Violet

The sky bled rain, and it bled hard. Grunting and pushing his way through the foliage, the survivor trekked on. He had to reach his shack before it turned to light, and he was fried alive. His violet eyes – changed since he had been in Wonder – landed on the back of his hand, where a large scar had healed. He then looked up at the sky and saw the dark clouds hanging and sparking above the forest. When the rain turned into light, there was trouble to be had.

Finally, he broke through the trees. Now that he was nearly home, he could take his time. He looked up at the clouds, peering through the downpour to see the lightning rolling around in their quilts of water droplets. A songbird sang in the trees behind him, raising its voice to intimidate the thunder.

The ground he walked on was brown and lifeless. Beneath him, there lay dozens of exotic skeletons, hidden from searching eyes by six feet of earth. There were ghosts here, whispering in the shadows of the feather-saplings, and nobody dared come near. Nobody but the elusive Don-beast. Donnie chuckled and stepped over a broken tombstone. The smaller inhabitants of these woods were actually afraid of him. They thought his purple eyes were that of a demon’s, and that his voice was like the cry of a winkle. He had yet to learn what a winkle was, but he knew that if enough time passed, the creature would find him first.

Running alongside the graveyard was a short wall made of stones. They were multicolored, ranging from deep burgundy to ultraviolet. Wedged between some of the larger rocks were little doors that led nowhere. Their paint was peeling, their doorknobs rattled, and their hinges didn’t move. He had looked on the other side of the wall to find no other side to them. They were a queer decoration that nobody had placed. He had long given up on getting through one of them.

A rumble of thunder rippled through the land, sending the trees wailing to the wind. He grabbed at the bag at his side to ensure that he wouldn’t lose any of the fruit he had collected. Food was scarce pickings here, since every other plant was either poisonous or a hallucinogen. Once he had grabbed something that looked like a banana and opened it to find a tiny, red monkey nestled inside. The beast had clung to his arm for a week before scampering away with a handful of his hair.

His shack was surrounded by an empty moat filled with spikes and various traps he had made from the scrap inside. It was weak against anything big that had its mind set on killing him, but it sure helped with the little pests that invaded in the night. He stepped over a small, rat-sized grave and hurried on.

Suddenly, a flash of lightning ripped through the air, striking him blind for a few crucial seconds. He stumbled forward into a feather-tree, making it squirm and flap its wing-like leaves at him. Crying out in fury, he rolled and grabbed his sack again. More lightning meant that the light was coming. He scrambled to his feet and turned, his eyes catching on the stone wall. One of the doors, one with floral wallpaper plastered to it, was open. Lying halfway inside was what appeared to be a girl.

“God,” he said, looking up at the sky as another crack of lightning dazed him. When he could see again, the clouds had begun to glow. “Oh shit!” Without another moment’s hesitation, Donnie was racing toward the girl, his bag forgotten and left to dangle around him on its strap. When he reached her, he saw that her shirt was soaked with blood. She was sobbing and clutching her hand. “Come on!” he barked, grabbing her in his arms and starting toward his hut. She stumbled beside him, obviously terrified out of her wits, but he helped her along. There was no time to sit and talk about her feelings; right now, they had to get inside or die trying.

When they reached the moat, he cursed. He untied a thick vine from the small plant that grew there. “Come on. You have to hold this!” He shoved it into her hands and nudged her toward the edge. She had to jump. The other end of the vine was tied firmly to a tree that grew on the other side. All she had to do was make it to the edge, and she would be able to throw the vine back to him and…

He saw her mutilated finger and felt a chill run down his spine. Great. He sighed and looped the vine around her waist, testing its strength before making a bigger loop for him to fit into, then grabbed her up in his arms and jumped. The tree’s supporting branch creaked angrily down at him until his feet touched the other side. Once they were free of the vine’s embrace, he grabbed her hand and pushed his way through the door.

