Discovery 1.1

The sirens of cop cars had finally grown louder than the sound of the pouring rain slapping against the mud-caked ground outside. Interchanging red and blue light cast shadows off the crosses on the nearby gravestones and onto the marble walls of the mausoleum. The shadows danced on the gouged and time-weathered stone until they eventually stretched further and further, softly fading away in sync with the scream of the sirens.

A nearby streetlamp was the only source of light remaining, casting a hazy yellow glow across the iron gate leading out of the tomb as it squeaked outward on the rusted hinges. A single black leather gloved hand appeared threaded through the cage of the door's facade. Another loud protest from the rusty hinges and a slender shoulder, dressed in nothing but a flimsy, sheer, forest-green top appeared. Connected though goose-pimpled flesh, was the head of a young woman, her hair, slick with rain water, was mostly auburn with a shock of snow white to frame, and presently obscure her face.

A crack of lightning illuminated the sky above and was chased by a thunderclap loud enough to shake the earth. The woman in the doorway dropped to the ground and ducked back inside. Reared back and on all fours, she scuttled backward into a far-off corner and wrapped her long legs dressed in shredded black stockings with her pale arms thoroughly laced with red lashes. Her drenched hair fell into the small shelter between her chest and legs. She felt rooted to the spot pressed against the wall below a gaping window, helpless to stop the ceaseless onslaught of water pounding against her head and back. It was difficult to tell how much time had passed when she spotted a bright white searchlight playing at the shadows above her head. There was the faint sound of battery radios and shouted voices in the near distance.

The sharp snap of a twig breaking nearby made her jump slightly, and she opened her eyes, gray and sparkling in the dark - wide and slick with tears.

The sound of sloshing mud off boots bounced off the hallow walls of the tomb and soon a single hand wrapped around one of the bars of the iron gate. She could see through the bars, a wide man with a bright blue jacket and a glinting gold shield off his chest. The man peered through the bars in her direction and began to pull the gate open with an ear-splitting creak.

"Ricky!" A good ol' boy's voice cracked above the pour of the rain.

The moving door stopped, the fingers playing at the metal bars of the gate adjusted. "What?"

"Tommy and Joe had a sighting down at Jackson Ridge!"

The fingers pulled away from the door with a snap and a few heartbeats later there was the loud revving of an engine. The familiar shriek of a police siren suddenly punctured the air and quickly faded until it was no more.

It took a while for the woman's breathing to steady again and for her heart to fall back into place and out of their mouth. When it eventually did, she stood on crooked feet and trembling knees. Using the wall for support, she made her way back towards the door and peered through the cracks. Everything was again still and silent as the dead. She sucked in a lungful of air and pushed the door open the rest of the way. Standing now in the threshold of the home of the dead, artificial yellow light from the street lamp illuminated the finer features of her face. The mascara that ran deep trails down her face, the remnants of purple eyeshadow clung to the corners of her eyes and amethyst-colored lipstick smudged her bottom lip and parts of her cutting chin. Her wild eyes darted left and right along the time-worn cobblestone footpath of the graveyard.

A strange feeling in her gut, a feeling she hadn't acquired till recently, told her to head West towards the housing developments in Thistle Grove. She had only ever heard of Thistle Grove by name, but for some reason flashes of a quaint two-story house appeared in her mind's eyes when she thought about it. A house she knew she had spent the last few years living in with her dad and stepmom. Except… she didn't know her dad… and she didn't have a stepmom.

When she tried to think through the conflicting information it felt as if her head might burst at the seams. She clapped both hands to her face and rubbed at her eyes with the heels of her hands. When she opened them again, she found her feet already walking westward, following the broken cobblestone street out of the cemetery, she didn't stop them, she instead allowed her body to be whisked away by some unseen force, too tired to give any more fight.

