I can't think of a decent title... A short story, dealing with insainty

This is a short story I wrote recently as an assignment, it's part of a series of short stories dealing with "Tyrozumen", a demon, and a man named Detective Clarke, this is sort of a prologue. It's not a very happy story, and if I add to the "storyline" of the short stories it won't be a very happy world.

The setting is strange, and it's all about the disillusion of sanity. As Clarke continues to discover more about the cult mentioned in this story, I'm planning to make it increasingly more wild and strange, dealing with matters of Heaven and Hell, other dimensions, unfathomably evil and powerful old Gods, in the spirit of Lovecraft country.

For you Grammar Nazis, this will piss you off, I'm terrible at editting, and I'm sorry to those readers who find my weird conventions hard to read, I'm trying to write this in character, and Clarke, well intelligent and well-spoken has a very muddled way of thought, (and by the end of these stories, it's be extremely muddled)

And now... The story I still can't properly name...

I apologize for the weirdness of the layout by the way, Jade's site just hates my guts.

I'm going to try and fix this first.

To Be
Titled





“So you’re saying that you
don’t believe in the Lord?” My partner asked cramming his ham and cheese
sandwich into his mouth as he finished his question, crumbs fell onto his beer
gut, and he grunted as he brushed them off explaining his wife would kill him
for muddling up her handiwork. I leaned back in the car seat, looking out from
my window across the nearby lake pondering his question. The early morning mist
spread out ominously across the reaches, obscuring the shore on the other end
of the lake. The question itself was easy, but I instead considered the
reaction of a God-fearing man if I were to openly discuss my almost atheist
ideas. I looked over to him, now finished his meal was placing a cigarette in
his lips looking at me waiting for an answer.





“I’m not sure what to believe
Bill.” I answered, returning to look outside the window. Out of the corner of
my eye, I could see Bill searching his coat pocket looking for a lighter for
his cigarette. Once he found his lighter, he gestured for me to continue my
thought. “I’m not entirely sure if the Church is right, but I don’t exactly
believe in God. Maybe in spirits, not God exactly.” I finished adjusting my
fedora, and rolling down the window of the car to allow the smoke to leave the
vehicle, Bill did similar.





“If I didn’t know any better
I’d figure you for one of them Buddhas coming from China and the rest of those
places. Buddhas believe in spirits right?” He asked while leaning his head out
the window and exhaling a breath of smoke.





“I ain’t a theologian Bill.” I
sarcastically replied.





“No kidding.” Before Bill
could continue our radio screeched to us, Bill having more experience than I
had with these new radios due to his time in the war, grabbed the receiver and
listened in to the dispatcher.





Her voice
was garbled, but it was possible to hear her speaking, “A blaze and disturbance
at 26 Lakeside road,”





Bill cut
her off, “Miss, isn’t that the fire departments job?”





“The fire
dispatcher is asking for police assistance with the locals, sir.”





“And
we’re on call? We're detectives, we ain't supposed to help the blues with
patrol.”





"You're closest to the area and
have one of the squad cars fitted with the radio," The woman said her tone
growing more even. Bill rolled his eyes and announced we would be on our way
and I started up the car.





“Least I finished my
sandwich,” Bill said while tossing out his cigarette, “Y’know, I heard of that
place, we’ve been getting calls there haven’t we?”





“Yeah, locals calling in on
strange noises, terrible smells and people disappearing, they blame it all on
some house on that road.” I answered, repeating what one of the younger patrolmen
had told me during a coffee break at the department.





“People disappearing? Probably
the damned woods around here.” Bill quipped while placing his grey hat on his
balding head. I turned down the road that would eventually intersect Lakeside,
and Bill cranked up the siren, and another siren could be heard in the
distance, likely already at the house, I thought.





It appeared my suspicion had been correct as we neared the
old house, as evidenced by the other police car sitting beside the fire engine.
The ‘blaze’ was out; Bill snidely joked about how it was likely an exaggerated
bonfire. Bill ceased the cranking of his siren, as we pulled up to a stop.





