Chapter Fourteen

So we walked through the door, and closed it behind us. Everything was black, and there was no light.
“Where are we?” I asked. “Is everywhere in this dimension this dark?”
Luke laughed. The sound echoed. I could tell it was a very closed off space, not a lot of room. It almost felt like a cave, but with smooth walls. “No, it’s actually pretty normal once we reach ground level.”
“Ground level?” I repeated. “What do you mean?”
“I mean we’re in a basement,” Luke’s voice came from far away. I followed the sound of his footsteps and tried to keep up with him. “We’re under the ground right now, of a building, and so all I have to do is try to remember where the stairs are so we can get back up.”
“A building? What, like another abandoned factory or something?”
“No, this is actually a church.”
“A church? You took me to a church?”
“Hey, I don’t choose where these doors go. Oh, hey! There those stairs are. Ruddy basement almost seems like a maze sometimes. Come on.”
I went up the stairs incredibly slowly, scared for the fact that I might trip on them and fall over and completely humiliate myself in front of Luke.
He opened the door, and a light flooded into the darkness. I expected to be blinded by it, or at least a little bit disturbed, but the light was so dim and dark, it really didn’t bother me that much. So I climbed out of the dark and ruddy basement and walked through the door after Luke. We went into this little room, and then exited that room to get into the main hall of the church, which just so happened to be full of people dressed in black at the time.
“Oh…” Luke whispered. “I think we accidentally came into the middle of something. Usually this place is empty, not a lot of people come here unless its a funeral or something. You see, there is a graveyard behind this church, so that’s all people really come here for.”
Some of the people were crying, and I figured that they were probably having a funeral considering there was a big, black coffin at the front of the church, with the giant cross looming over it.
“I am so sorry,” I said. “For intruding. We don’t belong here. Come on, Luke, we should leave.”
“And we are sorry for your loss,” Luke said. He pulled me away from the coffin. “Come on, Caity-kins.”
I looked back and got a good look at the coffin. It was closed, of course, and I didn’t blame the person who died for wanting it to be like that. There were some flowers on top, and a picture of… a picture of Cedric.
“Hold on, hold on,” I said, pulling my arm away from Luke. “Is that… is that who I think it is?”
“Caitlin, we really have no right to stay here.”
“Of course I do,” I said so only Luke could hear. “That’s my brother, my brother is dead.”
“That is not your brother, Caitlin,” he said. “Remember? Alternate universe?”
I walked slowly towards the front of the church, and recognized the sobbing woman and man in the first row of seats, dressed in black, not daring to look up, as Cecily and Charlie Whitewood: my parents.
“Where am I?” I asked under my breath. “Where’s Caitlin?”
Luke took a deep breath. “She… she doesn’t exist. She was never born here.”
I nodded slowly. “Well, at least I didn’t die or anything like that. I was just… never born. Well, that saves me the trouble for what excuse I would have if I ever ran into myself.”
I looked back at the coffin. “How did he die this time?”
“I don’t know,” Luke said. “I would suggest asking someone, but I don’t think they would want to tell the tale if it was that bad or anything.”
“Excuse me,” I said to a random stranger. I later recognized her as my Aunt Judy. Or, this dimension’s version of my Aunt Judy. “Um, I am very sorry for your loss. I know I don’t really belong here… but could you tell me how this young boy died at such a young age? He wasn’t sick or anything, was he?”
Aunt Judy stopped blubbering for a moment and wiped away her tears. “N-no… the boy, my nephew, you see, he was perfectly fine. He… well, he was murdered.”
“Murdered?” I repeated. My jaw dropped. “I… I don’t understand. Someone killed him?”
“Yes, I am afraid so. He was so young, and I have no idea why anyone would have any reason to hate him so.”
“Does anyone know who did it? I mean, do we know who killed him?”
Aunt Judy shook her head. “I am afraid not. All we know is that he was stabbed in the heart by some odd, round knife.”
“A round knife?”
“Yes, You know how most knives are flat, and sharp on one edge? Well, this one seemed to be pointed, and round, like a cone. And it was struck through him into his heart, and ceased all bodily functions.”
“That is just… horrible. Who would do such a thing?”
“Only God knows, my dear child. Only God knows. Pray tell, may I know who you are and what you are doing here?”
“I am… uh… one of Cedric’s friends. From school.”
“It’s so strange, you look so much like him.”
“We get that a lot. Some people thought we were twins, but I assured them we were just friends.”
“I see. Well, take care, then, and may the soul of Cedric Whitewood rest in peace.”
“Yes. May his soul rest in peace.” I turned away and went back to Luke. “He was murdered. Was that meant to happen? For the universe and what not?”
“No… no, it wasn’t meant to happen. Some inter dimensional force must have killed him.”
“But he got stabbed. In the heart. With a knife.”
“Then the murderer must have been from another dimension,” Luke explained.
“I think it’s the same guy,” I said. “The one who has been, what did you call it?, dimension hopping. The one who killed my family back in my own dimension. But why the hell is he killing Cedric here? I don’t understand, why would he be murdering my family throughout all the dimensions?”
“I don’t know,” Luke said. “But I intend to find out.”
Luke grabbed my wrist, and began pulling me out of the Church.
“What is going on?” I repeated.
“Just follow me,” he said. “We’re going to go to the next dimension. I intend to find out what’s going on once we’re over there.”
He got on his motorcycle, and I sat in the back.
“So tell me, then, master of all dimensions,” I said.
“Keeper,” he corrected. “Not master. Master makes me sound pretentious.”
“Oh, like you aren’t pretentious already,” I said. “Whatever. What makes you so sure that there is something in the next dimension that is going to tell us where to go and what is going on? What makes you so sure that the key to find out what the hell is going on is going to be in this next dimension?”
“Well,” he started, “like you said, I am the master. And I have a hunch. And being a master, I have learned to trust my intuition. Because if I am the master, then my intuition must almost always be right. So therefore, I am just going to go with it. I hope that doesn’t bug you too much, but you are the one who said that I am the master.”
I rolled my eyes. “Forget it. Let’s just go.”
So he started driving the motorcycle down the empty streets of this oddly dark dimension. It was quiet, and I didn’t know what to expect. I half expected an axe murderer to jump out of the darkness and attack us. Thankfully, that didn’t happen.
We soon left the city entirely, and it felt like days before we entered a lone house in the middle of nowhere. No one was there, and I wondered if anyone had been in that house at all. It was small, dusty, and wooden, like someone had built it just for the purpose of hiding the purple door. Luke climbed in through the window, and I followed him. There was no thing or person stirring, so I figured it was perfectly all right to be breaking in. Luke went down to the basement, where it was impossibly more dark than the previous basement, except for the shining silver door handle on the radiant purple door. He opened, it, and went through, while I followed, close behind him.