ve always blamed Dad for everything. Everything from car payments to global warming, it was always Dad’s fault. Well I’ve got news for you, Winter! *You’re *the one to blame, you can take the whole load; Dad may have had faults but I guarantee that you’ve got ten times as many as he ever did.”

“How dare you!? How dare you, Peter!? I’ve taken care of you all these years, when your Dad wouldn’t lay-“

“Shut up,” Peter said, “Just shut up with your damn lies; you’re so full of them that you even believe them yourself and you’ve done nothing but try and fill your kids with them too! You never cared at all about any of us; all you wanted us for was so you could get your child support money and get back at Dad.”

And now Peter had crossed a line, and the gloves were off. “You sick little bastard,” she spat, “You think I spent all that time raising you children, sending you to school, keeping you out of trouble so I could get some child support money?”

“Why not? It’s what you do best, Winter. You leech off everyone else to make yourself feel all inflated so you can feel all wonderful about yourself, but the moment anyone tries to break free you turn into a psycho on them.”

“You know what?” Winter said rhetorically, “You re just like your father. Just the same bag full of miserable pathetic excuses! You’ve got your head so far up your ass you can’t tell left from right and you blame it on everyone else.”

“Look who’s talking? Seems to me you’re the one that wants to play the blame game all the time. You know what happened? I’ve kept it quiet for a long time cause I at least try not to be a petty jerk, but you know what really happened? Dad was a great Dad, but you drove him out because it’s all ‘you,’ all so you can get all the benefits without having to do any of the work yourself.”

“You brat!” Winter shouted, earning a dark smile from Peter; if she was degenerating to name calling it only proved his point that she had no real point to make. “Maybe I should have left you with your father and you could have seen what it was really like for yourself!”

“It would have been better than living under your household!” Peter shouted back. “Maybe that’s just what you should have done, cause I know for a fact it would have been better because anything’s better than you!”

Peter’s barrage stung hard enough that it stunned Winter into silence. But Peter was too angry with his bottled up feelings to back down. “You know what, you wanna be a good mother? You wanna make things better? Fine! You just go dig yourself a grave and die so you can join the rest of your asinine side of the family so the rest of us can just get on with our lives!”

The spew of bitter insults shut up everyone. As the utter silence stretched for more and more seconds, Peter began to feel a twinge of guilt at what he had just said. It was true, all of it, but he could have phrased it less hurtfully than he had.

“You don’t have any right to any of that, Peter,” Merar declared suddenly, the anger and hurt bleeding from his eyes. “No right! You stand there thinking that all the sudden you’re so big and powerful that you can do anything, but that’s just arrogance, that doesn’t make you right in a hundred million years.”

Angry that his brother arbitrarily decided that Peter’s new form had any bearing whatsoever on what were old, deeper grievances, Peter restrained himself from doing anything too suddenly. “You aren’t in a position to judge anything, Merar.”

“The Hell I’m not! I may not be the world’s most qualified person to judge anyone, but it doesn’t take a supreme court justice to tell that you’re being a self righteous hurtful scumbag. I’ve seen a lot of different stuff in my life, and you’re just-“

“You’ve seen?” Peter asked incredulously. “You’ve seen things in your life? What a joke,” he couldn’t help but add disparagingly.

“My life isn’t a joke, Peter! But you’ve never been able to look past your own pride to see that. You’ve always looked down on me just like you look down on everyone, and I’m sick of it.”

“Ha!” Peter laughed. “You want to know why I don’t like you, Merar? You want to know why I treat you like crap? Are you that dense that you can’t figure it out? It’s because you’re a pathetic whiner, Merar. You just sit around sulking the whole time, feeling sorry for yourself.”

“Well, I’m sorry if I somehow have offended you by happening to care about the world!”

“You’re so full of it,” Peter said, offended by Merar’s attributing his pathetic nature to something so supposedly grand. “You call sitting on your bed listening to your so called ‘music’ and wallowing in your wangst caring about the world? That ain’t caring, Merar. You just can’t fess up to the fact that you’re just another pathetic emo who gets all weepy and upset about everything when he doesn’t really even know a thing about real life and real work.”

“Better than what you do,” Merar shot back, “Better than pretending that you’re a good guy who can do no wrong when you’re so busy hating other people for having to deal with flaws you don’t know anything about.”

“Flaws, huh?” Peter challenged. “You call being apathetic to someone else dying just another ‘flaw,” do you?’’

Merar instantly knew what he was talking about. “Don’t you dare, Peter, you promised.”

“You know what he did?” Peter demanded of Winter, not so much because he wanted to convince her than to break Merar’s little secret out into the open. “That party he went to six months ago, that one where that kid died of binge drinking? He could have stopped it.”

“Peter!” his brother shouted at him.

“Yeah, he told me himself in one of his whiny fits; he had told this kid to keep on drinking even though he had wanted to stop. Merar sat there on his butt and egged him on the whole time until he ended up on the floor, dead.” He turned his attention back to Merar and chose his words deliberately. “That sound like just another flaw to you?”

“Peter!” Winter shouted. Clearly she was upset at Peter, predictably, because he was the one challenging her rule, but he could see that he had sown a seed of discord between her and Merar, one that would be difficult if not impossible to get over.

