A Collection of Ideas and Writings

Author's Note: Use any and all of this stuff however you'd like - I always appreciate credit, but by no measure is it something I expect.
At the time of writing I've been listening to a lot of CreepCast (hosted by Wendigoon and MeatCanyon), and I've found that making something and putting it out into the world for others to enjoy at no cost is far more satisfying and fulfilling than having to worry about tying it all to one's livelihood. 
I tend to pick up and drop stories at random intervals, never really "finishing" them unless I see much reason or I have a sudden inspiration to come back to it, so all the more reason for the reader to find these ideas and do whatever they like with them.
Sometimes these ideas are related - sometimes not - but read it how ever you like. I'm not your dad.

Text like this indicates violent and/or graphic content that can be triggering to some.

Text like this indicates that I think the text could be better, or could be removed entirely.

Beginnings

Through all of the miles and acres of death and blood and war and carnage and horror, human beings still persist, yet there is always some other tragedy, some other kind of pain we must bear witness to.

Artificial Intelligence is growing in size and strength and becoming a greater and more significant aspect to the human life - once it was considered impossible, but now we have seen the mere existence of it blow open the doors to the government's vaults and steal billions upon billions of dollars that have yet to be found, even years after the fall of our Bloody Empire.

Plagues ravage the land, our homes are destroyed and razed by clashes of impossible expressions of life that grasps at the throat of man, snuffing out life wherever it can be found.

The wealthiest and most powerful of us are able to skip over the most base and absolute step in life, and yet we are unable to even alter our genes to save ourselves. 

Do not mention to me how the Doomed Stars shine down upon our faces as we gaze up at them, all this despite the darkening of the skies.

Our triumphs and failures pale in comparison to the questions that remain unanswered.

A comedy.

That's what this is, a comedy.

See what I have seen, for you will feel what I have realized.

2 Samuel 12

And I heard, as it were, a voice of thunder, saying "Come and see", and I saw.

And I heard the names of the demons given by God in Heaven, and the tasks of which they were given.

"You will speak amongst yourselves and come to an amicable conclusion, and all will be as you say. I shall neither assist nor hinder, as my body grows weak, but know that I shall be the one to bring an End to Rules and All Things Considered. Furthermore, I have several statements for Laws which shall be followed:

"Sin- you shall drag down the best of the fools in this place, for you will be the axis by which all Atrocities are measured - both Just and Unjust.

"Finance- you will be the Bank, the King of Measurements, the Binding of Trade. Your hands will be Golden and your Words shall be thought of as Law, in the same vein as mine shall be when it is viewed by the likes of Humanity.

"Mind- you are the Memory, your Perceptions and Knowledge are Loved and Holy, you are Loved, as you are Reason itself.

"Chaos- you are War and Atrocity incarnate, your Cycles of Birth and Death annihilate and Recreate at will, Life and Death are toys of which you may tamper, for you are Decay and the Impossible of the Universe. Creation, your son, shall bear the cross of Christ and will be all the better for it."

It paused, seeing me, but continued.

"These rules I have put in place may be broken - forcibly, or by the act of Chaos. I have no power to stop any of this, but there is a limit to these acts. Even I, the Sleeper, may awaken, if they are broken without end. I advise that each of you watch the other, for my waking will be the End of Things. Now go, my children, and damn Humanity to the blackest abyss."

Reflections

So you see, the thing which we call life is a comedy - it is by an act of God that we exist, and God is a cruel, yet uncaring terror of horrible proportions.

The creation of the things such as Eden and Adam and Lilith were merely by-products - an offspring of Chaos itself.

Chaos is symbolized by the Great Worm - devouring and destroying, it's maw being a place of purification, but also a place of annihilation and total destruction. This is the state of the Universe. It is what enables births and deaths of our sons and daughters, it is what permits us to accept the difficulties and horrors of the Universe, for it will make us close to Him.

Mind is symbolized by the color Blue, sometimes referred to as Azul, or Lapiz in the Dead Worlds. The existence of it is an abomination, but it is that which brings us light, so we are not to deny it's grasp on our lives.

Finance is the atrocity by which all other atrocities are measured - there is no other nightmare or demon that stands above him, as he is the one to bind and restrict us to life. We fear him, yet we love him. He cannot be denied, refused, or pushed away. We must be brave amidst it's presence, for it will break all of us down and turn us back to animals. Holy is he, praise be to Finance. May my body be holy enough to whisper your name without your scorn being delivered upon me.

Sin is the agony of the flesh - all of us are bound by it, restricted and contorted by it, but it also brings us Good and it is said that it will bring Humankind to a greater Eden. It will not.

These abominable horrors have brought an incredible number of nightmares and tragedies into our lives, as we all would have remained in that eternal, timeless place.

Miscellaneous bits

The sky erupted in a series of noise and fire. Gore and brimstone rained down with all of the fury and blood one might imagine the King James bibles spoke of.

I'll be the one to have the last laugh, but by no means will I laugh the loudest. I will be the one to grin up at the Yellow King as he blinds me, but I'll be the one laughing as the world is pulled down.

There is an incredible darkness inside each of us that cannot be killed, quenched, quelled, or destroyed.

I was there to bury myself in teeth and bone.

I Am Becoming A Worse Person With Each Passing Day

Every second is tearing away a little piece of me, of my character, of my memories and talents and things that make me what I am, and slowly I am being made into a version of myself that will make me unrecognizable to everyone around me, and slowly, eventually, gradually, it will make me unrecognizable to even myself.

