Phantom Menace

He's here.

One hundred years later.

He finally found me.

He towers over me, gloating.

"Hello, love," he purrs.

I shudder.  What can I do?

He taunts me, teases, inquiring into the life I tried to hide from him.

I let his voice flow over me, wondering how I could possibly survive this.

He's taking me home, he says.  That place I had hoped to avoid the rest of my life.

The place where scars were his gifts to me.

The place where I was branded his for all time.

The place where I lost the ability to see beauty.


I try to wrest the brand from him -- I can't, I can't go back.

He's too strong for me.

I reach into my pocket and hold onto a shuriken, forming a desperate plan.

How I hate him.


Another voice whispers to me.  Do I trust it?

I strike.  He bleeds.  He's real.


How can he be real?

More words.  Talking, talking, talking, edging ever closer with his favorite toy.

My husband leans over me, hungry, eager to begin.  It's now or never.

I close my eyes and steady myself.  This is my last chance.

This is his last mistake.


Seeing him did freeze me, at first.

Knowing he was real took my breath away.

He's bigger, stronger, faster than me.  How could I possibly fight him?

But when he talks of home, something in me rebels.  I can't, I will not go back.


I may look like I've given up.  I may look like I'm weak, powerless, unable to defend myself.

I may look it.

But I haven't, and I'm not.


As soon as he touches me with that red hot metal, that's my signal.  I'll strike twice, just like the slithering snakes he loves so much.  My resolve has hardened into granite.  I WILL NOT GO BACK.

I close my eyes. 

I can feel the heat on the brand.  I tremble.  It will only hurt for a second.  He won't hurt me after that, ever again.  I open my eyes and stare into his coal black eyes.  Prepare for death, my eyes signal.

But as he reaches for me, a curving, evil grin on his face, he dissipates.

Wisps of smoke.  That's all he is.


Instead of relief, anguish floods my body.

I had him!  I had him in my sights!  Why wasn't he real?  Thoughts course through my brain.

He's still alive, somewhere.  Somewhere, he's hunting me.  He can still find me.  He can still hurt me.

My brain explodes with terror.

All the resolve I felt, though still present, is not enough to dam the rising flood of insanity. 


They find me and after navigating the library, we enter the graveyard room.  I rock back and forth, the panic barely contained.  The spectre continues to spitefully assist us in our quest for knowledge.  Ricin is alive?  Now I know we are to be sent back.  To our time.  To the time where he still lives.

What can I do?  We are needed there.  If I can't protect myself, I can still, for a time, protect those who don't have the resolve that I do.  Those who are still bound by their helplessness.

For while I haven't kept the terror at bay, the encounter with a vision of him has broken me of my chains.

He can try to hurt me.  He can try.