ARC: Crushed by Eliza Crewe Page B

feel it so much as hear it: a giant wheezy gasp. It sort of hitches and wobbles, as if the breather is new to the art and is still trying to get the hang of it. Then there’s another gasping breath, and another. The breaths smooth out and the black in my vision lightens back to the pink of my lids.
    Then Our eyes snap open.
    The Sarge kneels over Us, Professor Puchard leans behind her, his wrinkly neck stretched like a vulture as he peers over her shoulder. The rest of the Crusaders surround Us, curious but unwilling to come within reach. A heavily-accented voice is demanding to know what is happening – one of the incorporeal visitors. Then the image of the room begins to waver, as if I were viewing it through a thick pane of old, distorted glass. Or water. The asshole has forgotten to blink. I try, I make the motion that for seventeen years has successfully closed my lids. I exaggerate it, trying to force the motion. Nothing.
    “Meda?” the Sarge asks slowly, examining my face.
    My eyelids finally slide closed, though they aren’t really mine anymore. I refuse to call them his . Our eyelids. Then they open again and Our vision is clear. A rumble vibrates Our throat. It drags itself from a noise into a word. “Nnnnnnnnnnnnno.”
    “Arthur?”
    Our head jerks in a wobbly nod. The Sarge involuntarily pulls back, then peers closer, as if searching for some physical difference.
    Our body begins to twitch and move, one hand coming up, then another, Our legs bend, Our head moves side to side, then around in a circle. It’s like a the warm up of a puppet master, seeing which strings pull which limbs, or maybe more like a driver testing out the controls and motions of a new car. Our motions become smoother and more controlled, and We sit up. He clears Our throat a few times, then says a few “mi, mi, mi, mis” like a singer preparing to go onstage. Everyone waits silently, except for the shouting incorporeal Frenchman who still can’t see what’s happening. Their expressions are blends of horror and fascination, depending on their personality.
    We push awkwardly to our feet, and the Sarge scrambles back and to her own feet in such an uncharacteristic manner that under other circumstances I would find it funny. But I wouldn’t laugh now, even if I could. I’m too busy shoving against the hot, swollen foreignness that fills my body. It squishes in my mental fingers like some formless sponge, swelling to fill every available space, pushing me back, back into a tiny corner of my mind. I am nothing but a watcher, a prisoner in my own body. Merely an existence, trapped until he chooses to let me go. If he can let me go.
    I don’t hyperventilate, but only because it requires lungs.
    “Sergeant Reinhart,” We say formally to the Sarge, tilting Our head. The words are stiff and deeper than if had I said them. He clears Our throat and wiggles Our jaw. When he speaks again it sounds more natural – more like me. “I believe we had better begin our experiments.”
    “Yes,” the Sarge agrees, still studying my face. Then she seems to snap back into herself. “Yes, of course.” She turns and addresses the crowd. “Move back. Give her – him – them some room.” People shuffle back to their spaces behind the table, clearing room for Us to work. My body is still moving, jogging in place, then bouncing on the balls of Our feet, as Graff refines his control, and… I sense something from the Wrongness. Just a hint of a feeling, like catching a scent in the wind – of delight . I press my – existence, is the only way I can describe it – against the intruding pressure, following the “smell”, and it grows stronger.
    He’s enjoying the possession. His body is old, worn down. Even at his peak, he never had the strength, the vitality that I do. For him, possessing me is like climbing out of a battered hoopty into a souped-up Maserati. He’d forgotten what it was like to move without pain, in joints still protected by