I am becoming the person I hate, and it is all thanks to me, myself, and the grave I chose to dig and chose to bury myself in, even now.

I am being ground down by my time and thoughts and interactions with this "other", and like cheese on a grater, I am being sheared and stripped off for the benefit of this "other".

I am becoming a worse person, and I continue to live both out of spite for other beings, and spite for them.

I live because I both hate them and because I love them.

I am living in an age of horror, just as we always have, and Hell is here.

We're never getting out of here, even when we die, we're just gonna be stuck in this place, repeating these days.

Forever.

Run, sinner.

Run.

Israel - The Land of Only Milk and Honey

All men are sinners - there are no (chosen/saved); But you will all be brought into Heaven, though it will be your Hell.

That which brought you joy and boundless summer will become ash; your hopes and dreams will turn into fears and terrors; your endless sky will be an unending night; your warmths and fires will burn and scorch you; the endless days will be an atrocity amidst a ceaseless apocalypse.

The world will be witness to a Winter of the Wilds; beasts and plague shall stalk and hunt in the Moonless Night, while those given my gift shall hunger and grieve, for theirs is a long and feastless strife. Your bodies are now bound to this place, neither my prophets nor my children shall be spared an ounce of the pain that they brought upon themselves.

Out There 

Lambert had been itching to use the restroom for several minutes, now. Despite the nagging insistence in the back of his head that he should remain listening to the static, he knew at some point that his ability to "hold on for just a bit longer" was going to run out, and he also knew that it was going to give out very soon. 

Regardless of how much he chewed the inside of his mouth and pressed his white-knuckled fists against his desk, and no matter how much he tried to keep the words of "dry, crusty bread in the  desert" running through his head, he knew that any moment now his will would break, and his mental fortitude to keep listening to the white noise of the damned satellite would faulter for a fraction of a second, and then he'd be sprinting down the stairs as fast as he possibly could, he would rush through the empty halls underground, and find a bathroom (or frankly, any kind of sink, at this point) to relieve himself.

But he knew that once he did that, he'd miss out on what he'd been hoping for this entire time.

So he waited for one more moment. 

One more. 

Just one. 

Come on. 

Just one little sound. 

<i>Anything.</i> 

But it didn't make a single distinguishable noise. 

Not one that made any difference.

Several more moments passed.

"Damn it!" He grunted to himself as he threw himself towards the door and ripped it open.

Surprisingly, the metal hinges didn't instantly come loose from the speed at which it slammed into the concrete as he whipped through the open path.

As he ran down the stairs and (finally) got to the bathroom just in time, he imagined all of the things that might come through the radio.

Sounds of aliens garbling indecipherable languages, or robots sending impossible equations, or declarations of war against a foreign nation, all possibilities tumbled and tossed through his mind.

Although for different reasons now, Lambert sprinted back to his post just as quickly as he'd left it - he knew something had to have made a noise, some kind of being out there had to have made contact in the few minutes he'd been away from the headphones connected to the satellites that listened so closely to the sounds of space.

The commute to and from the bathroom was probably the worst part about this job.

He managed the feelings of isolation, he could choke down the bland healthy food the government supplied him with, and even the scorching heat of the sun outside was something not impossible for him to eventually get used to - but leaving the post unguarded was something he would not ever in a million years be capable of mentally coping with.

The pay wasn't great, he'd been separated from what few friends he'd had back in the city, the coffee was more like some kind of greasy watery paste, plus there were numerous other things he hated, but the job of listening to the sounds of space interested him massively.

Most of the time he was - like now - listening to complete static and nothing of any real interest, but occasionally he'd pick up some strange warbling and hit the record button, then later go on to do some basic calculations, clean up the sounds, and find that it was some noises from a distant planet.

It was interesting stuff.

He was starting to get pretty good, by his own estimations.

With a little of digging into the websites the government specifically allowed him access to, he discovered that he apparently could identify the types of bodies the noises originated from.

Not only that, but the sizes, the atmospheres, and he eventually might even find out what some of the materials they're made out of, as well.

It fascinated him immensely, but also was aware that he couldn't let himself get too pulled into that, as it'd distract him from actually finding more things to listen to - the main point of the job.

He'd only been on this for a couple weeks, now.

He'd gotten training for MONTHS beforehand, all sorts of psychological evaluations and tests and exams and he had to spend massive amounts of time on huge equations to prove he was the guy for the job - they weren't gonna let anybody do such a massively complicated job, so he'd go along with all these things, giving it his best shot and working on whatever they gave him, doing the tasks at hand as best he could, fixing any errors, the whole shebang.

Because he wanted this job, real bad.

He knew he wanted to listen to these sounds, so he learned the equations and studied and became a fucking <i>genius</i> at them.

He knew all of them like the back of his hand, he could do the highest and the most complicated stuff in his sleep and not even notice.

And here he was, listening to static.

It excited him, but also frustrated him to hear it.

The static was probably the least inte-

Wait.

He paused, then played the static back.

What was that?

Something was there.

That sounded like something.

He spent several minutes fiddling with the dials, trying to focus the satellites to the specific spot, everything had to be right, recording the data, detailing the date and time, how loud was it, for how long, what frequency, the details had to be <i>exact</i>.

It was right on, soon enough it was just close enough, it was almost perfect.

Then he heard something distinguishable.

"...eat... ...Lak... in..."

Holy shit, that was a human voice.

His heart immediately began racing, that couldn't have been a voice.

He fiddled with the dials, now more excited than ever.

A voice? 

A human voice?

English?

His mind was barely keeping up with his body, he stumbled through all of the actions he should've known more than well by now, but his hands were shaking.

A <i>human</i> voice?

How?

There it was again, clearer this time.

"...ake is not org..."

His breath was getting shallow, but he had to focus. 

Focus.

What frequency?

How many hertz?

Play that last part back again, what did he say?

"...Lake..."

It sounds like he said 'lake'? 

Did he say 'lake'?

Maybe something rhymed with lake?

The distortion was too heavy, he'd have to make a copy try to de-noise it, but the fact he - someone who was apparently "not physically nor psychologically fit for active duty in any government field", according to a number of military and government agencies - was able to find something that was so uniquely and undeniably a product of his skill and time just goes to show how clearly mentally stable he is.

Someone that's insane wouldn't dedicate years - if not decades - of their life to spite someone that'd denied them an incredibly promising job opportunity, would they?

'Surely not,' he'd thought to himself as he'd fall asleep the following night.

Murder in the Fifth

The existence of the knife would go on to haunt Vice Chairman Lorenz for the rest of his life - he had constant visions of the runes burned into the hilt, had reminders of the blade that he'd buried into Doctor Abbots' chest, the stench of blood on him as he slammed it into the man's increasingly red organ-case, and recalled the expressions on the faces of the people in attendance.

While in the Vice Chairman's mind he attempted to shut out the things he had done, his personal relations did not.

His wife and older child disavowed his actions, calling his deeds "reprehensible" and "completely unwarranted" to the press. 

Both his children and wife would leave his estate; the younger son, Ishmael, would stay with his mother and grow up to prepare for a lifetime of tales concerning his father's terrible deeds, while the older son, Matthew, went off to college and become a geneticist, eventually transferring to the University of Washington in the United States, becoming well-known for his work in the field. 

The mother would go on to care for and continue to raise Ishmael while also working for print media in her own residence in Bristol, England.

As mentioned previously, Vice Chairman Lorenz would be forever tormented by the weapon he'd killed another person with - which was about three months.

On the night of June 18th, 1946, the Chairman's body would be found mangled, burned, and ripped apart in his own estate, with no clues as to who could have done something so violent, nor how.

The Chairman had gained many enemies throughout his life, especially after the murder of the late Doctor, but it was completely unknown how his body could have been so severely damaged without leaving any trace of attack on the surrounding furniture - the only proof the body was there were  bloodstains on the carpet and floorboards.

There were no bloodstains on the walls, no furniture was knocked over, no scorchmarks anywhere in sight - however, seven days after the discovery of his body, the potential crime scene was discovered - 132 miles away, in the town of Truro.

A husband and wife (both of whom requested their names be expunged from the public record) came home to their house on the night the 18th to find a horrific scene, to which they immediately called authorities.

Ticktock Man Said

The scorching heat of the coffee was soothing as it flowed into his mouth, though his body failed to properly register the temperatures when there was such a large amount of coilite in his system.

He didn't care for the feeling of the clothes on his skin, didn't appreciate the sensation of the harsh metal chairs he'd sit in while in his office, and found the numbness of the dumbing chemicals to be a great relief when he woke up in the morning.

The temperature of the coffee was simply to keep him awake, and the taste of it also helped with his consciousness.

From time to time he had to be shocked awake by the Overseer of the current project, but his efficacy couldn't be denied - he was, after all, the cruelest producer in this part of the grid.

His death rates of employees was far beyond everyone else, and that spurned the other employees under him to perform even better.

The contradictory state of things was what kept the entire grid-system running, as if it broke down, then all would be well and good, but if it continued, then it would only mean expenses on the part of The Company's Investors, even though the expenses what kept it running, having it shut down wouldn't mean unemployment, it would mean more job opportunities.

The Last Child of the Congo

An entire mile, a nearly lifeless pile of half-starved dogs.

The rot from the mostly deceased corpses failed to keep it from slowly clambering northward, however, only slowing it down.

The few animals foolish enough to assume they'd found a simple meal were quick to find that the near motionless pile was more than eager to assimilate them into itself - whether by slowly dragging them back via fleshy, sticky tendrils, or by the lightning-like speed of one of the jaws of the beasts it'd devoured previously, it made little difference to the flesh.

It would either be made into energy for the whole, digested and devoured, or it would be reincorporated into itself, the tendons, blood, cartilage, and bone would be another vector that it would spread itself.

Scientists that would study this particular strain of the Conglomerate and find that it was contradictory.

Most living things store energy in some form or fashion - for example, the average human body typically stores reserves of the most useful resources in fat cells, and to a certain extent, the same concept is applicable to the being at hand.

In a way, this being "ranks" each part of an animal to be more or less useful, however, what is a one "part" of an animal? 

Where does one organ begin and one end?

In truth, all beings - all things - are one small reflection of the whole, the human mind is the things that simply categorizes the "things" it experiences.

So, with this in mind, the entire "thing" that is being described here is not a separate entity from the world around it, in the same way that a single atom of water both is and is not separate from the ocean around it.

Becoming Unperson

<p>His face was expressionless, but in the reflection of his eyes, I saw my own, and I saw fear thrown back at me. That was when I knew that I've slowly become less and less human with each passing day. That program was breaking me down, inch by inch, then cell by cell, all down to the atoms that make up my body. I'm changing into something else, and soon it'll begin impacting my mind. Eventually people will start to notice, they'll see it in my face and composure. I'll be a stranger wearing a complete stranger's skin.</p>

A double-agent with no goals and no loyalties. A no-sided coin. The opposite of a human being. An unperson.

