Wearied from my workout and weighted by my woes, I descended to detention in a funk that day. Knowing it would be my last, I had hoped to coast. Brother Beck denied my wish by making us write lines.

‘I obey the Bord.’ This we wrote ad nauseum amid the mounting illness of our keeper for the day. “When you’re done, you can go,” Brother Beck announced, looking eager to escape before a nasty scene.

Present for a prank in which he’d played a minor part, Gordy finished writing last of all except for me. He sped to the front and placed his paper on the stack, glancing at me with a mix of guilt and gratitude.

Brother Beck loudly cleared his throat for my attention, pressing me with urgency apparent in his glare. With a wince, I went back to working toward freedom. Only one line later did I suffer more distress.

“I obey the Bord.” Unseen at my side, Salvador read aloud my writing on repeat. He tutted capriciously. “Still in trouble, eh?” I exhaled with prejudice and shot the boy a scowl.

“Pendrak!” roared Brother Beck, battering his table. I attended like a deer dazzled by the light. “Focus! Or do you want longer stint?” I shook my head timidly and returned to my task.

But as I repeated my oppression on the page, I could hear the coach’s stomach churning from afar. Agony adorned his features as he gripped his gut. “Bohddang tuna,” he queasily cursed.

Stolen glances granted me awareness of his hurting and the longing looks he cast upon the bunker’s spiral stairs. Giving in, he shot up and sped toward the exit. “Don’t you move,” he warned me amid his ascent.

I waited to hear the heavy bunker door swing shut. Once alone with Salvador, I glowered at him. “Could you please not talk?” I seethed.

“Sorry,” he replied. “You get shook, and I get stuck here watching. It’s boring. Can you blame me if I wanna speak on what I see?”

“I guess not,” I allowed. “Pick your moments, though. You keep interrupting when I’m focusing on school.”

Salvador eyed the wooden bracelet I retained. “We’re always at school,” he dreamily sighed.

I missed his melancholy, prickling at his point. “I can’t summon you at home,” I reminded him.

I had twice tried to bring him home with me by then. When I left the school, alas, Salvador would vanish. I had taken pains to make him present where I lived, but no matter how I strained, he would not appear. He swore when I saw him that he never chose his showing, sitting in a dreamlike nether ‘til my angst appealed. I’d deferred his speculation as to why that was, fearful of the falling of his face’s bottom half.

I’d also deferred an explanation of my efforts, far from keen to seem a failure to my only friend. I regret that choice as I recount the claim it caused: “Maybe if you really tried,” Salvador accused.

I slammed down my pencil and rose above the boy, standing taller by the boon of adolescent growth. That advantage aided my intimidating ire. Anxious in the dour depths, I abandoned grace. “I did try,” I hotly contested Salvador. “It didn’t work. This is where we meet.”

Salvador rolled his eyes. “Sucks for me, I guess.”

“If you hate it so much, then leave!”

I had never dared before to speak that suggestion. Would that I’d remembered our communion at the time. Something other seemed to move in answer to my order: one whose slimy memory I suffer to this day.

Reminiscent of a moment not too far behind, I detected something thick a-slither in my throat. I gripped at my gullet as I felt it multiply, joined by several squiggling tendrils teasing my insides. I expelled an anguished whine as two escaped my mouth, pushing out of me like something squishy being born. I retched forcefully, desperate for its exit, but my pain intensified as two more limbs emerged.

Thicker than the tendrils that preceded their escape, the bumpy additions explored my face. I grabbed them instinctively and tugged with all my might, disregarding the destruction in my throbbing throat. I could feel them swelling still as I forced them out, and my torment deepened as their number grew to five. With a heave, I dislodged the danger from my mouth. I followed its freeing with a bucketload of bile.

My excretion hovered as I hurled upon the floor. I raised bleary eyes to see it as it found its shape. I observed the opening of half a dozen eyes, all affecting glory as they glowered into mine.

“Fear not!” spoke the something spawning over me. I perceived its message though I saw no mouth to speak. I saw rather the unfurling of its frilly gown, masking masses wriggling beneath its star-shaped head.

