Flip the Coin [BL]-Chapter 177. The Window

I run, my breath stuck in my throat, a dazed smile etched onto my face. I run with all my might over debris, climbing as fast as I can; like a drunk, I watch everything move, turn, and flip.

"Hahaha!" I laugh out loud when my feet lose contact with the ground. The anguish and the terror, as I know what will happen now, make my whole body limp.

I close my eyes , not daring to look at the giant that had caught me again.

Grabbing, lifting, falling, CRUNCH.

My limbs are smashed, my body crushed, ripped, and swallowed,

I wake up knowing everything will repeat again.

I retch, the terror not lessening, as my basic bodily functions give out and I piss myself, trembling and vomiting all over as I run with all my might.

Everything shakes when the gigantic steps come, and tears spill from my eyes as I feel an overwhelming unwillingness to die.

To die like this.

But no matter; not one straight thought can I form as I run and climb, as I flee with all I’ve got. The instinct to grow stronger, the instinct to survive, overcomes me.

So I do instinctively what I can to survive.

Grabbing, lifting, falling, CRUNCH.

I grab, lifting, falling, CRUNCH.

I grab, I lift, falling, CRUNCH.

I grab, I lift, I let go, CRUNCH.

I grab, I lift, I let go, I MUNCH.

*************

"ARGH!" I coughed my insides out, trying not to vomit after waking up.

"What’s wrong?" Teddy jumped down from his bed while I still tried to catch my breath.

I felt as if something was stuck in my throat, something that wanted to come out.

"Fuck." I started to cough more; my whole body was full of cold sweat, and I couldn’t get it together, crying like some weak little shit.

"Kenny, what’s wrong?"

"I don’t know," I choked out, only remembering the naked horror that nearly left me crippled.

"It was just a bad dream; come on. Everything is fine." He covered my eyes, and I nodded, feeling like a little child again—so full of fear that you would do anything just to make it stop. Just so it would go away.

"Maybe your body is protesting because you got too many tattoos at once." Teddy said quietly.

I still tried to empty my mind and think about something—anything—other than this horror. I thought of my grandma, my stupid family, about Henry and how he kissed me, that fucker; anything was better than this.

It took a good while until I patted Teddy’s hand. It was still dark, though not for me, but everyone else was asleep.

"Better?" He asked, taking his hand away.

"Mhm." I would be embarrassed, but I couldn’t muster the energy for that, and who the fuck cares after that experience anyway?

A few days had gone by, and every day I had four hours for my body modifications. At night, I would draw for the next day’s sessions. We were finished with my throat and arms; tomorrow, the tattoo artist Teddy introduced me to will bring another girl to help with my upper body. They will both work on me together so that we can get it done as soon as possible. Thanks to my fast recovery rate, the tattoos were completely healed the next day, yet curiously, the ink didn’t disappear or fade—which I had feared would happen. 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

I promised them plenty of money, and Teddy vouched for me for reasons only he knows, so I can only hope that Henry will come to pay them soon.

Teddy turned around and lounged on the ground, leaning against my bedframe.

"There is also something else..."

"Spill it. You already saw me crying and retching; we are buddies now." I said it just randomly, looking up at his bed before glancing at my tattoos. They looked so fucking cool. All black, partly geometric designs, partly some shit that had happened, a dark round door on my throat, which I could sadly not see without a mirror, telling the tale of the damn portals. I had to somehow use this project to process all the shit that had occurred.

Mostly, however, they were the tattoos of what I saw my future self, the chief, having. So I copied myself.

"...You really aren’t the same person."

"Yeah." I think that Teddy is the only one believing that I am not that junkie fucker.

"What I wanted to say... Because you told on the wizard, he is currently in isolation. But he will come for your ass."

"Oh, everyone already knows that I talked?"

"Yeah."

"Good. Let that motherfucker come." I’ll kill him for real if he insists on getting killed; if he is out for me in a sexual way, I’ll make him dickless and then kill him.

"Good. I’ll help you then, so don’t worry."

"I have a gun. So there is no need to worry for you, and there is also no need to step in."

Teddy turned around in the darkness and looked at me with raised eyebrows.

"You have a gun?"

"Wanna see?"

"No. I’m going to sleep." The man knew when to stop being curious. Or maybe he thought I was talking about some gay shit—no idea.

Let’s see.

First, the monster had hunted me in my dreams while Henry and I ran from it inside a green forest.

Now the monster hunts me while I flee from it inside the crater of the deer-monster world.

Why do I have a feeling that it’s getting closer? Closer to me, and closer to devouring me?

Well, even if I know about it, what the hell should I do now?

It isn’t like I could prepare myself to fight that thing.

Though, maybe my power can.

I can’t fight that creature and probably never will be able to, but I feel an urge to find a way to survive when it chews me.

I have been chewed so often in my dreams that I remember it vividly. There was no way to just slide through its mouth and get swallowed as a whole.

That thing had a tongue, and it would fling me accurately between its teeth. There must be a way to survive that damn chewing.

Attacking the tongue should be the answer.

Conjuring up a gun to attack the tongue, I think that even rhymes, yay.

Maybe I can do even more. My theory is now like it had been before: if I can reach through the window into the past and take something out from it, I should be able to climb into it. Let’s start with something easy.

I rolled onto one side of my bed, pressing my back against the wall.

Now I imagine how it was to lie straight on my bed. Let’s flip the coin—my window—through which I can see the past and future.

I imagine the coin’s motif changing from that woman with the hands to a figure on a rectangular surface, namely me, straight on my bed. It somehow manifested as a drawing like that of a kid, with circles and lines; the head was a triangle.

Let’s try.

Flipping the coin in my mind again and again, I then imagined the coin I had thrown in the air above me expanding, the window opening, and, like a hula hoop ring, falling around me.

Take me through the window.