The house was an old colonial
house of particularly grand size, with an opulent front gate decorated with
bizarre gargoyles and graffiti. The masonry of the home and gate seemed
ancient, and sturdy, despite the fact the home had stood since the days of
colonial expansion. The door to the house was imposing and one of the officers
from the car stood with a firefighter discussing something. Above the windows
were either boarded up or cracked, and a kind of thick ivy grew up the side of
the otherwise unmarred home.





Bill and I stepped out into
the cold early morning air, the cool breeze of the lake biting through the
meager protection offered by my trench coat. The officer at the front seen us;
the firefighter waved us over.





“There was no damn fire just a
bunch of idiots threatening to start one.” The man cursed when Bill walked over
to him, “My boys and I aren’t needed here.”





“We’re through with questions.”
The officer said, ushering the sputtering firefighter towards his fire engine.
The firefighters were ready to be off in short order.





“Detective Clarke,” The
officer said offering a handshake, I took it and introduced Bill as well, “Glad
you two are here, my partner is questioning neighbors to see who called it in.
Looks like a nightly prank.”





“Why are you still here then?”
I asked the young man while I adjusted my collar to better ward of the night
air, Bill followed the firefighter pestering the man with more questions.





“Because the owner of the home
asked for us to leave,” The younger officer answered He said ‘I don’t trust no
grunts,’ his exact words to the two of us. So we stayed here waiting for
someone else to lend assistance. House gives me the creeps." Above the
door near one of the old cracked windows a shadow danced against the far wall,
shown by a lit candlelight. A faint sound of chanting could be heard above the
howling wind.





"Into the house then?"
Bill asked pointing towards the old door, I followed in behind him, the heavy
oak door swinging opened with an angry creek. The air within the place stank of
incense and rotting wood. My feet creeked on the floor as Bill announced our presense.
When no answer came I turned to the officer standing outside of the house.





"Where is the man of the
house?" I asked.





"Don't rightly know Detective.
He was down here not ten minutes before you arrived." The officer said,
his hand's inside of his pockets to ward off the chill of the increasingly loud
wind.





"Hello!" Bill called out
again, no answer once more. I shrugged my shoulders and tapped Bill's
shoulders.





"We're here to just check in
and see why there was a disturbance called, be it fire or whatever. We have
every right to have a look around." Bill nodded his agreement and we
continued into the old house, the wooden floors groaning in protest to Bill's
weight. The walls of the place were covered in strange paintings, Religious
imagery of some-kind. Blasphemous images of unknown beings and creatures, one
painting in particular was extremely horrific. A huge waste of red, like a sea
of blood, and sprouting from it long towers tipped with odd points and
irregular shapes, so bizzare that looking at it boggled the plain man's mind.
And the entrance hallways was lined with such pictures and murals. Along the
way Bill kept calling for the owners of the house. We apporached a grand
staircase, with the railings of rigid brass, symbols most foreign inscribed
along the length of it. The chanting that I had heard increased in volume as I
stepped on the first stair.

"It's the Police Department, we
just want to have a word about a 'Disturbance' of some kind!" Bill
hollered as he walked up the wood and metal staircase. The chanting quieted
down for the first time since we entered, but instead of the sound from above
us, I instead heard a faint more ominous chant from below, as if it was in the
cellar of the home, passing through the floorboards.





"Go away! We don't need
police!" Came the unexpected warning.





"We just have ourselves a few
questions!" I called out walking up the staircase towards the voice. At
the top of the stairs here was another hallway, this one with an old red and
black rug, knitted with more imagery akin to the kind I seen on the murals down
stairs. The hallway ended with a cracked window and a lit candle, where I had
seen the shadow earlier. The wall near the window had a huge red pentagram
painted on it, with an eye in the center of the upside down star.





Apparently Bill also seen the mural,
"Got ourselves some Devil worshippers." he mumbled, I could hear the
slightly angry tone in his voice. I on the other hand found myself throughly
fascinated by the strange shapes and pictures in the decor found within the
house.





