Sticks and Stones - Part 3 of 3

 

Photo by Dylan Hunter on Unsplash

3

Reluctantly, Christoffer started for the dumpster and climbed into it without looking back. And then, for a long time, nothing happened. He must’ve stayed in the container for several minutes when he finally dared to lift the lid and stick his head out, at which point, it had become dawn and the sky was painted in the shades of twilight.

Neither Betül nor Farouk was around when he climbed out, stinking worse than he could smell. But their absence was not the only perplexing thing. All around him, scattered at random, were what he could only call human body parts in all shapes and colours, as well as different stages of decay. Even the soil beneath his feet was full of bits of flesh here and there, sticking to his shoes like glue.

But before he could wrap his head around what had happened during those hours he stayed hidden in the container, he staggered back only for something to get caught underfoot, something that he immediately recognised upon picking up. It was a stone, one that belonged to Farouk. But what was it doing here?

He retraced his steps back to his apartment, taking in the bloody carnage all around him but unable to make sense of it. But the worst had yet to come, only he didn’t know then. When he finally arrived at the third-floor landing, the door to his apartment gave way without resistance and unlocked. Inside… nothing. Only traces of blood – a lot of it – on the striped wallpapers, on the floorboards that had become swollen. Neither his mum nor Reila was around, though. In their stead, something else was.

In the kitchen was a large pot bubbling away. As he crept closer, each step warier than the last, he lifted the shaking lid and came face-to-face with a stew made of human body parts. One of the severed fingers had a ring on it, one his mum had been gifted by his deceased father and never took off. This realisation made him stagger back, and his breath became shallow and laboured, and that was exactly when the living room door slammed shut with a deafening bang across the kitchen.

He whipped around and sprinted out the gaping front door, not looking back even once, not until he made it safely out of his apartment and was back outside. When he looked up at the third floor, however, a faceless shape waved at him from the kitchen window, and he fled that instant, springing wherever his feet took him. Once he came back to his senses, he was back at the site of the dumpster, or rather, back inside it, counting the seconds, wishing upon the stars for a miracle that this was only a nightmare and that he would soon wake up from it.

Once nighttime came, however, nothing changed. Stuck in a bad dream with nowhere to go, he climbed out and picked up more stones on the damp soul, and as if to keep himself from losing his senses completely, began to play by himself like a madman.

He must’ve played for several hours by the time he noticed the approaching footsteps and quickly hid back inside the container. Through a small gap, he saw the homeless people returning, each one of them chewing on a human body part. They settled at the dumpster site and drank all night, oblivious to his presence, and when morning came, they left.

This repeated for a few more nights, with the homeless people returning to the container with human body parts and then leaving only to return the next night. One morning, however, instead of waiting in dread for dusk to come, Christoffer decided to follow the homeless people who seemed to be unaware of him, no matter how much noise he made.

They wound up a dark pathway through an empty field or some kind of overgrown pasture no longer used and kept walking for hours on end without respite. And when darkness fell once more, the pathway came full circle, and they were back at the site of the dumpster, only now Christoffer knew where the source of all those human body parts came from.

During this nocturnal walk with no aim or purpose, the homeless people picked up wooden sticks now and then, and by the time night came, those sticks became human body parts. But the homeless people weren’t even aware of this, for they were far gone and unsound of mind to think straight and get back to their senses to realise they were caught in a loop of some kind, reliving the same day over and over, and somehow, he had ended up in that loop, too.

By the second week, he decided to pick up some sticks himself to quench his growing hunger, and although the sticks tasted weird and gamey, like rotten flesh, he did not mind since he knew the sticks were anything but human. The taste even grew on him after the fourth fortnight, and he ended up joining the homeless people, who did not mind him following them around and mimicking them.

Then, one night, as they were having a feast by the fire, something that had never happened happened. One of the homeless people turned to him as they were about to get back on their feet and follow the dark pathway till dusk. This was the first time they ever talked or acknowledged him, as if mimicking them had somehow allowed him to become visible again.

“You stay here, climb the container.”

And so he did.

When morning came, he climbed out only to find himself back in the normal world, no longer bound by the time loop. But several years had passed since then, although he had stayed the same age as when he disappeared. Everyone he knew had long since either passed away or moved to another place – everyone save his good friends Betül and Farouk, who had grown grey and as old as the hills.

They recognised him immediately, although it took him a second to recognise them. None of them could explain what had happened that night, only that he disappeared after climbing into that dumpster. Betül had told the police what had happened, but the police refused to believe her story, and so he was registered into the system as another runaway. When they asked what exactly had happened during the time he was away, he couldn’t tell the truth – or rather – the whole truth.

The two of them passed away not long after this fated reunion, dying almost a week after one another. The entire neighbourhood was in mourning during the funeral, and Christoffer had attended it with those stones that Farouk always carried with him, the ones he found in the nightmarish loop. But as he was paying his respects to his two friends, he heard a familiar rustle in the clump of bushes near the Muslim cemetery, and he decided to take a look at what it was.

There, hiding in the bushes, were some wooden sticks arranged in a neat circle. Without realising it, he picked some up and started chewing, slowly making his way back to the funeral attended by the whole neighbourhood. When they saw him approach, they gasped collectively and pointed fingers at him. When he looked down at the stick, it had turned into a human leg dripping with fresh blood.

Then… a chilling scream.

A woman rushed from the clump of bushes with a child in her arms, one of its legs missing. When she saw him, with his teeth still dug into the tender flesh, she let out another bloodcurdling scream, and before he knew it, the people around him tackled him to the ground and kept him there until the police arrived. When the police asked for his name, he gave them the one his parents gave him, but they wouldn’t believe him, saying he couldn’t have stayed this young after all those years.

Now he was locked up in an asylum, counting the days. His psychiatrist said he had been cured of his illness and that he would be able to return to normalcy once the related paperwork had been sent off to court. In the meantime, to kill some time, he played stones by himself and occasionally chewed on his own arms to satisfy his hunger. Once he returned home, the first thing he would do was to climb into the dumpster. That way, only a child stupid enough to come near a place like that would go missing, and the police would write them off as simple runaway cases.

Sticks and Stones - Part 2 of 3

 

Photo by Foad Roshan on Unsplash

2

“Argh! I told you guys to listen to me! My mum’s going to kill me!”

Betül and Christoffer locked eyes, both apologetic, as Farouk crouched down in defeat and looked devastated as the phone kept ringing in the background. He lived two blocks away from themand would have to walk for several minutes in the gloom to get home.

Also, everyone in their neighbourhood knew that his mum was really strict. She had become so after having lost her husband in a work-related accident seven years ago, and so they feared that she might actually thrash Farouk as a form of discipline for not returning home in time to take his epilepsy pills.

Christoffer, “Hey, don’t beat yourself up too much, dude. You can just stay over at my place, and I’ll have my mum call yours, say that you had a seizure and couldn’t make it home?”

Farouk looked up with misty, bloodshot eyes.

“Then she’ll only get more upset!”

“No, I think Chris has a point. Would you rather she thinks you’ve spent the night at the playground?”

“Of course not! Are you mad!? She’ll kill me if—”

“Then, it is decided,” she said, gesturing at Christoffer. “Hey, lend me a hand and let’s bring this idiot to your place.”

“What about you?” Christoffer said as they each wrapped an arm around Farouk, who was still quite out of it to even lift a finger or move on his own.

“I’ll be fine. My apartment’s not too far from your place.”

“No, I meant, like, won’t your parents, I don’t know, say something?”

“My parents? No, why would they? It’s not like it’s the first time,” she said, changing the subject before he could inquire further. “You had a little sister, right? What was her name, again?”

“Reila,” he said, adding, “she’s not really my sister, though.”

“How so?”

“My mum remarried when I was a toddler to some Japanese guy, who dated her for the green card and then, yeah…”

“Oh, I see. But I thought you two looked pretty close the other day.”

“The other day?” Christoffer repeated, adjusting his grip on Farouk, who was dragging his feet through the pavement with a hollow look on his face as if his whole world had shattered and fallen apart right in front of him.

“Yeah, at the supermarket. You know, the one near the gas station.”

“Ah, right! Yeah, Mum brought us along grocery shopping, but I wouldn’t say we’re that close.”

“Really? Why not, though? You guys must’ve basically grown up together, like real siblings, no?”

“Reila can be… difficult, sometimes, you know?”

“Difficult? Like to elaborate on that one? How difficult can she even be for you to say this?”

“Hard to explain… Not sure where to start…”

“Well, you don’t have to if you don’t want to. I just thought you looked close, but—”

“It’s just that she creeps me up, sometimes. Especially as of late. I’m not sure if it’s because she’s older or her teenage hormones acting up, but…”

“But?”

Christoffer cast a look at Farouk as if to make sure the other was too lost in his own misery to pay attention to their conversation.

“It’s like she’s possessed. I keep seeing her wake up at night, going through the entire fridge. Mum thinks I’m the one doing that and won’t believe me.”

“And your step-dad?”

“He’s, uh, not around anymore. Been dead for two years already.”

“Oh, sorry ‘bout that. I didn’t know…”

“Don’t be.”

“And you and your mum’ve been taking care of her all this time?”

“Yeah…”

“Wow, I’m not sure my mum would do that,” she said matter-of-factly before suddenly coming to a halt and seeking his confused eyes. “Hey, did you just say she was going through your fridge every night?”

“…Yeah, why?”

“So, basically, she’s hungrier than usual? Right?”

“I’m not following.”

Betül let go of Farouk and helped him settle on a wooden fence, which only reached to their ankles at either side of the pavement.

“Lamia! She must’ve been possessed by her!”

“I said she was going through the fridge, not eating children, dude.”

“Yeah, so what? Maybe that’s just how it begins? And then, when the hunger grows, she might—”

“Betül! Hemen buraya gel!”

They both turned in the direction of the kiosk just around the corner, where the silhouette of a dumpy woman with a hijab made some angry gestures at Betül. It sounded like her mum, it even looked like her from this angle, but why was her face completely swallowed by the darkness? Not to mention the way she moved her arms seemed so… stiff? Unnatural, even.

“Is that your mum?”

“I…”

“Betül!”

“Hey, you okay?” Christoffer said. “You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

“Huh? No, I’m… I’m fine. I’m just… confused.”

“Confused?”

As she was about to reveal what was going through her mind, Farouk suddenly rose to his feet between them. In a trance, he then pointed in the direction of the corner where the silhouette was, before going into a seizure with his eyes rolled back into the sockets. They barely caught him in time, and when the worst of the convulsions were over, the silhouette in the corner was gone, too.

“What… what was that?” Christoffer managed, his voice cracking. “Hey, talking to you, Betül! What the heck just happened?”

“I’m not—”

She never finished her sentence, or rather, could not. A nauseating odour arose from the kiosk, right at that shadowy corner, the smell a cross between charred flesh and the sweet and greasy smell of swine mingling. Then, that voice came again, this time from somewhere behind them, and Farouk went into another seizure.

“Gel! Gel! Gel!”

Behind them was nothing but darkness and several apartments lined up on one side. But not for long. Through the shadows, where the eyes could not penetrate at nighttime, several figures emerged, their chilling voices repeating like a broken record the same words over and over again.

“What do they say? Betül!”

“Come,” She met his bewildered gaze, just as fraught with dread as her own. “They are telling us to come.”

“Come? Come where?”

“I-I don’t know! How would I—”

“Reila?”

Betül followed his eyes back to the strange figures moving closer and closer to them by the second, and that was when she saw the girl she had seen at the supermarket the other day. But like her own mum, the girl’s features were hardly visible in the gloom, as if her entire body had been drowned in a sea of shadows and become one with the darkness.

And as Christoffer was about to rush towards her, Betül seized his arm. “What are you doing? Can’t you see it’s not her?”

“…What?”

“Look at them, look carefully! See, Farouk’s there too! But he’s here, isn’t he? Whatever these people are, they are mimicking people we know, trying to lure us closer!”

“How is… how is this even possible? What’s going on?”

Betül, on full alert, “Now’s not the time for asking questions! If we don’t move any time soon, we might not make it!”

“Make it?”

“Listen,” she said, “we have to hide. And that quick!”

“But where? Look at him.” Christoffer gestured at Farouk, who had finally stopped convulsing but was still unconscious. “Does it look like he can move to you?”

“Who said we’re bringing him with us?”

“Uh—what?”

“Quick! Hide in that dumpster over there! Hurry!”

Christoffer followed her gaze to the corner and arched his brows.

“Isn’t that where those homeless—”

“Stop asking questions and just go! Hurry!”

“What about you?”

“I’ll try to distract them! Now go! Go, Chris! Go!”

Sticks and Stones - Part 1 of 3

 

Photo by Luca Maffeis on Unsplash

1

”No! You missed it, dude!” Farouk snapped as the huge piece of stone failed to hit the smaller ones lined up on the sandy ground, rising to his feet from where he was crouched and utterly devastated that his team was losing. Again. “How can you even miss it twice in a row!?”

Betül rolled her eyes before picking up the carefully chosen stone with the uneven edges, one she had successfully used over the course of a year without once missing the mark. That is, until today. She couldn’t say what it was, but something felt off. Whether it was the overcast weather, the increasingly darkening sky, or just something innately inside her, she did not know, but whatever it was, it made her skin crawl and mouth run dry like her whole mouth was made of sandpaper.

Christoffer, on the other hand, was a team of his own and older than them by a year. He celebrated his miraculous win with his signature gesture, shaking his shoulders in an Egyptian dance and making loud noises to annoy Farouk on purpose – going as far as turning his back to them and shaking his butt like a real Arabian belly dancer.

“Woohoo! Losers!” he said, making a huge ‘L’ with his hand, before extending his hand. “Now give me everything you stole!”

Farouk, cheesed off, “Stole!? We won it fair and square, you little—”

“Hey, easy, you two! And you,” Betül said with a firm voice as she turned to face Farouk. “Give the guy back his stones and shut it.”

“Uh… what’s with her?” Christoffer mumbled.

“Do I look like I know?” Farouk said. “Here, these were yours, right?”

Christoffer studied each piece of stone as if it were a jewel. Farouk had fetched from his pockets a full of valuables and picked up three jagged stones seemingly at random. It was a mystery how those huge stones even fit into his pocket, not to mention on top of all those smaller ones in there, too.

“Yeah, seems like it,” Christoffer said, placing the stones inside his folded shirt since he did not have pockets of his own. “When on earth did you even win all those stones? You have no social life or something? No school?”

Farouk lifted his head with a proud smile, so much in fact that Betül thought for a brief moment that his crooked nose would stay suspended mid-air and wanted to smack him back to his senses. But she didn’t do that, of course.

“Dude, like, who do you think I am? I am the Farouk!” he said. “I always have time for victory!”

“Victory?” Betül repeated, her tone laced with sarcasm. “More like defeat! Besides today, have you ever truly won without my help? Like ever?”

Farouk met her sarcasm head-on, his eyes narrowing and lips curling into a pout. “You’re seriously going to live as if stuck in the past? What matters,” he said, grinning wide, “is what we win today, in the present. Which means, I win. Not you, sor-ry!”

“You’re so dumb, you know that?”

“Who you calling dumb!?”

As the two teammates were about to clash and get into a huge fight, one in which Betül would emerge as the winner since she was larger in build than Farouk, who hardly had any meat on him, Christoffer nimbly intervened and separated them before they could start throwing punches.

“Yo, calm down, you two! Hey, you guys hear me!? Geez! Stop it! Both of you!”

Betül ran a hand down her hair as she was the first to retreat, before Farouk too calmed down enough for Christoffer to stop holding him back. “You guys are craaaazy. How did you even end up being friends?”

“Friends? More like enemies!” Betül said, adding. “I recruited this idiot after seeing him win once, and then he just kept losing ever since!”

“You mean twice! I won twice!”

“Dude,” Betül exclaimed as she realised what he was referring to. “Winning against those homeless people… you call that a win? Like, seriously!?”

“Well, you didn’t dare, remember?”

“Yeah, but only because they are homeless, duh!” she said, adding in one single breath before he could interrupt, “and don’t act like you don’t know the rumours, you idiot!”

“What rumours?” said Christoffer.

“Don’t mind her, they’re just rumours!” said Farouk. “See! Nothing bad happened to me!”

“Just because it didn’t happen that one time, doesn’t mean it won’t happen ever! Just how stupid can you even be?”

Farouk glared, rolling up his sleeves to throw another future punch when Christoffer interrupted. “Hey, guys, what rumours?”

Betül and Farouk both turned to Christoffer at the same time as he was about to repeat himself, both of them seeing red and too furious to explain stuff to him. “SHUT IT!”

“Uh, what?” Christoffer said, the tone of his voice giving away just how offended he was at being shouted at out of nowhere. “You guys… got some loose screws or something? Dude, I was just asking.”

Betül, now a tad calmer. “You haven’t heard the rumours? Is that it?”

“Why would I ask if I knew?”

Betül then exchanged a knowing look with Farouk before gesturing each of them to come closer, so that they hunched down in a tight circle of three.

“I’m not sure where the rumours come from or who spread them,” she whispered, dragging each word on purpose to get her words across. “But I don’t doubt them. Not even for a second.”

Farouk, “Me neither.”

Christoffer, utterly confused, arched his brows low and whispered, “What do you mean? You’ve… seen something?”

Betül drew a deep breath before finally speaking, letting her brown eyes sweep over the two boys for the briefest of moments as if to prepare them for what she was about to reveal.

“I was walking home from school one day two years ago. My sister was sick, so this was my first day going home on my own, and as you both know, our apartment is right around that dumpster those homeless people hang out at, drinking and pissing all over themselves. Like, ew, so, so disgusting… Anyway, so I was walking home, and then I felt something strange, like someone watching me. So, I looked around…” She paused, letting the silence stretch on for a tad longer than either of the boys wanted. “And, then I saw one of those people was staring straight at me!”

“W-What happened next?” Farouk croaked.

“Then he waved me over, of course!”

“And did you?” asked Christoffer.

Betül broke the tight circle. “Of course I didn’t, idiot! If I did, would I be here, you think?”

“I don’t get it. What’s this whole rumour thing, then? To me, it just looks like the guy wanted to chat or something…”

“It hasn’t been long since you moved here, right?” she said.

“Yeah, it’s been about four months or so. Why do you ask?”

Farouk, “There was this girl, let’s call her Ida for convenience. One day, as she was walking home from school, she disappeared. Just like that! The whole neighbourhood tried to find her, but when night came, she was reported missing to the police. According to the rumours, someone saw her talk to one of those homeless people before she vanished!”

“She was… never found?”

“No,” Betül said, “she wasn’t! The police wrote off her case as a typical runaway, but the poor girl was only eight years old when she went off the radar, only two or so years younger than what we are today.”

“You think… there’s some truth in those rumours, then?”

“Of course!”

“But didn’t you,” Christoffer turned to face Farouk, “just say that you played and won against those homeless people? If the rumours were true, then you wouldn’t be here, would you?”

“Yeah, but I was not by myself! All the neighbourhood kids were there too! Just imagine if I’d been there all alone?” Farouk shivered at the thought. “I’d be long dead!”

“Still, something doesn’t add up. Maybe the police are right? Maybe she just—”

“An eight-year-old runaway?” said Betül, adding before he could protest. “Come on, dude! Get real! No kid that age runs away, unless…” Betül gestured them to come closer again, closing the circle, “…something else happened to her.”

“Like what…” Christoffer said, his voice cracking from the growing dread in the air around them. “…exactly?”

“You two ever heard the story of ‘Lamia’?”

“Lami—what?” said Farouk, who was getting increasingly unsettled by the stuff they were discussing as the sun fell below the horizon every passing second in the background, casting the entire playground in deep shadows.

“It’s originally a story from Greek mythology, one only a few know, and luckily for you two, I’m one of those people in the know…”

“So?” said Christoffer. “What’s the story about?”

“Okay, so there was this super pretty queen named Lamia, and Zeus, the king of the gods, liked her – like, liked liked her – and his wife, Hera, got soooo mad. She was jealous and made Lamia go totally nuts! She took away her kids and made her into this scary children-eating monster!”

“Children…”—Farouk, peeking over his shoulder at once as if something had moved in the deepening shadows and crept closer to them—“…eating monster?”

“And get this, you two,” she continued without missing a beat. “Lamia could never close her eyes, like ever, so she just wandered around all night, looking creepy and sad and angry. Then she started stealing kids from their beds, and she’d eat them! Eat them all!”

As she said the last sentence, she raised her voice on purpose, and Farouk almost had a heart attack as he jolted up with a gasp and took shelter behind Christoffer. Christoffer, although equally scared, tried to play it cool.

 “What a stupid story. Why would a monster from Greek mythology even be here, in our neighbourhood? Stop making up stuff just to scare Farouk—”

“But I’m not making any of this up!” she interjected.

“Everyone knows you’re a bookworm,” Christoffer said. “You’re just telling us stories you’ve read! Anyone can see that, so stop pretending!”

Betül, “I didn’t read about it anywhere! I swear! I heard it from someone!”

“Really? Like from whom? Come on, go ahead. Tell us!”

Farouk, sensing the growing tension between those two, with his weak and antsy voice, then tried to intervene. “Hey, uh, maybe we should go home now? It’s getting dark and—”

“I-I promised not to snitch!”

“Promised!?” snapped Christoffer. “Since when do you keep your promises?”

“Are you saying I don’t?”

“Just admit it, Betül! You’re just making stuff up to scare us!”

“I already told you—”

“Guys, listen to me, it’s getting really dark and—”

“Shut up!” they both said in sync.

And for a while, the heated conversation continued back and forth with neither of the two backing off or throwing in the towel, not until the streetlights on the playground turned on and they found themselves way past their curfew, at which point it was too late to rue the day because Farouk’s phone now rang and pulled the three friends back to reality.

Gate of Hell – Part V [Final Part]

Photo by Gabriel on Unsplash

“They’re looking at us,” whispered Tom through gritted teeth as low as he could.

Edmund cast a look around the shadowy darkness where the faceless people watched their every move and didn’t tear their hollow eyes from them.

Why were they staring at them like that? It was so creepy. Had they done or said something, he’d understand at the very least, but those things just… watched.

“Hey, Edmund!”

“What is it now?”

They were halfway across a rickety bridge as dark as coal when Tom brought his attention to something he hadn’t noticed before. Then again, it wasn’t so strange he missed seeing and hearing it.

The wailing spirits in the crimson river screamed their heads off and tried to drown out all the other noises. Thousands, perhaps millions and billions of people, cramped in the bloody river and flowed to the current of macabre tunes.

“Look over there! Look!”

Edmund followed the boy’s gaze to the distance. There, through the pitch-black darkness blanketed in walls of fiery fire and drowned out by harrowing screams, a peculiar train emerged.

“What in the whole world…?”

“Do you know what that is? Edmund?”

“No, I…” Edmund briefly looked away. A thought dawned on him, one that he thought he had long since forgotten. He sought Tom’s eyes. “It’s… it’s that train!”

“What are you talking about?” Tom said in a hushed tone, acutely aware of the faceless people drawing closer now that they were reaching the other side of the bridge.

“It’s that train that took my mum with it! I- I’m sure!”

“I don’t understand. Edmund? You said she died giving birth to you. Hey! Edmund!”

Edmund averted his eyes. Thousands of questions spun in his dire mind and disturbed his thoughts. What was that train doing here? Here, in the abode of the damned!

Could it really be…?

Those nightmares of his mother screaming for help, could those really be real after all? But what if he was mistaken?

He… he had to investigate and find out the truth! But this was easier said than done. Had he come here all alone, he wouldn’t bat an eye and follow the train to wherever it went. But he promised Tom that he’d bring them both home.

“Tom, the thing is… I have these dreams, nightmares if you will, that I’ve had ever since we moved here…”

“Nightmares? What kinda nightmares?”

“That train… I keep seeing it. And then I’d hear my mum’s voice calling my name. I… I think she needs help.”

“How do you know it’s her, though?”

“Who else would it be?”

Tom cocked his head. “I dunno, the Devil Himself, maybe? Since we’re in Hell and all that circus – literally.”

“Why would the Devil lure me to Hell? I’m just a kid!”

Tom shrugged. “How would I know? You’re the one who hears and sees weird stuff. Allegedly.”

“You think I’m making all this up!”

“No, that’s not what I—”

Edmund raised his voice. “Look around you, Tom! Do you really think I’m some kinda weirdo, who- who makes up stuff just for the sake of it?”

“Geez! Keep your voice down, dude!”

“You know what? I shouldn’t have told you to come with me!”

“Edmund, for crying out loud! Keep your—”

They both turned in the direction of the booming voice.

“Humans…?”

Tom grabbed Edmund’s arm and hid behind him as the menacing cross between a demon and a werewolf approached. With its black fur and red eyes, it brought the suffocating darkness with it towards them.

“W- what’s that thing?” Tom whispered.

“How would I know?”

Tom was about to snap back at him when the hybrid creature beat him to it.

“Speak! Both of you! How did you get in here?”

Edmund wet his lips. “We… we…”

“Speak or I’ll cut your tongue!”

“We- we got in through that- that portal, sir! The one inside the shipwreck!” Tom chimed in as politely as he could, although anyone could see as clear as day that this thing was anything but a gentleman. It was a brute in its purest form.

“Shipwreck?” the demonic creature repeated. “What shipwreck?”

Tom was about to reply, but Edmund beat took over.

“Where’s- where’s my mum? I keep hearing her voice ever since we moved to Gaddon Township. She’s gotta be here!”

Tom watched with his mouth gaping wide. What had happened to the kid who was so antsy that he couldn’t even form sentences a second ago? But the brute didn’t seem to mind his dare-devil question.

“Gaddon Township, you say?” The creature looked away as if it was pondering something before looking around itself with two lines etched between its thick brows.

“Too many prying eyes here. You two, follow me.”

As soon as they crossed the bridge and followed the hybrid creature, the faceless people retreated to their shadowy hideouts and kept at bay.

Tom leaned in. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“What do you mean?”

“What if—”

“We’re here,” the hybrid demon stopped dead so suddenly that they almost stumbled into it. “You two stay put and don’t go off anywhere, all right? Nod if you understand.”

They nodded in unison and watched the demonic creature enter what looked like a mighty building in the midst of the fiery pit surrounded by scorching magma.

“Okay, let’s make a break for it before it returns!”

Edmund, “It told us to stay put and don’t move, remember?”

“We don’t even know what that thing is! And you’re seriously gonna do as it says?”

“Well, do you have a better idea then, Mr know-it-all?”

“If you must ask, yes!”

Edmund knitted his brows, trying to figure out whether the blond boy was pulling his legs or being serious.

“Yes…?”

“Yes!”

“Y-es?”

“Yes!”

“So? You’re not gonna tell me what this ‘yes’ is all about or what?”

Tom flashed a proud smile. “I thought you’d never ask.”

“Well, then? Go on…”

“See over there?” Edmund followed the boy’s finger to a group of people setting themselves on fire. “Those people, do you see them?”

“What about them?” he asked, genuinely confused.

“Well, can’t you see what they’re doing?”

Edmund took another look at the strange crowd screaming their heads off while they turned themselves into liquid time and again.

“I don’t get what I’m supposed to see here. They’re literally setting themselves on fire, that’s all!”

“Not those people, dumb-ass!”

Edmund’s eyes became narrower.

When he finally spotted them, the faceless people, he couldn’t help but knit his brows and seek Tom’s eyes as wide as the absent moon.

“Can you please tell me what’s going through that head of yours? ‘Cause I’m lost!”

“They keep following us, don’t you see? It’s like… it’s like they want to tell us something! But as soon as that creature shows up, they just poof! disappear!”

“You ever thought they might want to hurt us, and not that demonic thing?”

“But they didn’t!”

Edmund couldn’t deny this. The faceless people did indeed have all the chances in the world to attack them. Even back when they were in the woods, instead of hurting them then and there, they let them pass without doing anything.

“That doesn’t mean they won’t hurt us later on…”

“Well, I’ll cast my vote for those faceless things. What do you say?”

He was caught between a rock and a hard place. Tom had a point, but something about those hollow eyes bothered him in ways no words could capture.

At the same time, he couldn’t fully trust that brute, either.

“Edmund? