13 R 2 2

The protrusion which I assumed to be the head lifted. Shiny ooze stretched and about dozen of eyes opened up, scattered all the way through the chest and back into the grass. Deformed, leaking features turned to face me. I held back a shudder of repulsion.

"You misunderstand," a hole in the face moved pretending to be mouth. It was so terribly mispronounced I barely caught it. I was too in shock to argue and human shaped creature invested all that time to gain firmer shape.

"It knew the other one," now fully understandable, feminine voice sang. "The slumbering brain. It tried to help it, get its attention. It succeeded." The face with far too many eyes but clear-cut, dainty bone lines smiled sadly at me. "It couldn't have gone any other way," she finished with a note of finality, but to me it just affirmed that the crawling snot really did know what it was getting into and how it would end.

"But… why?" I was appalled. Why risk it all?

The girl's many eyes turned to gaze somewhere far, only few staying fixed on me. "They used to be one," grassland girl said eventually as though it explained everything.

"As in… together?" Some monster equivalent of dating? Did I land in a middle of a meaningless squabble? Which would be fine and dandy and I wish I could just back the hell out of this, but all my friends were dead.

The woman smiled gently as though she was privy to secrets and laid her head down onto the red moss. If I didn't know better I'd think rest of the body was beneath the turf. Instead, she must have been this entire scene. But it did look comfortable.

"Not in the way you think," crimson lips enunciated. "You are so young, little brother."

"I'm not your…" Should I really be correcting the assumption which could possibly be keeping me alive?

"You are more than you are not. The last to consume and put us back together has been same being."

"That doesn't really sound as moving as you imply," I grumbled.

Relaxed, napping face with many alert eyes had a slight smirk. "Did you have a say in which family to be born?" My shoulders hunched, the glistening bust of a lady went on without pausing, "That world… doesn't procreate in human sense. There is no need to be together. They rip out desired parts from one another, or discard unwanted chunks of themselves. Some of these develop self-awareness, especially when there's much of brain mass involved."

"Oh, so… They're… Uh. Related? Used to be one. I get it. Wait. So, snail… is the child?"

The woman's slight smile did not change but I got the impression I was correct. The longer I pondered the notion the more upset I got. The loathsome monster which plagued me turned out to be deserving much more hatred than I already had for it. The abandoned baby monster seeking any shred of attention from its uncaring parent, for the latter just to lash out in most terrible way. 

At least my parents properly fucked off, leaving me no chance to try and cling to them. My younger self would have done something equally heart-breaking.

"And you're cool with that?!" I shouted suddenly, invigorated by fresh wave of anger. "You'll die!" I was vaguely aware how hypocritical that sounded, but the faintly smiling woman did not seem unhappy to exist as an ominous meadow. Or whatever these snot-trailing creatures were up to.

"I am but a mouth, little brother," she spoke melodiously. Not happy nor sad. Not particularly resigned either. Likely she had parted with the emotions altogether. "I can't find you within. You shall be safe. Unless Nervous System comes looking for you separately… But we can change your smell further, if you like. You'll be safe."

"No!" I screamed. "That's not what I want at all. You think I walked all this way to get to another monster because I wanted safety? I need that thing to suffer. No matter what cost. And tell the god damn snail to snap out of the craving for mommy and do something to survive."

"It has been listening," woman on the ground said and I squirmed. Thankfully these creatures did not subscribe to erratic emotional outbursts and hopefully took no offence. I barely cared, really, but I needed these creatures on board.

I cleared throat and addressed the silent participant, "The only way that conceited bastard will ever remotely notice you if you kick its teeth in," Then fixed my burning glare onto the many eyes of the lady, "You know I'm right. Both of us can convince it, I'm sure of it," I said completely groundlessly.

She snickered through what seemed to be light sleep, "Would you listen to a body part? All your cells are screaming in pain, you disregard it completely to go on this suicidal quest."

What a winning argument. Everything did hurt. Exhaustion, sprains, cuts, burns, lack of water and food. "I'd already be dead if not for this," I insisted, but changed gears to think of the helpfully offered alien's perspective. Did the snail have similar drive which kept up its existence? Being unwanted orphan did open me up for reckless situations, until somebody showed up to hold my hand and tethered me to this existence.

"I need you. I need the help of two of you," I appealed. "All of us can get through this."

"What can you do, little human?" napping woman asked humourlessly. "My body is old and powerful, so much so that the mere movement of these two beings towards each other are wiping many others out of existence. Their meeting will decimate that world."

"So? What does the life of others matter when your own is at stake? Have they ever lifted a finger to help you survive?" I threw out callously. I only ever had sympathy for those who have been kind to me first, and such people were far and few in between. In fact, snail was the last one of those.

"Can you even imagine how much greater the parent body is, to discard so much as though it was a mere fingernail?"

This bit of information did burst my bubble. Perhaps it was a pipe dream all along. I pursed my lips, freed the hand woman was still holding onto and began digging around in the bag pack.

"There's still something," I said, clinging onto last shred of hope. "When I was caught, military men threw this at us. It's some sort of deadly gas. Knocked Brainiac straight out. Perhaps if we get more… or just nuke the fucker? He kept saying anything can die. One way or the other, the fireball over there wants to visit another armoury and we can grab whatever we want there too." Yes, excellent! All the variables were finally aligning, this might really be it. This monster dream team would be unstoppable by puny locals.

The slumbering woman propped herself up, now with hands and watched me pull out the container. She was intrigued, but half of her eyes watched me sceptically… or with a disappointment.

"Human weapons would be great," she said eventually, "but I can't transfer it over."

I looked at the canister. "Be… because it's… not meat?" How had I ever managed to overlook such obvious thing? Dammit. No, that can't be right! The absence of coin burned my pocket.

"You are so young," she exhaled, relaxing into a pretend slumber again. "I'd need to consume it, which is deconstructing to most basic components and recreating anew in the other place. But if it's poison effective on Fearsome Nerves, I'd just wither first."

Fuck. I sighed and laid down on the wet grass to look at the grey sky. Was this truly the end?

The two-legged pyre was uncharacteristically crackly and I pooled concentration that way. "Human gateway," it kept repeating. The unlikely helper might have been pumped up after mention of a nuke and I didn't blame it. That would be pretty sweet, even if I had no idea where those had been kept.

"Too far," woman whispered in reply, dashing all the remaining hopes. "I feel his approach on the waves."

"Fuck," I couldn't hold back muttering. Time constraint completely scratches off the plan to force-march this mouth to hefty settlements and have it grow in mass like the first one. Whether the weight categories were that insanely different was but an unproven claim, after all.

Lady in red paint snickered gently, "My body has ideas."