Fear flooded Reg’s insides as he gazed at the monster across from him in disbelief. For a split second, time slowed to a crawl and he and the mimic shared a look of understanding. It was a deep, meaningful exchange that transcended the need for spoken word.

  ‘I think you know what happens next,’ the mimic said without speaking.

  ‘But the window’s right there’ Reg insisted, silently. ‘I could—’

  The mimic, still donning Tera’s skin, shook its head sadly. ‘You could not.’

  He could not indeed. Not with the real Tera back in the apartment. Reg may have been a coward, but he wasn’t the backstabbing kind that left his friends for dead. He snatched the phone from his desk and fumbled to find her number. Alas, the phone, too, seemed stuck in slow motion. “Tera!” Giving up on the useless device, Reg leapt to his feet and screamed at the top of his lungs, knowing his voice would carry through the paper-thin walls of the apartment. “Get out!”

  The mimic twisted its hands and chanted beneath its breath. Dark plumes of energy lifted from its flesh as the hot crackle of magic filled the air. The stench was overpowering, like the unholy combination of ammonia and rotted meat on a hot summer day. The toxic fumes infiltrated Reg’s lungs, weighing him down, slowing his steps, until every muscle in his body acted as if it were caught in quicksand.

  Few things could stop dark magic in its tracks—talismans, charms, other equally strong magic, essentially. As Reg had none of these, he had to settle for the old book-to-the-face maneuver. His father’s journal whipped through the air and smacked the mimic square across the nose, disrupting the spell from its lips. Spell broken, the invisible weight lifted, but Reg wasn’t any nearer to the open door than he’d started.

  Reaching the door meant going around the monster currently obstructing his path. A task that was easier said than done considering the darn thing was still trying to curse him! The mimic lowered its head and started its incantation anew. Reg grabbed a random volume from the shelf and flung it at his attacker. And so it went for several aggravating turns. Each time the mimic opened its mouth it was rewarded with a well-aimed book to the face. Reg could nearly recite the first half of the spell from memory by the time the monster reached the limit of its patience.

  Unable to thwart Reg with magic, the mimic settled for ripping him limb from limb instead. It threw its head back with an unearthly snarl and charged.

  Wait for it.

  Reg crouched lower, ignoring every impulse screaming at him to shift planes. He placed both hands against the desk and watched terror-stricken as the gap between him and his imminent death shrank with each step. The mimic was only paces away when he made his move. Reg shoved the desk into its path, taking the monster out at the knees. The maneuver bought him some time. Two whole seconds of it before the uncanny Tera-looking creature crawled over the desk and dropped down onto the floor in front of him. Its mouth twisted into a smile, revealing a top and bottom row of jagged teeth.

  The mimic’s smile disappeared a second later when Reg brought the heavy bookcase crashing down over it. Reg shifted forms and jetted for the open door. He was nearly in the hallway when he felt a scalding heat rip into his phantom body. His particles spasmed, throwing him off course. Reg struck the wall and then the floor.

  He flipped and tumbled head over heels until rolling to a stop. Reg eased upright with a pained groan, alarmed to find his body had returned to the physical world without running it by the rest of him first. What on Earth?

  A resounding thump shook the floor as the office bookshelf tipped back over. The mimic’s staggering footsteps started towards him.

  Reg tried to shift planes but the transition lasted only a split second before he slammed back down onto the hard laminate. Pain pulsed across his skin, radiating from his left leg. A hurried glance revealed three stomach-churning gash marks just below the knee. The dark denim of his pant leg was torn and dripped red with blood.

  The mimic must have struck on his way past. Reg could feel its dark magic wriggling beneath his skin like maggots, worming its way upward. A single swipe was all it had taken to shut down his ability to shift planes. Judging from the numbing tingle steadily traveling up Reg’s thigh, the unknown spell was well on its way to doing the same to his internal organs.

  Not good.

  Gritting his teeth, Reg stood and staggered down the hallway, dragging his injured leg behind him. Blood marked his trail into the living room. He made it halfway to the couch before he collapsed. The skin on his face was feverish and slick with sweat. His heart beat erratically. Its usual lub-dub palpitation was fast and clumsy, stumbling over itself as it fought to pump blood to the rest of his dying body. His lungs did their best to keep up, but his short, panting gasps failed to provide the breath he needed.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  His vision blurred. Reg blinked, refusing to give in without a fight. He shook his head, blinking the tears from his eyes until the room came into focus again. The living room was the same as before, except for the addition of the shadowy figure hovering in the corner.

  Hope turned to ash on Reg’s tongue. Oh, no. Not you. Not now. Crapppppppp.

  The faceless figure in the corner watched the unfolding scene with well-practiced indifference. It wasn’t the first time Reg had seen a reaper. Being tied to the spirit world, he’d encountered his fair share over the years. But those sightings had always been on the behalf of other people, not him. Not before, anyway. Now—now there was only one reason it was here. Reapers were harbingers of death. They served but one purpose: to collect willing souls and usher them into the shadow world beyond the spirit plane.

