Read Online Midian Unmade by Joseph Nassise - Free Book Online

could take with the girl, but none seemed right.
    Without warning, Asteria—now fully in her human vestments—burst from the room and shouldered past Amy.
    â€œCome on,” she said as she swept by. “We have to get rid of the truck before anyone notices it’s here.”
    Amy followed, stopping only in the bathroom to pick up two sets of rubber gloves. Outside, Asteria was doubled over, retching in the driveway. Something fell from her mouth and tinkled to the ground.
    Amy scowled at the bloody, shiny pile in the dirt and asked, “You swallowed his keys, too? Really?”
    Asteria refused to respond. She tore a pair of gloves from Amy’s grip, snapped them on, and picked up the keys.
    â€œReady?” she asked no one in particular.
    Amy folded her arms over her chest and said, “I think we should talk about it.”
    Asteria blinked and smiled as if amused by some slow-burning joke.
    â€œTalk? About what? Where we’re going to leave the truck?” she asked. “I assumed we’d ditch it out by Pine’s Mountain, near Route 45.”
    â€œNo, Asteria.” Amy sighed. “Not about the truck. About what you did in there. About what I saw.”
    The smile grew wider, almost clownish.
    â€œWhat did you see, Amy?”
    Amy struggled to find words. She’d seen death. She’d seen pleasure. She’d seen the inhuman heart of the universe beating strong and vibrant in one of its favored children.
    â€œI’ll tell you what you saw,” Asteria said, preempting an answer. “You saw me. All of me. And you saw me doing what I do, what I have to do. It took ten years, ten years of you desperately avoiding what you knew to be true, but you finally saw it. And I know. I know. It’s one thing to see the fangs, the spines, the crazy eyes and studded skin, and stand in awe of their power, their destructive potential, but it’s another thing entirely to see how that power is used.”
    â€œAsteria, look … look.” Amy stumbled over her thoughts. “You … we … need to find someone. To help you. To help you control it. This is all just … just too much.”
    The smile on Asteria’s face vanished, replaced by a hard, freezing vacancy.
    â€œI had people who could have helped me. A lot of people. In Midian. They were going to teach me when I was just a little older. But someone burned them all away, Amy.”
    Amy stood silent. She had no way to quench that fire from decades past and she wondered if it would ever stop burning.
    Asteria gazed up into the sky. Dusk had settled over the firmament and stars had begun to poke through its darkening bowl.
    â€œIn monster movies,” she said, more to the stars than to Amy, “nobody ever really likes the mob of villagers. They’re not heroic. They’re not villainous. They’re nameless, faceless nobodies. They have pitchforks and torches and shotguns and riot gear, which you’d think would give them some sort of character, but, really, they’re just a lumbering mass of anger and fear. See, they’re angry that something has threatened the world they know and understand. Whatever that thing is, it’s forced them out of their little routines, their safe assurances. And they’re afraid—oh so afraid—that it will change everything for them and that their knowledge, their understanding, their routines and assurances, will be forever lost.
    â€œEveryone who watches monster movies wants to be the hero … or the monster, I suppose, but no one ever wants to be one of the mob. Why? Because everyone already knows that they’re part of it. Despite all the illusions of heroism or villainy most people cultivate about themselves, everyone knows that when a true threat enters their world, they’ll glob onto a huddled mass and pick up a pitchfork, too. The mob makes everyone realize that they’re not heroes or