“You think you’re all that, don’t you you arrogant son of a bitch!” Merar shouted.

“Hey, watch who you’re calling your mother, Merar,” Peter said with dark mirth.

“Shut up, Peter,” Winter jumped in, “I think he’s allowed little things like that when you’re so busy tearing the family apart.”

“I don’t need any instruction from *you *about tearing families apart.”

“Maybe you could use some instruction about being a decent human being,” Merar challenged, “seeing as how you’re lacking in that respect in two ways now.”

“At least I know how to go on living rather than rotting in my own shit and despair,” Peter retorted.

“Well thanks to you we’ll be living in this god forsaken wilderness for the rest of our lives, all because of you!” Winter shouted, so angry that she thrust the flash light to the ground.

“You’ll just find someone new to leech all the life you need off from.”

“At least I didn’t leech off all my family’s hope of ever returning home!”

“Not much of a home to return to as long as you’re in it!”

“I wish your father could have been here so he could have seen just how bad his influence on you was!”

“Fuck you!”

“Go to Hell!” Merar shouted alongside his mother. “You’ll even be able to fit among those demons now that you’re showing your true colors.”

Peter’s blood was boiling and he was starting to doubt whether he should hold back from physically harming the two of them at all. “I swear, you keep up trying your bullshit to hold the moral high ground I’m not going to hold back with these new ‘additions’ I have.

“That’s the way it’s gonna be? All right then,” Merar declared, reaching for the crowbar and marching up to Peter. “You wanna make this into a fight you bastard, you just come on. Come on!” he shouted, and charged forward at his older brother with reckless abandon. “COME ON!!!”

That was the last straw; Peter simply wasn’t going to put up with this anymore. Enraged he instinctively breathed in; he didn’t realize what was happening until the last second. But even as he did, he just smiled grimly and let loose with a stream of flame that erupted from his throat. Immediately it flew forward and, while it was pretty small and pathetic for dragon flame, was more than enough as it engulfed Merar’s leg and set it ablaze.

The fire engulfed Merar’s leg and quickly started spreading up the rest of his body as his clothes ignited. Winter stepped back in horror and Merar ran around panicking and screaming in agony. The spring however was only a few feet away so he instantly bolted for it and threw himself in. He managed to stop from being covered in flames, and the burn marks only extended up to his lower torso. Unable to contain his dark glee, Peter roared. He roared until Merar had exhausted the flames and pulled himself out of the spring. Winter hesitated in shock but ran up to him to help him up.

A smaller blob of fire flew and struck Winter’s purse, knocking it over and spilling out the berries that were inside which were quickly set upon by Peter’s flame and burned to ashes in short order.

“Not so tough now, are you,” he said, taking a dangerous step forward. “Where’s all your bravado now, huh? Where is it now!?”

Peter was stopped as he was momentarily blinded in his left eye. Blinking, he realized it was the flashlight and looked over and saw Angel, who had kept out of the argument and had watched the exchange unfurl, probably picking up the flashlight when Winter had thrown it in anger. She was backed up against a tree, squeezing her teddy bear so tightly it looked like its head was going to pop off. She stood there, absolutely petrified and quaking in terror.

And she was waving the flashlight through the air, like she had done two times earlier that night when beset upon by frightening creatures.

Except now she was waving it* at him*.

And, in that moment, as he looked with his now serpentine orbs into his baby sister’s soft blue terrified eyes, he saw his own reflection in them.

It wasn’t what he thought it would be.

The reflection he saw was something that had robbed her. It had taken something precious away from her. It had taken something far more valuable than mere piece of mind. It had stolen, cheated her out of her future, a future where she could learn a normal life and learn to read and live with other kids her own age, do things like eat cake, watch TV, live without having to worry about if she was going to be able to eat that day.

It was a reflection that had threatened her, menaced her and her family and had actually attacked it, forever shattering whatever security of mind she had ever had up to that point.

It was the reflection of a dark, serpentine, monstrous beast that had shown itself to be a spiteful, hateful creature that struck out in rage and destroyed everything that she had ever wanted.

The monster froze, unable to move, breath, or it even seemed, to think. It just stood there staring at the little girl, stunned. Slowly, however, it started backpedaling, and every pass of the flashlight beam that the girl passed over it seemed to wound it, sending it back farther and farther in pain. It appeared to hurt so much that the monster’s eyes started to well up as tears began rolling down its face. It kept its monstrous gaze on the girl though, unable to tear away until she shone her light right in its hideous eyes. The monster hurt so much now that it started choking on its tears.

After what seemed like forever in a second, the monster suddenly bolted. It didn’t rush upon her, or her mother, or her brother, it just ran... away. It disappeared into the brush and head to the western ridgeline of hills. Its passage could be heard all the way up as it rammed its way through the foliage, and a minute later the beast emerged at the top of the hill. It was leaving the garden, running full speed to get away. The girl stood up, holding her flashlight up in the general direction of the monster.

Just before it disappeared over the ridge, the monster stopped, and turned its head to look back down into the garden, staring in the direction of the girl. She stood there, immobile, holding up her flashlight as though it were an enormous flaming sword. The monster stared for a moment longer, then lowered its head and darted quickly over the hills, leaving the garden behind and heading out into the foreboding wastes beyond, leaving her alone with her brother and mother.