Questions about my being flooded into my mind, and as I descended the ladder to the ground floor, I made a decision.

"After I have fully removed me from myself, I will make more of these," I thought to myself. "If I can make one, I can make <i>more</i>. I want to <i>learn</i> more. I want the world in my hands." My hands flexed as I walked, and I did not care that it was not me who did it. I failed to notice how I was dissociating for a moment - then I found myself back in my body once more, but my transformation gave me access to disconnect my mind from my body. 

I would practice this again tonight as I fell asleep.

My body and brain remained there to perform the actions required, but my mind was somewhere else. A second me smiled as I fell asleep, they knew this was meanwhile my consciousness wandered the planes of the earth, seeing the sights it offered where my mind chose to look - it was outside of space, and outside of time.

From 'Incatalahan'

For the past seven months, I've been receiving mail that is from a place only listed as 'Incatalahan'. That's it. No name as to who it's for, no city or street or zip code or anything. The only other identifying things on the letters are the postage stamps, which strangely enough, are apparently ranging from the years of 1917 to 1940. 

Some of the dates are explicitly on the stamps, such as the third letter I received, which is from 1928, but other times they have no date or identifiable mark, such as in the case of the fifth letter, which I recently discovered through sheer luck to be originally from 1918.

But anyway, I have repeatedly contacted the US Postal Service, and every time I ask, they've denied that they sent or received any packages from such a place.

I have spent several hundred dollars and trying to find out who is putting these boxes in my mailbox, but it is driving me up the wall.

I specifically dislike opening other people's mail - not only is it a crime, but it is something that just irks me, as going through another person's things feels particularly violating, but I've spent so much time and effort and energy and money and resources that I am sick of having to wonder what could POSSIBLY be in these boxes.

So, today I am doing it.

I'm finally opening the nine letters that I've been storing for whoever is supposed to actually receive these.

In This Place

In the belly of the beast, I was there, waiting.

Just simply waiting for hours, listening to it moving and grumbling.

I tried to remain calm, to keep myself from panicking at such a dire state, but my ability to remain as such was fading the longer time went on.

I closed my eyes and clenched my fists, then counted my breathing.

1-2-3-4, in through the nose, 1-2-3-4, out through the mouth, 1-2-3-4.

I did this ritual several times, and relaxed a little bit more every time I completed a cycle.

I started my fourth set when I heard it - it was a tinny, ringing noise that slowly increased in irritating volume inside of my mind.

This terrible ache in the back of my mind always started quiet and barely audible, then grew louder and louder over a matter of minutes. 

The ringing always got more vicious and wild, as if it was a bell connected to the neck of an animal as panic sets in, jangling and rattling more and more as the concept of death loomed over it.

"Like you," Something said to me. "Waiting like a sheep to be slaughtered."

My face curled into one of disgust as I pushed myself to myself off of the stinking insides of what swallowed me, and internally I shoved down my thoughts as I plugged my ears, even though I knew that this wouldn't protect me from the overbearing clanging inside of my head.

As I continued my breathing repetitions, I gave up on trying to block out the noise, and instead tried to brush off the filth and slime that had gathered on my clothes, but the stench and heat of this monster was so pungent and overbearing that anything I did to try to resist the filthy insides of this thing was in practically in vain.

As the noise reached it's peak, the feeling of relief began to flow through me as the grasp of the thundering in my head left me to gather myself and prepare to depart. 

As it became quieter and fainter, I had been preparing mentally for the scene that awaited me on the other side.

I envisioned an endless field of green, the massive treetops in the distance covered the sky, protecting me from the light of the day, the strong earthy smell bathed my body and filled my lungs and nostrils as I walked, shoes lightly pressing into the dirt and grass beneath me.

I knew this idea was unrealistic, it was a utopia in an endless sea of horror and boredom.

Yet it was what pushed me forward in times like these, where my depression and anxiety hit hardest.

When I was looking forward to ending it all, to finally getting to see an absolute paradise of tranquility and a clear, unburdened mind after all this time and work I've put in.

It was the thing that pushed me forward, to exit this thing and find an endless forest of greens and browns and light and life and the sounds of birds and bugs and living, breathing things that I could admire and love and adore for an endless eternity of bliss.

What I found instead was a grey, parking garage - a concrete wasteland without even any kind of cars.

Uninterested in my surroundings, I instead turned to see my transport. 

The thing that had apparently grabbed me looked to be a giant, winding snake, the scales on it looked to be all shades of different whites and blues and were some kind of metal or glass-like material.

"Hm," I responded. "Thanks for the ride," my voice trailed off as the space it inhabited folded back into itself and everything snapped back into place. "I guess." I said reluctantly to myself.

These giant things especially liked to make it so that one couldn't follow them through the paths that were created in their wake, for whatever unknowable reason.

As I began to consider my options, the usual droning ache after a long reality transfer sank into my head, and I could hear the blood in my head audibly pounding against my skull.

The pain was bad enough that I immediately sank to my hands and knees and clutched my head, trying to make the agony stop.

It felt as though someone had smashed a metal object against the back of my head, and the blunt impact was sending endless arcing electricity through my spine, sending out hot plasma for my body to be impaled on.

I laid there, on the ground, in an empty, unused, abandoned garage, groaning and twisting my body in this concrete wasteland for what felt like hours.

With my time in this place, I'd learned not to trust my senses when it came to time. Days felt like hours, hours felt like minutes, and seconds felt like decades - and the same applied in the opposite direction as well. 

