Ginger Snaps: Deathless

The blood tasted metallic, like melted nickels, as it slid down her beckoning throat. The harsh sensation shocked her at first repelling her slightly from the still warm corpse, her dripping jaws seizing in mid bite leaving her tongue alone in its exploration. During the mid second pause thousands of papillae relayed their sensations to her brain, over and over again, coaxing it until she felt safe. The woman's fingers relaxed and lowered spreading out over the exposed flesh before her, a large laceration in the creature's midsection spilling its inviting innards upon the cold, hard asphalt.

She took another bite, ribs cracking under the pressure, the curved bones unable to halt the predator's carnage as she tore through to the covered organs. The sounds of feasting fused with the cyclic hum of a nearby automotive engine forming a sickly aural backdrop to the vision bathed in the vehicle's sole remaining headlight. A slender girl lay in the glow, her face buried and hidden within the cooling carcass of a wild deer now stone dead. A quirt of blood streaked free from the remains impacting across the yellow paint of the parked van. It trickled slowly down the crushed bonnet before dripping into the light bulb's glare casting a devil's aura over the deserted landscape.

Rearing her head back amidst the morbid mood lighting, the bloodied girl gazed at her grim surroundings, a spark of modesty flashing briefly across her lustrous eyes. Her only neighbors were trees wreathed in cloaks of shadow, standing like uniformed guards across both sides of the vacant road. Her ears twitched beneath raven hair urging glistening eyes to skitter across the landscape, glancing briefing over her shoulder. But all she found was a familiar silhouette disappearing along the length of road as it stretched out into night. Even the stars above were oblivious as they danced in tandem to the slow tune of the universe. Yet the fine hairs on her tensed neck would not settle. Somebody was watching.

A nervous gasp escaped her, thick streams of damp mist rising into the cold night. Though the air was still, the ethereal vapor was not, darting quickly into the darkened sky. The young woman watched in awe as hundreds of smoky tendrils shot forth from the mist, entwining amongst themselves, coalescing into rudimentary limbs. It looked almost human. Then as if carved by some unseen hand, finer details began to emerge, slender fingers, the hint of bosom, long ruffled hair, eyes, ears, even the makings of a grim smile, each feature uncomfortably familiar to its bewildered witness. A pair of wings short of a fallen angel. The form began its descent towards the road below sinking into the crimson aura of the blood tainted light, siphoning off the color as it passed. And still transfixed, the brunette onlooker stood frozen as the figure touched down not a foot away, draped in the skin of someone long since dead.

"Hi Brigitte," the apparent woman spoke, her voice friendly but oddly distant. She took a single calm step between them, her flame-touched hair moving in accord.

"Oh my God!" the darker girl gasped, the final remnants of color retreating from her already pale features.

"Nice to see you too," the red head groaned. "But believe me when I tell you that 'he' has nothing to do with this."

"Ginger?"

"Yes dummy," she chuckled. "You sure know how to piss off a girl. No wonder we're sisters."

"I must be going crazy."

"Probably," Ginger teased. "That doesn't change the fact that I'm standing right here, and that it's rude to ignore me."

"You're not real," Brigitte cried, grasping her temples, begging her eyes to expel the impossible vision before her. "You can't be."

"I'm real to you," her sister assured softly. "Let me show you."

Stepping closer, Ginger reached out tenderly towards her anxious sibling, running a soothing finger across Brigitte's retreating brow. But the red head pursued, reestablishing her touch before running her fingers softly through Brigitte's raven locks.

"Your hair," Ginger whispered. "It's darker than I remembered."

"W-What are you doing?" Brigitte stuttered, still restless.

"I missed you B."

Brigitte felt the inviting arms of her sibling envelop her as she stood stunned, peering into the shadows past strands of auburn hair. The warmth of Ginger's chest on her own, the touch of her lips against her cheek, it all felt so real, so authentic, just like the tears that began streaking down her soft cheeks, the first cracks in her weakening mortar.

But it can't be real. It simply can't.

"Ginger," Brigitte began, her soft voice drowning in guilt. "I killed you."

Meeting the dark wells of her eyes, Ginger gazed deep before her knowing that Brigitte would do the same, forgiving her without words as she slipped her palms down past the other girl's slender frame before scooping up her hands.

"But you also saved me Brigitte. You carried me inside of you, in your mind, nurturing me until I was strong enough to come forth. You're my sister, my mother, and soon you'll be even more."

The now torrent of tears stung Brigitte's unaccustomed eyes, much like the fateful night years past, deep in the bloodied basement. Salted drips of sorrow had fallen upon her sister then too, and she attempted to raise a hand in effort to wipe away the damp memories. But she found herself bound, Ginger's abrupt grip unyielding.

"What are you doing?" Brigitte gasped. "Let me go."

"No Brigitte," the scarlet girl responded, her voice adopting an unsettling bland tone. "You've only given me part of it. You need to give me the rest."

"Give you what?" Brigitte screamed in confusion.

"You."

"This is insane."

"Is it?" Ginger spat, a malice long committed to childhood memory seeping into her words. "You said it yourself B, don't you remember?"

"What are you talking about?"

"What you said," Ginger continued. "In the greenhouse when you sliced open our palms? Those four little words… Now, I, am…"

"You," Brigitte whispered, that one word brining with it a sense of dreaded finality.

"Bingo," Ginger affirmed with a click of her fingers. "I'm here to collect."

"No! Get out of my head!"

"Would it really be a bad thing?" Ginger queried. "You seem to losing it anyway."

"Like you did any better the first time around," the brunette spat back, anger beginning to churn within her. "I'm doing fine on my own thank you."

"And just what happened here then?" Ginger mocked, gesturing towards the shredded deer. "Couldn't get to a drive-thru?"

"Fuck you Ginger."

"You took my life B," the red head seethed, rising to her sister's fury. "I'm just taking it back. You invited me to after all."

"Try it, and you'll find that my hair isn't the only thing that's darkened."

"Fine," Ginger receded, releasing her grip. "But you really are your own worst enemy."

As both girls glowered in each other's direction, the single remaining source of illumination exploded within its glass housing, the night rushing back in the reclaim its rightful domain. Inescapable shadows consumed both their bodies as Ginger's form dissolved into darkness, leaving Brigitte once again alone with nothing but a chilled corpse for company.