"What!?"
He hit the floor.
In a dimly lit cave the floor was cold stone and beneath him was a circle of engravings that ran outward in patterns he recognized as something Egyptian in the outer ring, something Indian in the inner,
Andreas looked up.
The thing looking down at him was large. He saw many arms of various lengths and sizes, and a snake like body made up hundreds of human and animal bodies.
Its head was a snake's, long and unhurried, and the face on it was a woman's, and that face was the only part of the situation that made any visual sense, which somehow made everything else worse by contrast.
She was smiling.
One of the shorter arms reached down and found the hilt of a niddle with the length equal to andreas and a width of his arm.
He whimpered as his heart is pierced and he feels unbearable pain as the needle pierces out his spine and back, and every heart beat only worsens the pain.
He was also groaned as he started to cry,"ducking son of a bitch."
Another short arm reached for his head and pulled it up by his hair with a grip that was gentle in the way that made clear gentleness was a choice being made on his behalf.
She looked him with a pleased expression.
"Oh," she said warmly.
"You look so adorable."
Andreas tried his best to hold the niddle with both his hands and once touched it the snake like lady had her lower half crushed into a puddle of bones and blood by an invisible force.
The snake screamed, "Ahhh!!" And fell.
Andreas was dropped and the niddle was pushed deeper. He gritted his teeth and thought goddammit as he started to to cry in a fetal position with on of his hands covering his face.
***
Kihoko opened the door to her bedroom.
Marcel was sitting on the edge of her bed with a glass of wine, looking at the room the way people look at things they consider already theirs.
I need to fire whoever let him in, she thought. All of them. Today.
Marcel looked up and smiled and crossed the room toward her with the particular confidence of someone who had never seriously considered the possibility of rejection as a category that applied to him.
"Don't," she said.
He stopped. Took a sip of wine.
"Kihoko." His voice had the patient quality of someone explaining the inevitable. "I can't have my future wife kissing other men in front of me."
She looked at him.
"So I sent him to Haxan," he said. " the snake witch."
The window behind her was large. She turned and went through it.
"Goddammit — goddammit — goddammit —"
Her voice faded with distance.
Marcel watched the empty window frame for a moment and took another sip.
"She really needs to stop playing hard to get," he said to no one.
In the sitting room Naxys had her eyes on Dang.
Dang's katana was drawn.
Neither of them had moved for some time.
Through the window Naxys caught the shape of Kihoko cutting through the sky at speed and tracked her until she disappeared over the roofline.
She lowered her gaze back to Dang and exhaled.
"We can go now."
She glanced at Anat.
"Thank you for cooperating." She paused. "Whether he survives or doesn't... I'll reward you either way."
She looked back at Dang.
"And you." Her voice stayed even. "Don't expect my help if he finds out."
***
Andreas grabbed the needle with both hands.
"Ngh —"
He pulled.
It did not come easily. He groaned through his teeth and pulled again and felt every inch of it and made several sounds he would not be repeating to anyone and then it was out and he dropped it and it hit the stone floor with a weight that seemed excessive for a weapon.
He pressed both hands to his chest.
The bleeding was immediate and priestly white clothes lost their beatifull white color into a messy and bloody red color, he felt the suffocating feeling of nothing where his heartbeat should have been.
He sat on the cold floor.
"Why me," he said.
No one answered.
"Why?...."
He laid there in silence Somewhere in the dark the snake woman made a sound that suggested she was not entirely crushed.
"Why," Andreas said, "Damnit."
Thirty minutes passed.
He stood up.
The chest beneath his bloody clothes had no wound or scar. As if nothing had happened.
He pressed a hand flat against his sternum and waited.
He breathed in deeply. Then again. Then again, thinking vaguely that if he just kept going his heart would beat again
On the fifth inhale he felt bloated and stopped.
He stood very still in the dim cave.
What the fuck am I.
He looked at his hands. Then at the circle beneath him. Then at the dark around him.
There was a trail of blood on the stone going somewhere. It was extremely wide. He looked at it for a few seconds and felt disgusted and then felt angry and then felt both at the same time.
He followed ithe trail.
After a few minutes of following Andreas walked past snake head several times lager the andreas.
As it used its long arms to crawl foward andreas walked about ten meters in front of it looked up to see a lake sized body of water suspended by nothing.
He frowned and exhaled deeply, " So how do I get out of here... if you tell me I'll spare you." He said as he forced himself to look at the creature.
The creature looked at andreas for a while and answered," continued to walk along behind you and turn left."
"Thatnk you. He said and smiled.
He speedwalked along the cave and turned left making sure that creature didn't take the opportunity to strike him.
He quickly walked to the metal door and opened it and saw two bald men quickly draw their pistols at him and shoot.