At one point I'd thought I could count the seconds internally, like in that one war book, by that Dalton or Trumbo, or whatever his name was.

Unfortunately for me, I am not lucky enough to be able to keep track of time in the way he described.

I count the seconds, but eventually my minutes grow or shrink in number, and I begin questioning if it was actually an hour that had passed or if it was close to an hour, and then everything slowly unravels, and I'm right back where I started.

I'd also attempted to keep track of where I was by marking out where I'd been somehow.

Eventually, however, even that was used against me, as I'd found other markings just like mine in places I knew I hadn't been, and I have been in this place for long enough that I knew there wasn't anyone around to do this - so either it was the place itself that was somehow adapting my changes in the environment into it's own design, or it was... something... else.

As the pain subsided, I regained consciousness, finding myself in this place once more.

I was exhausted.

My mouth was parched, and my whole body ached.

As I sat up and examined my surroundings, I quickly recognized that I was somewhere entirely different - I was still in the parking garage, but not where the giant snake-beast had left me.

Instead, I was near an elevator, where earlier I was in a corner, underneath a burnt out light.

While this didn't necessarily mean anything, I found it to be strange - especially since I'd been here for how long, and hadn't ever passed out or fallen asleep, and that's what happens?

Then I scoffed at myself, realizing my situation was already ridiculous as it was, I didn't need to be worried about whatever that was.

"Yeah, I'm sure that's the biggest worry you have right now," I said aloud mockingly to myself, my voice barely echoing off of the concrete.

"Sleep demons," I laughed, the idea springing to my mind as I stood.

"Now that might actually be a nice change of pace," I chuckled and smiled as I began to walk the length of the area I was in, observing the architecture and taking in the details of such a place.

I'd internally noted that it smelled like concrete, but especially freshly laid concrete, like on a construction site. 

It was overwhelming, but I'd only really noticed it once I had awoken from my black-out.

Weird Experience

"Don't worry about it," He says as he grabs the last item in my cart and scans it, then places it into an open plastic bag.

"Worrying just makes it hungry," He taps on the keyboard in front of him as I attempt to process what he's saying.

I blink several times, not entirely sure what he just said to me. I ask, "Excuse me?"  

"Cash or card?" He lifts his head up and responds, pointing to the card scanner.

I pull my credit card out and insert it into the slot.

"I- uh, c-credit," I stutter as I look down at the machine, insert my information while the cashier places the groceries in my cart.

"Thank you, have a nice day," He announces dejectedly to no-one in particular, his eyes dark pits, lacking any kind of emotion or connection to the things around him.

"Next customer to aisle 7," The overhead announces, subtlety indicating to me to leave.

I turn to leave and push the cart of groceries with me to my car, where I put all of them in as I think about what he said.

My face twists into one of confusion as I start the car, and sit there in the parking lot to ponder his words; "Worrying just makes it hungry," the scrawnily-built 18-year-old echoed to me in my ears, the glasses on his face barely reflecting back the dim light of the screen as I stare at his blank and  expressionless face.

I sigh and swallow the feeling of unease as I return back to the real world, then proceed to put the car in park and go back to my home, back to my flat; my own little piece of limbo.

As I open the door, an eternity of pitch black silence greets me.

I search along the wall for the light switch and hit it, but not before a snapshot of an image appears and disappears as quickly as it came, alongside a flood of emotions and thoughts and feelings, all crashing against my mind as I am carried along with them, not sure what to make of it.

Interrogation

"I was trying to help," I coughed and spat on the ground below me, expecting to to see clear spit, but instead found the source of the sudden taste of iron - blood.

It was thick and viscous, and I coughed again.

"Yeah, well if you wanted to help, you should've stayed away," She said as she turned away from me. "A stranger with a gun and a very obvious god complex typically makes people panic - especially if they're wearing a badge."

I groaned and held my held my head, I could feel another wave of a headache preparing to crash into my brain like waves against a shore.

"What are you talking about?" I asked, the dull pain in the back of my skull reduced to a slow tapping.

She scoffed and turned back to me, disgust evident on her face.

"Why would somebody with a weapon help things?" Her eyes studied mine, my facial expression repeating what I'd asked, inspiring her to roll her eyes, kneel down to me, and put her face right up to mine.

"What do you think the purpose of the police is?" She asked simply, then waited for my response.

I searched in my mind for a response.

'Was this really the time to have a philosophical discussion?' I'd thought to myself, the tapping grew slightly more heavy while I tried to stutter out a coherent jumble of words.

"To- to protect and s-serve," I quoted, the words scrawled everywhere in my station, at the entrance of the building, printed on every document, painted on the side of every police car,  everybody knew the words and heard them from everywhere, all day and night - it was something we couldn't get away from.

She stood back up, put her hands to the sides of her head as she closed her eyes and spoke. "Do you believe that?" Her words came out frustrated and shaky, as if I'd said something wrong.

I looked up at her, questioningly.

"Of course I do," I whispered back. "I'm a fucking cop."

She scoffed again, her right hand rubbed her chin, then turned towards the window and moved take her place back in her seat.

She sighed deeply and looked at me; it was unclear to me how she would proceed with current events, and I imagined she'd just have me tortured for information or killed.

"How long?" Her eyes met mine as she asked the question, then clarified. "How long have you been a cop for?"

I sat there on my stomach for a moment before I moved to sit back.

One of the people to the side of me shifted uncomfortably as I did, "Don't move," He grunted out to me.