  Time slowed to a trickle. Reg heard the mimic slowly stalking down the hallway, but he didn’t check, unable to tear his gaze from the awaiting reaper. He wanted to shout at the dark apparition, berate it for being early. For goodness sake, it could have at least waited until his corpse was cold! Normally reapers didn’t make an appearance until after the final breath had already been drawn.

  Good gods, he hadn’t died without realizing, had he? Reg drew in another shaky breath, pleasantly surprised to discover he still counted among the living. Temporarily, at least.

  Perhaps an expception had been made on his behalf. Reapers weren’t exactly fond of his existence. A half-human born with all the ability of a reaper and none of the responsibility didn’t reflect well on the species. Neutral by nature, reapers weren’t allowed to meddle in the world of living and, thus, Reg’s existence was tolerated solely on the basis that there wasn’t anything they could do about it. Until death did he part, which was only moments away, apparently.

  Movement from the corner of his eye drew Reg’s gaze from the reaper to the mouth of the hallway. The mimic slunk into view. It still looked disturbingly like Tera, except for the eyes, which had gone black like a starless night. It approached cautiously, afraid perhaps that Reg had another secret arsenal of books up his sleeve.

  If only.

  Reg dragged his lifeless legs closer to the couch as he searched the room for an answer. Now would have been a good time to know where Tera kept her rifle! Not that salt pellets would have done him any good against a flesh-and-bone monster, but at least it would’ve been something! Seasoning perhaps, for his dead carcass, right before the mimic gobbled him up.

  The mimic drew closer. Its steps transitioned from cautious to deliberately slow as if realizing its prey had finally run out of ways to annoy it. A cruel smile split across its human face. What was even more cruel was that it was a face Reg loved. The face of his best friend, his rock, his partner in crime, that one person who’d stuck by his side through thick and thin. Tera had threatened to kill him more times than Reg could recall and now, in some sick twist of fate, an unspeakable abomination was robbing the real her of the chance.

  Reg’s strength gave out beneath him. He collapsed, helpless against the invisible noose that tightened around his neck, cutting off his air. Color bled from his vision as the surrounding walls turned from off-white to drab shades of gray. His ears picked up one final sound: footsteps. They were so fast and light Reg barely registered them. He might have died having not noticed the approaching footsteps had Tera not burst from the adjoining hallway at top speed and leapt onto the shoulders of the mimic.

  The pair hit the floor with Tera on top, clawing at the mimic’s face with her bare hands. No, not bare. Reg swore he saw something glisten against the low light. Was that…lotion? Good gods, was his partner seriously trying to defeat a monster with moisturizer?

  The invisible noose around Reg’s throat loosened, opening his windpipe. Reg sucked in a desperate breath of sulfur-laden air and filled his shriveled lungs. Color returned to the world around him. He turned in time to see the real Tera get thrown back. She struck the floor with enough force to knock the wind out of her. She rolled over onto her side, gasping and giggling so hard she was snorting.

  What. The. Hell.

  “Tera!” The word scraped the inside of Reg’s dry throat on its way out. He was dead, wasn’t he? That was the only logical explanation. Somehow, some way, without his notice, he’d died and gone to a cruel version of the afterlife, forced to relive his final moments in the most bizarre way possible. “Tera,” he repeated, “what did you do?”

  Tears streamed from Tera’s eyes. She clutched her shaking sides, laughing as the mimic gathered its wobbly feet beneath it only to fall over again. She spit out a single word between fits of giggles. “Poison.”

  “What?”

  Tera unwrapped her hands from her sides and lifted them in the air, wiggling her glistening fingertips. Her manic smile widened. “Ribbit.”

  Ribbit? Ribbit? What, were they role-playing animals now?

  Reg tore his gaze from her to the mimic as his scattered thoughts struggled to process Tera’s meaning. The poison was already running its course. The mimic flailed about on the rug, unable to wield its magic any more than it could its unruly limbs. Even without its magic, the monster was entirely too close for Reg’s comfort. He scooted out of reach, as far as his numb arms and legs could drag him.

  His shoulders bumped against the couch the same moment realization struck. The answer, he realized, was as obvious. “You used tonic toad mucus.”

  It was genius, actually. Except for the part where his brazen partner neglected to take her own welfare into account. Again. Reg’s accusing glare settled back over Tera’s giggling form. “And you still didn’t wear gloves?”

  “Pshhhh,” was all Tera managed before she slumped back against the ground and stared wide-eyed up at the ceiling.

  The mimic was still moving. With an agonized screech, it heaved onto its unsteady feet. The last shred of glamour faded, revealing its true form. It was humanoid in shape, with flaps of gray skin hanging loose from a skeletal frame. Each bony hand bore murderous claws. They dragged against the floor as the monster lurched for Tera, intent on destroying the human responsible for its untimely poisoning.

  Reg screamed to get its attention, but his cries fell on deaf ears. His eyes darted to the dark form in the corner. It was still there, patiently awaiting an inbound soul.

  A fresh lance of fear bolted down his spine.

  The reaper wasn’t here for him.