"Vacate the premise!"
Someone called, this man's voice different and more high-pitched. The voice
though more high-pitched was a tad more threatening, "Just leave!"


"We haven't done anything
wrong!"





"Then come out and talk to
us." I said keeping my voice calm, hoping to dissuade the agitation of the
men, who's voices numbered in at least three. The chanting from below us seemed
to get louder by my ear, but still not very clear, or as loud as it was a while
ago. I seen a man walk out from behind the door, he was tall and lanky, his
arms covered in tattoos and scars. His hair was slicked back and greasy, his
eyes seemed to stare past us for a few seconds before returned to Bill and I.





"Go 'way strangers. We don't
want any trouble." He said, raising his cut hands up, revealing scars
under the wrists. He wore a plain overall and grey shirt, the shirt stained
brownish-red with old blood, he stank to high Hell as well, as if he handed
washed in days.





"Answer our questions,"
Bill demanded stepping closer to the strange man. The tall man took a step
back, placing his right hand under his coveralls, "Hey buddy! Relax."
Bill said, his hand likewise moving to the left side of his coat, where our
holsters were.





"We don't know about the
police," The man stated not moving his hand. I could hear footsteps below
us, and as I noticed them , the chanting got louder and louder. The man in
front of us winced as much as I as a certain word was uttered in the chant.
Bill seemed not to notice and took a step towards the man, trying to keep his
tone gentle. The man in front of us flinched as the chanting reached an almost
clear sound. The words I heard made no sense, but seemed to call to me. Bill
again seemed to not hear it.





"Bill, didya hear that?" I
asked quickly, trying to keep from wincing as the chanting rushed in my head,
filling my veins with a kind of confused gibbering pain. Bill looked at me out
of the corner of his eye, I was sweating badly, and the footsteps behind us got
louder, I turned to look behind us, the young officer walked up behind us, his
face pale white and a similar sweat on his face. The man in front of us
twitched his right hand out as the chanting got louder. Inside the right hand
was a pistol. The others in the room he walked out of stepped out also holding
weapons.





"Woah buddy!" The officer
behind us shouted, "keep calm." I likewise raised my hands to defuse
the situation. He levelled the handgun at us as the chanting raised in volume
once more. The other stood beside him, one clutching a double barreled shotgun
with hands that looked to be flayed of skin. Then the tall man fired the
pistol. Time moved quickly from there, I pulled myself back, hearing the
officer behind me shout out in pain, my right hand darting to my holster
pulling free my handgun, Bill returning fire as the two of us backpeddled. I
grabbed the officer and pulled him down the stairs with us, Bill firing two
more shots, hitting one of the men causing a gurgled yelp. Evidently the shot
was lethal.





We ran down the staircase, the
younger officer bleeding on my coat, calling out curses as he unholstered his
revolver. He was leaning under my arm, but kept trying to look behind us, as we
ran down the staircase's first flight of stairs. We hit the second flight, the
one at the ground floor, with Bill still firing another few shot at the men,
again causing one to scream out in pain. Above the shooting and shouting I
heard the chanting start to ebb down again, and footsteps below us on the
ground floor as well as shouting from the outside and distant sirens.





As we hit the ground floor I ran
with the officer to the front door. His partner ran up to the door, "I
called it in!" He yelled, grabbing his partner, how was bleeding very
badly and grunting with every step. I turned towards Bill, who was coming up
behind me, his back turned to us getting ready to fire at the men running down
the steps.





"Aw Hell!" Bill called
out, the slide of his handgun slipping opened revealing an empty clip. The man
with the shotgun leapt down the steps, coming to the inbetween section of the
overlapping stairs. He took aim and fired. I grabbed Bill and pulled him to the
door at our right, the officiers at the door fell back from the buckshot. Bill
yelped as some hit him in the leg, I pulled harder as we dove through the door.
I let Bill down and turned on my heel quick as I could, slamming the door shut.
The man fired once more. I opened the door and fired blindly. There was no
sound. I leaned my head around the door, gun leading. The man at the top of the
staircase was aiming instead of me, at the officers outside the door. I fired
one more shot, the bullet going slightly wide of the large man wielding the
double barreled weapon. He flinched and fired the shotgun. I pulled back, the
buckshot smashing into the wall behind where my head had been. I could hear the
man running back upstairs. Another man came running down the stairs. Lighter
steps, likely someone else from the upstairs rooms.

