Page 75 of Can you take it?

“How can you even say that?” Anna snapped. “Just because we’re women?”

“It’s not because you’re women! We’re just not used to not having this amount of strength,” I said, struggling with the same issue. The best I could do was knock Eletha’s curvy hips into the skeleton, gaining a few seconds of freedom before it caught up. “Why do you wear shoes like this? They are so impractical,”

I yelled at Eletha. “If I didn’t have these wobbly shoes, I could kick a rib out or something!”

“I can walk just fine in those shoes,” Eletha snapped back. “How do you focus when you’ve got your dick moving all over the place like this?”

“I know, right?” Anna called.

“What do you mean, moving around?” Walter asked, confused.

“I wear boxers,” I told Walter, who snorted with laughter. “It’s disgusting,” Eletha said.

Suddenly, Walter realized what was happening. “Hey, stop thinking about his penis!” he shouted while being spun in the air.

This continued for what felt like an eternity.

Panting, Anna called out, “I can’t dance anymore. I can’t do it.”

Hearing her distress triggered something primal in me. Typically, I’d try to cause the least harm. But now, I didn’t care. I didn’t care who I hurt or what the consequences were, as long as I got to her. The trouble was, in Eletha’s body, I struggled. My center of gravity was off, and every hit missed its mark. Somehow, I managed to knock my skeleton down long enough to run to Anna in Walter’s body and try to pull her free. As soon as I got close, I was snatched back by another skeleton.

“Fuck!” I shouted. “How do we stop this? How do we switch back?”

“If I could switch back, I could get out of here!” Walter snarled, and I believed him.

“Bexley, where are you? Do you know how to get out?” Silence.

Eletha, in my body, growled, sounding feral. “Stop touching me! You bony fuck!” she screamed.

I heard a snap and realized Eletha had broken one of the skeleton’s leg bones before it grabbed her again—this time around the throat.

“Ah, fuck! Why do you wear this?” Eletha complained, referring to the pendant around her neck after she knocked the skeleton’s arms off her neck.

“The pendant!” Anna in Walter’s body said and realization dawned on me.

“Oh shit,” I muttered. Eletha and I locked eyes.

“Hand me the pendant,” Anna called to her sister.

My heart dropped. This was it—Anna was going to get the pendant and all its powers. She’d take over the Underworld, and who knew if I would ever see her again?

Eletha let out a crack of laughter, obviously feeling victorious. “Come this way,” she said, taking the pendant off my body’s neck. I couldn’t do anything to stop her as the skeleton whipped me around while my worst nightmare unfolded.

I finally found my voice. “Eletha, please don’t. Anna, you can’t. We’re tied. If you get that, I’ll be tied to you forever.”

Anna’s expression faltered, like my words had slapped her. I realized how harsh they sounded. “That would be terrible, obviously.”

I watched as Eletha dangled the pendant, arm outstretched, and Anna snatched it from her.

My head hung in defeat. “Fuck,” I muttered feeling completely deflated.

Anna held the pendant with Walter’s hand but didn’t gloat. She seemed conflicted, running her fingers over it when the skeleton moved its hands from her waist back to her arms, knocking the pendant from her grip. “Shit!” Anna shouted.

It was a mad dash—everyone scrambled to grab it, but none of us could bend down enough. The skeletons’ feet smashed mindlessly over it. My stomach landed in my throat, worried they might trample and break it.

“Oh shit,” I heard Bexley call as he ran in from the dining room with a bottle of drink in his hand and a wheel of cheese in the other.

A large hooded creature, at least nine feet tall, in a black cloak, walked steadily after him. Bexley looked petrified.