Panting heavily, he leaned on the door and let his eyes adjust to the darkness. His clothes and hair were dripping wet. After a moment he could see that the same could be said of the girl. She was sitting in the corner, shivering and clutching her hand to her chest. Silently, he watched her. She was normal. Her skin was human. Her hair was in a nice, normal ponytail. She looked up at him, and he saw that her eyes were big and blue; human. She was unchanged. He howled in joy and leaped to hit the ceiling. This was good!

Donnie rushed to the opposite corner from her and started searching through a few bottles he had collected in the time he had been here. A small black one rested in the corner; this one he took in his hand and went to kneel beside the girl. “Hold your hand out,” he said faintly in the quiet room. The soft pounding of the rest of the liquid rain was tapering off and away.

She looked up at him again, and this time he could see the tears in her eyes. He winced and held up the jar.

“It will help your finger.”

Calming after this, she leaned back and lifted her hand. She watched him steadily as he unscrewed the lid of his treasure and turned it over. Into his hand, a strange thing had fallen. It was like a sparkling purple – and clear – sausage. It jiggled in his palm. She stared down at it with wide eyes, unblinking and unsure. When he took her hand, she flinched away, but he shushed her. He squeezed the purple tube in his hand and then opened it to show that it had melted to his fingers. He wrapped them around hers, and a warm tingling sensation coursed in her hand. She yelped and tried to take her hand away.

“Hey, stop it. It’ll help.” He looked at her earnestly. “Trust me.”

Once she had relaxed again, he continued shaping the purple jelly around her crippled finger. He sat back and sighed, wiping his hand on his pants.

“It’ll feel good for a while until it heals.” He nodded to her hand, and the shining purple shape encasing her hurt digit. “If we find the Ebon plant, I bet we could even get your whole finger to grow back.” Shrugging, he turned and started to go through his bag. “Aw, shit…” He had lost nearly half of his collection in the struggle to get the girl inside. Grumbling to himself, he dropped it on the short table he had found and looked back at her. “So… what’s your name?”

She blinked those big eyes of hers at him like he was speaking in another language.

Donnie raised an eyebrow. Maybe she had lost the ability to speak. Oh well. That sucked. He yawned a little and looked out the small window. Outside, it was glowing. Disenchanted by the spectacle, he shuffled to a different corner and knelt. There was a large shredded piece of tree bark that covered a tiny hole dug into the wall. He pulled it aside and propped it open with his arm, reaching inside to take hold of the tiny creature that was asleep there.

A smile grew on his face as he lifted his friend, a tiny grey bat with large ears, and kissed its head. “Hello, Nicodemus. How did you sleep?” He stroked the little guy’s wing and went to sit beside the door. “Have a look around if you want,” he said to her. “You won’t be leaving anytime soon.”

The girl rose to her feet. Curiously, she looked around, coming to the window and peering outside. Instead of the rain she had felt when she had fallen out of the door, there were large, egg-sized droplets of what seemed to be light. They streaked downward and sizzled into the ground. She saw little trails of steam rising from each point of impact. She gnawed her lip and played nervously with her ponytail as she looked out. There were little trees that looked like they were made of feathers. They were deep green and blue. She stood on her tiptoes and saw the light falling only feet from her. It was beautiful.

“Can you talk?”

She looked down at him, her eyes drifting unfazed over the little bat that was crawling on his shirt. “Yes.”

Donnie grinned and glanced over at her. She wore no shoes. “Alright, now we’re getting somewhere. What’s your name?”

“What’s yours?”

Nicodemus was climbing from his fingers to his hair as he looked at her. “Donnie.”

Their eyes met, his bright purple, hers bright blue, and silence fell over them. The light fell outside, singing quietly as it descended. “My name is Allison.” She leaned on the windowsill and looked out, lost in thought. “Where am I?” she murmured, almost to herself.

He smiled and leaned his head back, his eyes crossed to look at the small head that was leaning over his face. “We’re in Wonder, Allison.”