Bill hauled himself over to the door
and pulled it shut before he turned to me, "We ain't going through there.
Better find a backdoor or the basement cellar or something." Bill's skin
was pale, much like mine. Above his tired voice I could hear it the chanting,
calling me to below the house. My blood thundered and my mind rushed, the
chanting finding a firm grip in my mind. It was quieter than earlier, but loud
enough to keep itself heard.





"Bill, do yah here that damned
chanting?" I asked the cold sweat started again on my brow. Bill had
limped over and pulled the door shut already, and waved me to hush, he leaned
against the door listening to the movement outside. Evidently they were more
concerned with the officers and sirens in the distance just outside the front
door. I steeled myself against the chanting, now sounding a bit like man
discordant voices saying the same words. Bill waved me over to the door he now
faced, reloading his handgun with his spare magazine. His upper thigh bore a
blood stain of the buckshot grazing by, tearing out his slacks and flesh,
although the wound seemed to not bother him.





"Get a bookcase or something.
To brace the door I mean," His eyes went from his pistol to me, evidently
he could see the fright and paleness of my face, "C'mon man, get your head
out of the clouds. Ain't the first time we've been shot at."





"No it ain't Bill," I said
quickly looking around the room for some kind of furniture to brace against the
door. The room was in good shape like the entry hallway was, with lavish wood
panels and fine flooring. The fireplace in the far side of the large room was
made of a foreign green-black stone, with an otherworldly glow around said
stone. The room was lined with bookcases packed full of all kinds of thick old
books, most of which dealt with old occult manuscripts, some with names common
to our tongue, and some being barely pronounceable. The books seemed to deal with
blasphemous arcane magic that I felt myself instinctively lured too. The center
of the room had a beautiful solid oak table, with and near the strange
fireplace was a lectern, a heavy leather bound book with a pentagram similar to
the images in the paintings we'd seen throughout the home. In front of the
lecture were two rows of church pews. I turned back to Bill finishing my
thought, "The place just makes my head swim, can't you feel it?"





"I do, the paintings and the
books are strange, I'll give you that. But we've got people shootin' at us,
that's a bit more important than some damn books." Bill quieted and
motioned for me to do likewise. I had a look around the room, curious to check
the book at the far end of the room. Outside the door I could hear shouting,
the voices of the cultists, praising something they called only
"Dragon" before screaming insults at the police outside. I knew that
reinforcements would be here in nothing short of twenty minutes, but this house
was on the outskirts of the city and it was a slow night. Bill and I would be
in the house for quite a while if we couldn't find an exit. I felt an
instinctual joy at the thought of exploring the house, but a kind of deep dread
of the unknown. I told myself that it was only the fear of being shot at, but
the chanting below my feet assured me it was a deep fear of whatever the cult
had been up too. The men upstairs fired a few more shots at the officers
outside. I came back to reality and Bill was talking, "Y'know, forget the
backdoor, the windows are all boarded up mostly, but we can just pry 'em open
right? Just need a crowbar or a hammer. Hell, help me with the door here and we
can go grab ourselves a fire stoke from the place over there."





"Help me with the bookcase
then." I said, grabbing of the smallest of the book cases and giving the
old wood a mighty heave to start the pushing. The damn thing weighed a ton,
and as we moved it I could hear the grating of the wood, evidently the bookcase
had been in place for many, many years as heaps of dust fell on the brim of my
fedora. Eventually with much effort we managed to shift the thing to the door.
With a bit of effort on both our parts with pushed it as close against the door
as possible. Bill pointed to another and we walked over to move it as well.
This one was heavier, and a much thicker base, and was much more difficult to
get moving, several thick old tomes dropped from the shelf. Again with effort
Bill and I hauled to the brace the other in front of the door. Bill without
missing a beat leaned against the bookcase and pulled out a smoke from his coat
pocket. We both new the bookcases would be shifted with a few good running
shoves, and that we wouldn't have much time before the men blew the door
opened.