“You behold a holy seed born of Bohd’s Abode,” continued the creature, curving in its face. “I am Blessed OhmN, Angle of the Bord. Blessed be ye bridging by The Sanctity of Heve.”

I could hardly mark the nature of my once-invader, thoroughly bewildered by the break in sense. I felt keen to call myself a girl gone mad right then, but the word of Mrs. Mons wafted through my thoughts. So, I gathered grit and mustered mettle as I could, choosing then to weather witness of the haughty star. I focused on seeing to its solving with all speed; it would surely garner me no points with Brother Beck.

Greater terror gripped me when I glanced at Salvador. I beheld the horror of his visage when we’d met. He had pressed himself against the bunker’s farthest wall, open-faced and facing OhmN overwhelmed with fear. OhmN flexed its face to track my looking with three limbs, widening its eyes in fervor on seeing my friend. It cried out in arcane dialects I didn’t know, but I knew it meant to menace him as it lurched.

I sprang up to chase it down and place myself between them, somehow certain even then that they mustn’t meet. My intrusion proved enough to pause OhmN’s advance. It turned all six eyes on me. “Do not interfere!”

“Blessed be the bridgr!” I urgently uttered, keeping quiet just in case the coach was drawing near.

Perhaps it is time to tell the Reader of the religion that dominated the domain where St. Circe stood. We were of The Bohdric Bord, as were most alive. Bohd was the being who received our praise and prayers. Angles were the agents of His will within the world, coming to and sometimes through the faithful of His flock. Blessed bridgrs were the kin who granted them conveyance. None could know their role as such until an Angle came.

Let us now forego the finer details of the doctrine to keep with my account of my encounter with its cause. OhmN had given its name and thus was free to act. The blessing I’d spoken stalled it by the bridgr’s right.

In responding as required, I had earned insight. “Pose your questions,” OhmN spoke. “You get only three.” Recognize the cosmic consequence of such a chance. May your sense inform your judgment of the three I asked.

“Why are you here?” I probed hastily.

“For whom you call Salvador,” it coolly replied.

Feeling foolish, I gave greater thought to my next ask. “What is he to you?” I queried in time.

OhmN flexed the feelers of the star that was its head. “He and I are bound to join by the brace of Bohd.” It ignored me to address my friend of broken face. “Let me live in you again,” it begged.

Stripped of speech, Salvador could only cry in fear. I gritted my teeth at the too-familiar sound.  “How have I delayed you?” I sharply demanded; no edict I knew said OhmN couldn’t multitask.

OhmN’s eyes narrowed as they refocused on me. “By a force I cannot name,” it harshly intoned. “I am young upon the Bord and early in my growth. Trust that I will gain in graces once we are rejoined.”

OhmN’s ignorance and indignation distressed me. I felt bidden by the Bord to bend to its whim. But I found it far a fouler thing than lore foretold. I saw further that Salvador spurned its desire. I looked over to meet bulging eyes aglare with grief, and I quivered at the suffering his state implied. I decided then against assisting his assumption. “What if he belongs here?” I dared to inquire.

Something swelled inside the frilly frock beneath the star, firing a menacing expansion down its length. “ONLY THREE,” it repeated as a caustic choir. Its façade of gravitas fell to frantic wrath.

Tens of tendrils sprouted from its head-limbs and its gown, pushing through a plane of pressure I could scarcely sense. I knew by a nascent instinct that the force would falter. Blessed be the Brother for the time of his return.

Our offender froze as the bunker door swung open. All eyes in the room attended to the spiral stairs. Brother Beck descended in a haze of post-expulsion, sporting puffy features too familiar to me. He furrowed his brow as he caught me crouched in terror, narrowing his eyes at the space where OhmN loomed. But they soon landed on the pool of sick I’d spewed. “Pendrak!” he bitterly blurted as he retched.

He retreated up the stairs, shouting orders down: “Get that up!” he commanded, urgency implied. We three beings watched his exit with tense interest. I knew well enough an Angle’s law to pose a point.

“He’ll be back,” I warned.

OhmN receded. “So shall I,” it hissed. “Do not take our parting as partition of our bond. You shall bear its blessing by the beating of your heart.”

If it stayed, it became something I couldn’t see. I forgot its threat to see that Salvador could speak.