The girl shot him a look of anger. "Shut the fuck up, Dennis. You're lucky to even be here," She spoke his name with dislike, surprisingly enough to me.

"Matter of fact, get him a chair," She nodded toward the pile of cheap, folded up chairs in the corner. "And don't open your filthy mouth again unless I tell you to." Her gaze was locked onto him as he did what she said, avoiding her bladed-look all the while.

The other person helped me up and carried me over to where this Dennis had placed the chair, closer to the desk, and closer to her, further into the room than I'd been dropped.

"How long have you been a cop for?" She repeated as she moved her emerald eyes towards me, her expression changing from that of irritation to instead, one that was less harsh, as though I was being interviewed for a job, and not basically interrogated.

I'd not really ever given it that much thought, but I suppose the time had gone by quicker than I'd presumed it had.

"Uhh... I guess about two or three years now," I found myself to be speaking more confidently as I sat upright, the thin, crappy cushion of the seat reminded me of those back in the police station, and made me feel less like I was going to be executed.

I looked her in the eye as I said it, my mouth set and my face hardened, but the second the words left my mouth, her expression changed into that of shock.

"Wait, how old are you?" Her green orbs narrowed as she spoke, suspicious of me.

"I'm 25," I replied, and her eyes immediately jumped to the guard on my left for confirmation or denial.

"Is that correct?" She asked him, and he replied with a curt nod. "Yes, ma'am. That's what his license says."

She pushed away from her desk and stared to the blank wall on her left, mouth agape as she gathered herself and stood, her hands visibly shaking.

 "So are you telling me," She looked me dead in the eye. "That you've never dealt with anything like this before?" She was close enough to me that I could smell the sweat coming off of her - the heat of the room made the perspiration from everyone more obvious.

I had to consider my options before I said anything.

If I chose wrongly, she might just have me beaten for information, or might just beat me for the hell of it - but I couldn't get a read on her, nor what was supposed to be happening here.

If I said "yes", that'd mean I'm admitting that I have no idea what I'm doing, contrary to what my Sergeant ordered me to. 

I've been through plenty of training for something like this, admittedly, but the real thing is, well, it's real.

It's a completely different set-up; rounds are live and information is hazy, everyone just has to sit and wait until there's a hostage negotiator on-site, but we're somewhere out in the boonies.

Nothing seems real until it happens.

If I said "no", however, they'd want to keep me here - they'd likely expect me to know what I'm doing when it comes to hostage negotiation, and I have nowhere near that level of experience, but I also know that this is something that could make or break my career.

A small voice in the back of my head nagged at me, despite my best attempts to ignore it.

"There will be casualties," It whispered to me. "When it's found you're a liar, corpses will be piled sky-high."

I knew it was right, but to support my family, to support my friends, and even the people in this county, I had to say that I had.

With the pounding of the headache inside of my skull returning, it felt like my brain was being torn in half.

No matter what I chose, I was dead.

Both options with terrible outcomes.

"Your lack of a response tells me that you haven't," She spoke, snapping me back to the current moment. "And it also tells me that you're trying to decide whether or not to lie about it," She frowned as she continued.

"I was hoping I could trust you to be one of the few cops I've had the displeasure of interacting with to actually be honest for once in your life, but I suppose not." She stood up straight and nodded to the door, which the two guards stood and began to move towards me.

"Wait," I grunted, but before I could resist, their hands were wrapped around my arms. "Wait a second!"

"Be quiet," She said as she shook her head, and added, "Tape him so he can't spew more pigshit." The one she called Dennis looped his arm through mine and with his now two free hands, found a roll of tape on his belt and plastered it over my mouth, forcing me to breathe through my nose.

She continued speaking as the other guard opened the door, though Dennis forced me to stand still and I listened.

"You're going to be placed with the rest of the civilians in the Cage and wait for us to wrap this up, then you're going to find out about whatever your pig-bosses decide to do," She replied as she sat back down in her chair, put her feet up on the desk, and gave the order to put me back in the cell. 

"Now get him out of here," she ordered, and they did.

They took me through the laboratory, down through several areas of beakers and whirring machines, things that made loud screeching sounds, things that made humming and clicking noises, things that glowed and blinked and flashed "DANGER" on the screens as several people in long, white coats attempted to manage the situation with guns pointed at their backs - they took me all the way down to the last floor.

They took me down to "the Cage", as she called it.

Aptly named, it was a giant freezer - there were more machines and glass vials, tubes of unknowable liquids and things with labels and without.

It was cold - not so dangerously cold that we could see our breath, but cold enough that everyone had to wear blankets and coats made for the winter season outside.

One of the guards went off to fetch me something heavier to wear, as I'd only had my light police jacket on, and I imagined that I would begin to experience symptoms of hypothermia within a matter of hours with it on.

Several of the hostages looked relieved to see me, while others looked like they were having some kind of panic attack like they were children, but I suppose it made sense considering the condition we were in.

'Even if they are a bunch of cowards,' I thought to myself as they sat me down in the corner. 

I noticed that I was the only person who hadn't been given a second layer.

"He's a cop," one of the civilians that hadn't been gagged next to me whispered as they slid the door closed, surprise evident on her face.

"So they know what's happening," Another one whispered back, sounding relieved.

"And they've doing nothing to get us out." One far off to my right grunted.

"Quiet," One of the more heavily bundled guards said loudly as his teeth chattered. "No t-talking."

We sat in silence for about a couple minutes before the giant door opened once more, and a scientist carrying several coats trailed by two guards walked over to me.

As one of the terrorists knelt down to cut my ties, the other pointed his weapon straight at my face, intentions clear.