"Well, now we pry open a window
and gun outside, let the blues be heroes, I'm getting tired of being shot
at." Bill quipped striking a match for his cigarette, causing a half smile
to spread on my lips despite the near constant chanting. I walked around the
entirety of the room, half looking for something to get the solid planks of
wood covering the window out and half reading the names of the tomes.
Eventually I reached the strange green-black stone fireplace, decorated with an
opulent candles and strange silver symbols seeming to represent bizarre images
of whatever Gods were worshiped in this home. My mind whirled as the chanting
rose the closer I got the fireplace, it sounded to almost come out of it. The
fireplace itself was huge, with a man-sized opening for the flame, with no wood
in the fire pit and no mesh up to shield the room from sparks created. I
grabbed one of the stokes next to the fireplace and tossed it to Bill, who went
right to work with trying to pry boards off the window.





The lectern commanded my attention,
and the thick book sitting on it. The leather of the book was ancient and
decorated with runes I hadn't seen before despite my family's Pagan background.
The only letters were archaic and hand written, almost cut into the leather and
then embroidered with thick gold cloth. The title was something even now I have
trouble forgetting, for it was in a different language foreign to me, but in my
head I could understand it perfectly, "Compendix of Infinity". I
opened the thick leather bound book, my hands shaking, the skin white as fresh
snow. The book had been recently opened, and along the margin were english
translations and sermon notes. On the reverse of the cover read something that
boggles my mind. In plain English I could read the words "It Sleeps with
Souls of the Dead, Waking with the corpses of the Damned, Gods, Devils and
Angels meaningless mortals feeding endless Void, the Dragon" under the
writing was a crude drawing of an eye and little tendrilled beings with wings.
The Dragon was written in English, but it was obvious that it was a nickname
for something. The english translation of whatever God the book was devoted to
was written in bold script on the center of the page "Tyrozumen". The
name sounded foul to the tongue, it burned my mind and made my head swim. Now I
could understand part of the chanting I still heard coming from below me. A
chant to the return of whatever beast this was. I flipped pages, diagrams in
the manuscript showed images of men being strapped to some kind of alien
device, having their chests cut opened and blood emptied into a vessel of some
kind, and a summons, a calling towards the God. Runes and ancient script
pointed to the book being older than this house, but the pictures showed a
mechanical marvel so alien that it boggled the mind to picture. Side notes
detailed the burning of bodies as well, citing a "need for secrecy".





"Goddamn window's closed
tight." I heard Bill curse at the far end of the room. He had succeeded in
releasing one of the boards. Two more and a sheet of ply wood covered the
window. I turned back to the fire place, leaning my hand on the inside from
pure impulse. Above us we could hear stomping and more shooting. The sirens
were getting closer. Rescue. As I put my hand on the interior of the fireplace,
I felt it slip inwards. The grating of stone upon stone told me that the
fireplace had something behind it.

"Holy shit!" I called out
as the entire panel fell into the fireplace, and I myself fell in with it. I
could hear Bill jogging up to me. I pulled myself up grabbing my hat from the
floor surveying the room I exposed. It was lit by a weird greenish light
emanating from the stone walls. The entire place was full of weird symbols
engraved on the eerily lit walls, and the room reverberated with chanting. I
could hear the shouting upstairs halt as the chanting got louder. I winced like
I had in the upstairs hallway from the mental blast and constant murmuring of
the voices. Bill helped my up and I replaced my fedora. The pair of us walked
further into the room. The place screamed at me, as if I'd seen something like
it before.











