(In the last episode Patricia, a captive of Joseph, was being led into the pleasure room of the Kaliedoscope Eye Bar by Garter, an Elvish Rat breeder, who wishes to trade two Elvish Rats for the young dark girl, now owned by a man named Joseph who desires the Elvish Rats.)
They had entered the pleasure room and Garter uncloaked the cage. It was a two-compartment cage with a main lock and an inner and outer cage. The first cage was immediately accessible when the lock tumblers were tapped. There was a small Elvish Rat in one compartment and two full-grown Elvi’s, as they are known on the street, in the second compartment. A door with a tie-lock kept the two larger animals separated from the tiny one.
Garter reached into the cage with a synthetically gloved hand and grabbed the half-grown Elvi by the neck as it raged at him. He pulled a metal ball peen hammer out of a satchel and rapped the Elvi right between the eyes. The hammer penetrated its skull and a high-pitched whine filled the room. It seemed to be too large for the creature that emitted it. Joseph had looked into the cage at the other two Elvi’s and they were standing with feet that seemed to be locked to the cage bottom but they rocked to and fro in unison and their eyes were locked on Garter. Their throats were moving but Joseph could not hear any sound coming from them.
Joseph looked at Patricia. Her eyes were on the Elvi’s and she was rocking as if she heard a strange song with the same rhythm that moved the furry creatures with glowing eyes.
Garter spoke softly to Patricia.
“This,” Garter said as he cracked open the bones of the Elvi with a small metal instrument, “is where the marrow comes from. You, Patricia, will be infused with fresh marrow. This is the most powerful drug of all.”
Garter twisted a dial on the tube connected to the sac.
“The control is here. Only a small influx is needed. You will enter the realm of a permanently flowed being with just a trickle of the marrow. Even a half-flow at this stage will mist your mind and send you out of reach forever.”
Joseph watched as, with a special tool that put forth a hot beam, Garter efficiently scraped the interior of the Elvi’s bones and a loose, moist powder fell onto the table. Soon there was enough to fill the sac and the bulky man took a funnel and the sac swelled and looked as if it would burst.
Patricia watched the two living Elvi’s. Garter hit her head with his large, hard hand and she dropped to her knees in a daze. Garter looped a cord around her hands and lifted her small body to the table next to the cage and the dead Elvi. He opened a small black leather bag and took out stone-honed cutting tools. Garter pierced the neck of the dark girl and the blood pulsed out for a second until Garter plugged the hole in her neck with a tube, spinning a combination lock and sealing the hole in her neck with a cauterization tool.
At this moment Joseph could watch no longer and left the room.
Patricia could feel the dull pain but the humming sound in the room made her able to bear it. Garter was adjusting something in her neck and it was rubbing her flesh—then it was still. Garter made a small twist of the dial. Patricia came to full awareness when the first trickle of the flow hit her. It was a warm feeling and the humming became sharper and more intense. She sat up and looked at the two Elvi. Then she looked at the man who had eyes that spit foul light into the room and saw a bladed tool near her hand. First she used the blade to cut the cords on her wrist. It was as if the humming was instructing her and Patricia, with hands that never moved so fast, held the surgical tool tightly and sliced the throat of the big man who was leaning over her.
Garter grabbed his neck as if to try to staunch the blood, which sprayed about the room and he began to lumber about with small heavy steps. He opened his mouth to yell but his vocal cords were cut and the only sound he made was a hiss that emanated from the widening cut in his throat. He fell against the table and reached for Patricia but his hands hit the cage instead and it crashed to the floor.
For a moment the humming stopped. The cage door snapped open and the two Elvi leapt from the cage. In a nervous gesture, feeling high anxiety because of what had just taken place, Patricia reached up and twisted the dial on the poli-stirex tube and the gap was wide open. The marrow flowed freely into her and she swayed with the power of the hit and then dropped to the floor.
There was Patricia, eyes wide, falling away from the world as we know it and into total communication with the Elvi. Garter’s life was spilling out onto the floor as the two Elvi moved towards Patricia. Joseph, hearing the clatter, entered the room and stopped in shock. For the first time in his life, he was too frightened to move.
Patricia saw the world with new vision and heard the song of the Elvi and, for the first time, totally understood what they were singing. She knew her name was no longer Patricia—the Elvi leaned towards her humming her true name. They called her Yemaya and they leaned toward her loving her with sound and fury.
The Elvi hungered and sang to the dark girl, now called Yemaya. She spoke in the Elvish tongue and called to Joseph, no longer afraid of the pathetic man. Joseph moved towards her like an automaton, unable to resist her call, just as she was unable to resist the call of the Elvi.
Joseph hungered for marrow and the two Elvi leapt into the air tearing at Joseph’s throat. As he fell, he knew that he was food for the Elvi hives. The Elvi tore into his body. They ate of his flesh while Yemaya watched radiating approval to her new friends.
Joseph slipped into the void as he fed the appetites of the Elvi. His eyes were opened forever. The Elvi, when they were done feeding, climbed the arms of Yemaya and rested on her shoulders. It was time to go.
Yemaya opened the door from the back room and walked out into the main room of the Kaliedoscope Eye Bar. Some of the patrons of the bar swore, later as they told the tales, that the Elvi and the dark girl shimmered with rainbow light and floated a few inches above the floor as they walked out into the street.
Others said that all they saw was a skinny black girl holding a gold chain in her hand, flanked by two snarling beasts that leapt around her while she ran barefoot into the street. Some said that the Elvi rode on her shoulders.
There were some that say she opened the door and walked out of the bar. Others say that she traveled through the door and it blew apart after the fact. None will deny that the door ripped from its hinges and splintered in the street. On one thing they all agree. They all saw rainbows and then were stunned by magic.