Out of the cemetery, walking along the nicely paved sidewalk just beyond, she could see the flashing of police cruisers further down the road. Soon an ambulance and a firetruck zipped by and splashed her with their wake from nearby puddles. The shock of cold water fixed her feet in place and she looked down the hill in the direction they were headed. She could see it, even from where she stood - her high school, Whitfield High. Its gigantic beige brick facade ablaze with the lights of emergency vehicles.

It wasn't meant to be like this, any of this. Just that morning she could remember telling her best friend Jess how dumb she was for wanting to go to a school dance.

"Why, Anna, is it so stupid?" Jess asked her as they sat out in the courtyard that afternoon. They sat in their usual spot, at the decrepit lunch table underneath a jutting lip from the main building, safely hidden from the blaze of the early afternoon sun. Her friend was braving the cafeteria tacos, and for herself, the usual - a coke from the vending machine and a pop tart from home. "Like, I know that we say this stuff is stupid all the time." Her friend went on. "But - I don't know, we only have a couple of years left at Whitfield and why not experience everything we can while we are here? You know? Like, college will be here sooner than we think and -"

She pointed her last strawberry-flavored pop-tart at Jess. "And it can't come fast enough." She held her arms at either side. "Do I need to remind you of where we are Jess? Colpine, Mississippi! The place where dreams go to die. Hell, Jess, we ain't even in the best school in this shit pie! Out of the two, and we are by far the worst one! At least the other one has white boards and buses with all their windows for god's sake -"

"I ain't arguing with you!" Jess tsked and leaned over the table from where she sat. Her long brunette hair swept over her splayed hands. "I swear, sometimes having a discussion with you is like talking to a damn wall with earplugs in."

"I know what this is about." Anna crossed her arms and raised the tip of her chin. "Jock-itch asked you out, didn't he?"

Heat flashed across Jess's face, coloring her bronze cheeks right down to her black lipstick. "Maybe he did-"

"Ugh, really? You'd go for such a-"

"For what, Anna? A nice guy?"

"A dumb guy! God! All he talks about is sports and… and-"

"And about his carpentry business he has with his dad, and how he wants to start there after he's done with school. He also is really into jazz music and wants to pick up jazz guitar." Jess, looked up at her friend from under the ridge of her brow. "There are more to a lot of people than what they seem."

Anna rolled her gray eyes and glared at something beyond Jess's shoulder, her chin resting on her curled fist. "Sure. Whatever."

"Look." Jess took Anna by her gloved hand and held it both of hers. "I know it's lame. I know. But please, come with me to the dance tonight. Bret has this friend who has kinda been interested in meeting you."

Anna pulled her hand away. "Eww! You want me to go on a date with another one of them?"

"It's not a date… well, not a real date. Look, if you don't like him you can bail." Jess fished back Anna's hand and held it between them. "I just really want to hang out with you and do this thing together. A fun - sorta girly - teenagery thing for once. Please? I promise it will be fun!"

Anna looked from her held hand and up into her friend's big brown eyes.

Another crack of lightning tore through the sky and shook the earth. Anna's hands reflectively clapped to her face, and when she pulled them away again, she saw the bare flesh of her left hand. It was gloveless and exposed. Something her Mah told her to never let happen under any circumstance. Never was she to go around in public without some sort of gloves, nor was she have her arms or legs exposed. She tried to summon the reason to hand, but something else fought for her attention.

The 'something' was the thing in her gut begging her to go to Thistle Grove. When she blinked, she saw a tall handsome-looking boy staring at himself in a mirror. The dance attire that night was meant to be casual, but he couldn't help but put on his best powder blue button-up and khakis. He'd take his letterman jacket from the football team too. Chicks always loved the jacket.

Anna blinked again and she was in the driver seat of a Dodge Charger looking at herself walking up to the passenger side of the car. All she could think about was how she was the most beautiful girl she had ever seen. The goth thing was so… different, dangerous… sexy. God, she suddenly hoped she had remembered to put on her lucky cologne.