"Why does this all seem so
familiar?" I heard Bill mumble from behind me. He walked ahead of me,
rubbing his hands on the symbol laden walls. The stone called out to us, as if
we had returned to something that we had been too before, but not in a
lifetime. But unlike a home town, this felt more like we were walking into the
hands of doom itself, as if we were escaped mental patients returning to the
asylum we had run from so long ago. 'Home' with a menacing caretaker, a silent
promise of a dead eternity. I could hear Bill mumbling a passage from Psalms as
he ran his hands across the stone, his handgun held firmly in his grip. I
continued ahead of Bill, finding my way to a staircase of similar stone. I
waved Bill over, and both us preceded down, the sounds of sirens drowned out
by the shouting of chanting as we went deeper down into the sanctum. Here we
entered a grand room, support beams from the house the only normal pieces of
architecture in the room. The room was filled with the stone shaped into weird
altars and alien geometries. The floor was a kind of black marble with flecks
of red in it, reminiscent of classical interpretations of the floors of Hell
itself. The ceiling of the room was wide, an in the center a huge mural of
gigantic eye dominating an otherworldly plane, hundreds of humanoid beasts
blotting out the sky, and a frightfully huge "king" creature with the
wings of a dragon and the face of God itself commanding a insane amount of
power in the room. It's waste was submerged by a blood red sea of screaming men
and women, creatures human and inhuman. The demonic center piece creature's
eyes were thick rubies, and it glared at us and the rest of the room
simultaneously. The whispering chants reached a crescendo now and my mind
screamed against the insanity of just looking at the beast in front of me. I
flicked safety off an my pistol. Looking directly at those eyes I felt every
bit of my humanity eating away and falling apart. All that is holy seemed to be
gone in those eyes, and the insane gibbering chant that filled my mind spoke of
ancient bargains and commanding powers so great the thought made one's mind
scream in vain to reclaim it's blissful ignorance. The eyes dripped with blood,
and it landed in a basin in the center of the room. The stench of the room
filled my nostrils, but I could barely understand it. The minions depicted in
the mural were as horrifying as the beast pictured. Creatures with nightmarish
wings like the Demonic Prince, and blobs of molten blood forming out of the
water, reaching out with the limbs of and torn flesh of the deceased. Eyes were
forming on it in strange places. The mural seemed to shutter and my legs
wobbled. I needed to look away from the beast's bloodied eyes, but I couldn't.











"By God, what is this
place?" Bill asked, his jaw dropping as he looked around the room. I tore
myself away from the eyes gasping for air. I looked to where Bill was looking,
an altar with a man strapped to it. He squirmed pathetically, never screaming.
He didn't seem quite alive. It was as if his body just quivered alone of it's
own volition.











"We have to leave..." I
said, approaching the body, curiously terrified by what I seen. The man's face
was a grimace, his eyes cut out and his chest a gaping hole. My mind screamed
at the horror of the poor man. I looked away towards Bill, we was looking at
the body as well, moving to stand beside me, "We have to leave!" I
said, trying to force my legs to carry me from this horrible place. Bill lifted
his handgun and fired one shot in the dying man's head.











"Rest." Bill said, he
hunched down. My mind shrieked. And Bill blanched. The pair of us looked down
at the body. The man was dead, but he started to bleed into the stone floor. I
could hear grating stone and this wicked cracking sound. Screaming and air rushed
into my ears, and my blood boiled. The blood of the man seeped into the floor,
and the screaming of the chant got louder and louder.











"God, what have you
done?!" I screamed at Bill grabbing him. Briefly in my insanity and rage I
imagined strangling him, my mind screaming 'SACRIFICE', Bill looked at me with
cold eyes for just a second, before they flashed to a dazed and confused glare.











Then I heard the most terrifying
thing in my entire life. A shriek from behind us, Bill and I turned. Time
seemed to slow at the beast's approach. It had a large head, black as the
night, tendrils where it's mouth should be, and an emaciated ribcage and
spinal cord. It's arms ended three fingers tipped with red and brown claws,
dripping with a foul ichor. Behind the beast was a 'tear' a screaming gibbering
tear a doorway to a lake of blood, howling escaped and the foulest of stenches
leaked out of it. It shrieked again, I lifted my handgun and fired at it. It
took the 45. round without so much as a flinch, and though the creature was
man-sized it seemed impossibly tall. "THIS ISN'T REAL!" I screamed, I
felt everything make less sense to me. And yet it made more sense. This was our
fate. To perish by the hand of God itself, and one of it's 'Angels'.