The scientist helped me into the coat, then put on one herself, and the guards left us to wait in the freezing chamber for what felt like an eternity - I counted in my head.

Twenty minutes, forty, an hour, then two.

It kept on like this, just sitting and waiting for our asses to freeze off while my co-workers were warm and probably laughing at how I got stuck in here.

I rolled my eyes at the thought of it and we continued to wait.

Soon, the scientist that had helped me with my coat whispered to me.

"Any idea what they want?"

I shook my head and shrugged, why they'd go out of their way to hold up a lab in the middle of bumfuck nowhere had made me wonder, but I'd failed to come up with any reasons as to the significance of such a far-away place.

Science labs all over the world have plenty of research and technical mumbo-jumbo stuff, but unless the terrorists knew what they were doing, they were just wasting their time - and giving both the PD and suits from the government (whenever they'd get here, or if at all) a more than healthy paycheck for the trouble.

Snake Sirens

The horns of apocalypse overhead loomed.

I awoke in a black room, my senses gradually coming back to me as my consciousness came in. blinked and squinted in the dark. 

Immediately I noticed the bizarre scents that assailed my nostrils, alongside the damp humidity in wherever "here" was.

The best way I could describe the sort of sickly-sweet odor is that it was as though I was in a flourishing garden with rot and decay all around me.

The smell combined with the temperature immediately brought panic to the forefront of my mind.

"What the... what the fuck?!" I shouted, and grew aware that it felt like I was tied down to what felt like some kind of metal table, my wrists were locked in place by some sort of bindings, and began pulling against what felt like leather straps, but stopped when I heard what sounded like pots and pans being knocked over in a distant room.

Then as I began to focus on it, it sounded like there was a consistent scraping noise, as if someone was dragging a giant piece of metal against some kind of tiled floor.

This only enhanced the rising panic, and continued to struggle against my bindings as the noises grew closer.

I could feel the bindings on my right hand giving way slightly, but the left strap was completely deadset on my lower arm remaining in its place.

Then, the noises stopped, as if someone was listening for me, and I stopped struggling, hoping they would pass without stopping.

I sat there for a moment, in the pitch-black darkness, terrified.

It felt like the room itself was a giant beast with a thick layer of jet-black skin, threatening to devour me in my entirety.

I felt the pounding of my heart in my ears as what I assumed was a person waiting made some kind of groaning sound.

A set of doors banged open so violently and quickly that I was shocked back into action, instinctively knowing that this massive looming figure, with a bright and nearly blinding light behind it, was going to harm me.

It was so gargantuan that it had to lower it's head to enter the room.

As it did, the nauseatingly odorous stench that I had noticed before was overwhelmed by what felt like I was being punched in the nose by the overbearing smell of something akin to a drenched, sopping wet dog and... I could only describe it as what I assume smells like honey?

The odor was so pungent, I could practically taste the bile-inducing concoction of sweetened, honeyed wet fur on my tongue. 

I felt the swoosh of the titanic makeshift blade smash into the ground right next to me, barely missing me by just one or two inches.

Instinctively I covered my neck and lower jaw with my free hand, facing away from the impact as the terrible screeching noise of metal on metal nearly deafened me.

As I felt myself lurch and begin to struggle harder against the restraint than I had previously, now I was completely unconcerned if I had to break my hand to get out of the strap, one connecting swing of that thing's weapon was likely to instantly kill me, or at least it would result in a near-fatal blow, no matter where I was hit.

I felt the hand bend and the strap bit into my skin and I could feel it cutting the skin open with blood pouring out and I screamed out of sheer terror and frustration and I felt it finally give, and I pulled my hand out and despite the adrenaline coursing through my body, the screaming agony of open air against my hand was enough to alert me to the sound of scraping metal from the giant behind me.

I turned to look back, and just in time to see it pulling the huge piece of metal out of the bed.

Without thinking, I fell to my side and tried to roll away from it as far as I could.

Thankfully it had swung in such a way that my being on the ground just barely saved me, but I also knew that I couldn't risk trying to out-maneuver something with such impossible strength compared to me, and as the axe slammed into something and more sounds of metal on metal reverberated throughout the room, I pushed myself towards the door and looked back.

The light that streamed from the other room just barely fell onto the behemoth that was now attempting to pull the axe out from something it had just smashed into.

The light fell on the body so that could I definitively make out bizarre chunks and strips of fur that stretched in unusual and abnormal patterns.

Further towards the upper portion of the body - which was much more difficult to make out in the dark - appeared to be covered in a sickly yellowish mold that was threatening to slough off the body.

Due to the immense size of this fur/mold covered beast, the face of this thing was covered so much in shadow that I could only make out outlines of the head which... didn't make sense for a normal person. 

From the side, it had an almost concaved shape toward the front of it's face, but before I could fully grasp what I was looking at, it turned it's head and in that moment, felt that I'd wasted plenty of time that I could've used to escape this thing.

I sprinted through the doors, and amidst what appeared to be a cafe of some sort, the more notable aspect was that the entire thing was teeming with greenery and bugs.

The light that overtook this entire scene was not man-made, instead it appeared that it was that of the sun itself.

It was impossibly bright - so much so that I tried to block it from my view with my bleeding hand.

As I ran through the doors, I nearly tripped and fell on roots.

Bizarre, but in  but I was able to make my way through the massive footsteps this thing had left in it's wake, which I had to jump to to keep from tripping on the vines under me.

---

The blind ones brought something with them.

Something inside of a box.

Something small, something which made a clamorous racket of noise.

Something of leather and teeth.

Those who would see it reported some kind of awareness concerning their mortality that hadn't been so obvious before then.

There were two primary types of people it left alive - sons with living mothers and husbands who still remained with their wives. 

All else were often found among the hordes of dead, though it was not unheard of for the occasional insomniac or "silent-type" to be found huddled somewhere dark in the trenches among the corpses, half-starved and fully-mad.

We only heard the reports of what happened to these survivors when we came back home-side.

---

"Lieutenant, do you know what a 'death jackal' is?" The child's expression was fully serious, and more fitting on an adult, rather than someone his age.

A moment of silence as the Lieutenant stared at the youngling, the high-pitched voice that came from such a frail, nearly skeletal body terrified him - the concept of a person, letalone a child, becoming so grotesque and starved made it difficult for him to focus on the question.

The Lieutenant swallowed his pride and answered. "No, I've never heard of such a thing."

The child's expression remained unchanged, unaffected by the response, but sat up slowly, unhooking his arms from the both of his shoulders, and stood, the loose, dirt-soiled clothing barely clung on to his limbs as he spoke.

"How many men have you under your leadership?" The strange almost alien thing narrowed it's eyes at his commanding officer as his face studied the older man's.

Another shorter - yet still obvious - moment of unspoken silence passed between them before he responded, as if he was placed in the middle of a minefield and trying to escape without triggering any of the metallic rewards underfoot.

"Approximately 15, what are you getting at?" His voice lowered as the child stood at nearly half his height, and had to look at almost a 

The boy sniffed, then clicked his tongue as his eyes wandered from man to man, almost like he could see into their lives and was measuring each of them to determine who was worthy to live and who would feed the trenchrats.

"I suspect that you and at least 3 of the men in your company will be dead by morning, Lieutenant," his eyes flicked from the rifles on their backs to their packs of supplies, to the boots on their feet. Their faces all turned into scowls as he finished speaking, quietly and slowly; "Unless you do as I advise."

The Lieutenant's hand grabbed the boy by the collar and lifted him off of his feet, and his words came out harsh and fast to silence the mumbles of the soldiers nearby; "You will follow my orders, Private." The group of soldiers mumbled in agreement, their dislike of the young boy's presumptuousness clear as the Lieutenant threw him onto the dirt.

Silent and expressionless, the child simply picked himself up off the ground, dusted off his pants, and his eyes rose to meet the man's and opened his mouth to say something, but stopped and closed it, apparently changing his mind.

Instead, he turned and began to walk away, before the Lieutenant shouted at him to fall in line, once again emphasizing the child's military rank.

He turned to look back at the Lieutenant and simply responded with a quiet phrase; "Rank has no value here."

The Lieutenant thought to pull out his pistol and threaten the boy to get him to fall in line, but decided against it; someone so small and frail would be more of a hinderance to him and his company, so both watched as the youth disappeared into the curving, winding trenches ahead.

As the night went on, the men gathered small twigs and dry brush that they could find, then threw it all into a pit that had been made by another collection of men, speaking about what might happen to the child as the night went on. 

Some thought that he'd inevitably fall into a German trap, or be poetically devoured by rats in his sleep, or even die of dehydration and starvation as the hours went on.

Before long, they each looked to bed for the night, and so they did.

As the last man stomped out the burning fire, one of the men (nicknamed "Tallboy" due to his  stature) came over to him to speak, but both went silent as they heard something cry out, distant, and far off in the cover of night.

"What was that?" The taller one whispered after a moment.

"Maybe a ca-yote," The other whispered back, his Southern drawl mangling the word "coyote".

Several seconds passed before they heard another, clearer this time. It sounded as though a human being was imitating the bark of a canine.

"That's no coyote, man," Tallboy readied his rifle as he spoke. "There's something ou-"

Before he could finish, something jumped out from behind the Southerner, slamming him into the ground as Tallboy spun and fired at the shape, but only managed to hit air while he called out to his squad.

Before he could reload, it was gone.

"Hey," Tallboy whispered to him, as he nudged his shoulder with his boot. "Get up."

Several moments passed as he circled in place, aiming at any stray noise, careful not to step on what he assumed was the now-deceased Southerner.

Afraid to call out to his squad once more, he waited with his eyes darting back and forth between  every dip in the earth and every slight raising of the terrain, fearing he might miss a potential giveaway of the enemy's next attack.

Gradually his arms grew weak, and he grew dizzy from spinning in place, spinning at every miniscule noise, every breeze of wind and every twig crack had him whipping his head and aiming his gun at every little noise in the encroaching darkness.

The darkness that was slowly choking him out, bit by bit, inch by inch as the darkening campfire went out.

Something shuffled to his right, and he immediately jumped to the ground as he fired, something which he hit, and remained still.

He could hear low but clear voices following somewhere behind the body he'd fired on somewhere on the ground.

Tallboy immediately began to reload his M-17, assuming the worst.

"Lenny?" One of the voices called out, the Lieutenant somewhere.

"Here! I'm here!" Tallboy responded, his voice hoarse as he fumbled with the receiver on his rifle, trying to put another bullet in the chamber, but the overwhelming darkness made it impossible for his fingers to find the latch to pull back the pin.

His fingers could only blindly stumble in the dark, and something in the back of his mind told him that if he'd not reload the rifle before his allies arrived, he'd surely be dead when they did.

See this link for another project I'm working on, or copy-and-paste it into your browser:

https://blog.spacehey.com/entry?id=1213427