Anna blinked and she was standing next to herself, except - from where she stood - she was a good head taller than her doppelganger. They were both leaning next to the punch bowl looking out into the tinsel-riddled nightmare that was the school dance. Twinkling silver streamers and fake gold leaves oozed from the rafters and over the stage where a garage band pumped some faculty-approved slow jams. None of that mattered to her though when she looked down at her clone. She felt a flutter in her chest and a stirring in her gut that made her half want to puke. 'God she thinks this is so lame. This was such a dumb idea!' Anna heard a thought bubble up in her head.

She heard herself clear her throat, then, with a man's voice, asking her clone to dance. The clone looked up at her, then out into the gently moving crowd before them. The clone inhaled sharply and shrugged. Soon, they were hand in hand on the dance floor, looking deeply into each other's eyes. Her heart was pounding in her chest, and suddenly she was very glad that her clone always decided to wear those gloves so she couldn't tell how hard her hands were sweating. She felt herself leaning down and her clone looked up at her, blinked, and smiled. Her clone stood up on her tiptoes and their lips met for a kiss. A snap of electricity rode from her lips down to her toes and back. It was unlike anything she had experienced her whole life, except… she couldn't let go. Then it felt like her insides were suddenly being drained of blood, her mind on fire. Every muscle in her body spasmed and seized and then all simply went black.

When Anna opened her eyes next, she was before a quaint, two-story house with a wrap-around porch and a bench swing near the front door. She remembered - somehow - building the little dog house that sat catty-corner to a small, withering garden with her dad. A dad she didn't have.

Anna, seemingly back in her own body again, fell to her knees before the gate leading to the front yard, her hands clutched to either side of her head.

"What the hell is happening to me! Why… Why am I here? Who - Who even am I?" She felt something take her by the shoulder and she pushed away, falling to her side onto the mud-caked soil "Get away from me!" She screeched louder than she ever had before. "I didn't want to hurt him! I didn't do-"

"Anna! Anna Marie, listen to me! It's your Mah!"

"Mah?" Anna blinked the rainwater and tears from her eyes and looked up into the angular face of a woman. Her features were sharp and, despite the weather, she wore dark tinted sunglasses.

"Anna, take my hand, baby." The woman shouted over the pound of the rain.

Before Anna could give it a second thought, she reached up, grabbed hold of the small - yet oddly strong hand - with her singularly gloved hand, and was hoisted to her feet. "Come now, baby. Raven has the car running." Anna didn't resist as she was escorted over to an idling car and pushed into its rear seat, the woman following close behind. The moment the door closed, the car jolted to life and they sped off down the quiet road.

It was all slowly starting to come back now, like a ghost draping a translucent sheet over her aching body. The smell of half-smoked cigarettes baked into the car's gray felt interior, the feel of its bumpy ride, and the gentle roaring of its engine.

"I told you, Raven, I told you - did I not?" The woman hissed next to her in the rear seat of the car. One of her small hands were resting on Anna's thigh and the other was wrapped tightly around a folded white and red walking cane. "This dance was an idiotic mistake!"

The woman driving was tall enough that her head nearly touched the roof of the car. Her long black hair was pinned perfectly into a neat bun on the back of her head, revealing a slender neck. The woman said nothing at first and let only the gentle roar of the engine and slapping of rainwater against the undercarriage of the car puncture the heavy silence.

"I know what you said, Irene." The woman, Raven, said eventually. Her voice was honeyed and smooth. "And I've heard what you've been saying. I just… I wanted her to have this."

Anna felt tears form in the corner of her eyes as she looked between the women. "Mom?"

The woman next to her, Irene, looked in her direction behind the thick sunglasses and pulled her close. "Yes, baby! It's okay, honey. We are here." Anna didn't resist as her body was tucked close to her mother's, and she ducked her head under Irene's chin.

"Mah, I didn't - I wasn't -"

"I know, baby." Irene stroked the length of Anna's short hair, holding her while she shook in her arms. "It's ok, you're mothers are here now."