"Fuck you!" Bill shouted
in utter defiance unloading several shots into it's head. It grabbed at us, I
pulled away, but it's grip too tight, it's hands burning my skin, Bill yelled
in pain as it dug it's claws into his chest pulling us towards the doorway into
the lake of blood. I screamed in rage and denial, my grip on reality loosening
I screamed out impossibilities and curses upon righteousness and Hell, firing
more bullets into it's arms. It screamed back with each hit. Now at the tear
the howling and stench filled my nose, the pain too great, my mind snapping. It
all made sense now. From birth to death we exist to serve the whims of those
stronger than us. Humans are nothing but cattle, cheap replaceable cattle. The
chant sounded like a merry tune, a promise of eternity. No! Not a promise, a
threat. It's isn't real!











"GET OUT OF MY HEAD" I
screamed at the top of my lungs kicking and thrashing. The world of the living,
all I loved slipped away. It wasn't real. It's a dream, the voices aren't real.
But it was real, and I couldn't escape it's grasp. "GET OUT! GET OUT! GET
OUT! GET OUT!" My torment wouldn't cease, and I was pulled closer to
eternal damnation.











Now inside the portal, I could see
the black sky, raining blood and cinder. I screamed as Bill screamed. I pulled
away from the creature, that just dropped us. The ground before us was like the
floor of the room we had just left. Hard stone and jagged rock, and the air was
freezing cold, with cinder that burned as hit the skin and blood that boiled
and burned. Bill was pulled into the air by the creature. I didn't see him
fall, but I could hear the screaming. He dropped his gun, and I reached for it,
the pistol having more bullets than mine. The pistol I realized was my last
defense. One bullet to be kept for safety. In that moment of insanity, dying by
my hand was preferable to whatever was happening to account for the constant
tormented screams of these lost souls. Ahead of my was the lake of blood, with
a vast city of blasphemous shape and spiked Hellish towers, it was so far away,
but so easy to see. Mercy I called, mercy. Bill was gone, all I loved gone. I
couldn't describe the Hell I faced.











But why I wondered, was I still
alive? I lifted the pistol to fire at the beast, Bill now dead, his screams
drowned out by the millions of other screams. The creature turned to me, and
flew away, it's glistening black wings carrying it across the crimson lake.
Voices drowned out the screams now.











"You'll never die again, you'll
never be alone again, you'll always be here. You'll never be free again."





"You are ours."





"Nothing, you are
nothing!"





"Behold destiny. Behold
Infinity."











"Behold God" whispered a
commanding voice. I looked up, and at the edge of the city in the distance an
impossibly large demon with black wings and a huge demonic form, so
mind-rending it changed shape every time I blinked. It's mass turned to me. The
screaming resumed and wouldn't stop, chanting "TYROZUMEN TYROZUMEN
TYROZUMEN, He sleeps and wakes with the souls of the Damned." My eyes
burned and my skin screamed in pain as all around my burned with flame. I
pulled myself up and fired in desperation at the creature that landed beside
me, similar to the beast that dragged me here. It screamed in pain as I emptied
a clip into it's chest. The dreadful clicking of an empty clip. I threw the
pistol at it and I could hear a kind of dreadful laughter, grating on my now
broken sanity. Voices screamed in torment and endless pain. "Never be free
again." In pure defiance I lifted myself up. I knew the portal had shut. I
fired five more shots, knowing Bill only fired two from his pistol, which had
eight shots. The beast halted and shrieked, terrible bright red blood leaking
down it's black frame.











"GET OUT OF MY FUCKING
HEAD!" I screamed in defiance, holding the gun up to my head. It advanced,
laughing again, I spat at it's face as it closed on me, and instead of killing
myself, I thrusted the pistol into it's tendrilled mouth, firing one shot in
it's mouth. It shrieked in pain as I punched at it's slimy and disgusting
body. It pushed my backwards, through the portal behind me. Just like that, the
gateway shut.











