TICK TOCK: By John McDonnell
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010“I’m five hundred forty years old,” the girl said. She had long blond hair, and empty blue eyes.
She didn’t look a day over twenty one.
“Oh?” Lillith said. “Have you learned anything in that time?”
“I’m bored,” the girl said, pouting. “I can’t feel anything anymore.”
Those were the magic words. They meant that the prospect was willing to part with an obscene amount of money for the ultimate high.
“Sign here,” Lillith said, handing over the contract. Funny how science had achieved so much, including immortality, but an old-fashioned pen and paper were needed to enforce a contract under the law.
The girl signed, expensive bracelets jangling as she did. “What now?” she asked, after signing her entire fortune over to Lillith.
“Come with me.” Lillith led the way to the back of the shabby store, past a curtain and down a shadowy hallway. At the end of the hallway, she opened a door and ushered the girl into a room with an ancient hospital bed in it, and some medical equipment in a corner.
“Lie there,” Lillith said, pointing to the bed.
“Will this hurt?” the girl said.
Lillith chuckled. “Of course it will hurt. You’re perfection itself, honey. You’ve had the best of everything your whole long life. Money, drugs, education, beauty, fame, sex, knowledge — you’ve had it all. It’s not enough, though, is it? Everything gets boring after awhile. That’s why you came to me. You heard I can make you feel again, right?”
“Yes. I haven’t cared about anything for a century or more.”
“You want to feel fear, right? Terror.”
A light went on in the girl’s eyes. “I heard it’s the strongest emotion. A real rush.”
“Yes it is,” Lillith said. “But there’s no turning back, sweetie.”
“I understand.”
Lillith inserted the needle deftly into the girl’s arm, and emptied its contents into her vein.
“What is terror? Can you describe it?”
Lillith smiled. “Have you ever played the Slasher Game?”
“Yes, many times. Is it like that?”
Lillith smiled again. “Nothing like that. Because once the game was over, you came back to life, right? Your body repaired itself, so even if you had gotten your throat cut, it was just like taking a little nap, and then you woke up.”
“Yes.”
Lillith laughed. “Terror, real terror, is nothing like that. You will learn what it is now.” She threw the needle in the trashcan, and went over to the sink to wash her hands.
“I feel different,” the girl said. “Strange.”
“That’s normal,” Lillith said, wiping her hands with a paper towel. “Your body is changing. That’s part of the process.”
The girl got off the bed, and went over to the mirror above the sink. She peered at her face.
“Something is different.”
“Yes. It’s the beginning of terror. Your body is reacting to it.”
The girl seemed to have a tremor in her voice. “I, I don’t like it.”
“Nobody said you would like it, honey.”
The girl gripped the sink, hard, like she was trying to stop the shaking in her body. “What’s happening?” she said.
“You’ll get used to it. It’s known as aging. It used to be a common thing, many centuries ago.”
“I, I want my money back,” the girl gasped. Her face was ashen, and she was shivering. “C-c-cancel the contract.”
Lillith smiled. “Impossible. The contract is irrevocable.”
“No!” the girl screamed. “No! Please! I didn’t think it would feel this way. I can’t handle this. Please, you must understand. My face looks different.” She put her hands to her ears. “Oh my God. . . what’s that noise? What is that horrible noise?”
Lillith smiled and pointed to a contraption on a table by the door. It was a historical object, stolen from a museum, and Lillith had paid a lot of money for it on the black market.
“That?” she said. “Why, that’s the ticking of a clock.”
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©2010 John McDonnell