I collapsed on the floor, the
chanting gone. Terrible silence filling my shattered mind. It wasn't over. It
was still there. I could smell it. Hear it screaming at me. Hear it's promises.
I collapsed on the ground, and felt my mind slip away.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~





"Up Detective Clarke. Up." A man's voice said, sounding official.





"Who are you?" I asked, my voice sounding strangely foreign. The room swam with my mind, I was in a
hospital bed. I must have hit my head or something, "wait what was
that?" I asked abruptly, hearing scratching.








"Nothing. Detective, I'd like to ask you a few questions." I blanched at the man's voice, he wore a
thick suit and fedora and was armed with a notepad. The police chief stood in
behind him. Evidently the man seen my face pale, "Strange, normally you
ask the questions, hmm?" He had a slight laugh and I nodded dumbly, my
mind in pain. The ceiling was moving, wasn't it? The outside window glowed red.
And that stench of blood! God, it wouldn't leave! What was happening to me?!








"I'm here to test your
psychiatric health, you were found screaming gibberish in the library of an old
house. Also I would like to ask about your partner..."

















"Bill." I said quickly, my
mind glimpsing reality for a second. I knew I seen something outside the
window. It was screaming at me.





"Yes. Now I understand you were
held hostage for a while, a very traumatic experience."








"Not hostage! Black red bloody
sky!" I yelled out quickly. The chief in the background winced. Was it
shame on his face? They doubted me.








"No Detective, you were found
by the officers, beaten severely. You were tortured, with bad burns and cuts.
We've been over this yesterday. Do you remember?" My mind strained to
think back. All I remembered was an endless horrible dream of the dead
screaming in constant eternal pain. Yesterday I dreamt of Hell itself, like the
God that presided over that place, my sleep was strained and horrible. I seen
destiny. Infinity. God itself.









"I don't remember." I
mumbled, a young nurse looked down at her feet by the egde of the bed,
"How long have I been here? Where's Bill?"





"Two weeks, and you've been
waking up screaming daily. And we're still looking for him. With your help we
can find him, where is he?"





"No, no... Please. You must believe me. Bill was carried away!"





"Where?" He asked, happy
to make a breakthrough. Something in my mind whispered, 'You're insane, you'd
be better off dead. Come back little soul.' I blanched and grimanced.





"The black angel carried him
away!" I answered truthfully. The nurse looked at me with deep sorrow and
pity. I looked up at her blue eyes, I couldn't believe she didn't believe
me.She must have. If only she had seen. But then she'd be broken too. I heard
the scratching once more, and the sky outside blinked red and black. I blinked
again and it was gone.





"No... There is no black angel
Detective. Do you mean the men at the house? Are they the black angels?"
He asked pushing me. The police chief left the room, his skin pale and his
stride sad.





"I seen it! Hundreds, flying
against the blood red sky!" The man, a psychiatrist of some kind I guessed
pulled away to rub his beard. I grabbed him by the arm and pulled him in close,
"LISTEN TO ME, I can hear them calling even now! Bill is dead and gone
carried away!" The man pulled away and the nurse cooed gently while a
security guard ran up, "LISTEN TO ME GODDAMN IT!"





"Ma'am, sedation shot
please." The psychaiatrist said. I let go of him and looked up at her. She
smiled with pity and me as she readied a shot.






"Please, ma'am, listen to
me." I whispered as she injected the shot... The world blinked away,
melting. As my vision blackened I could hear the man saying, "Bring the
poor soul to my hospital, we can take good care of him at the Asylum. My
condolences to his family.", The black angel greeted my dreams once more,
and the screaming wouldn't stop. Even now, I still hear it. The stench won't go
away. I just want to forget it all, but every time I shut my eyes, it's there,
waiting for me.








Waiting,
calling that chant. Tyrozumen, Tyrozumen!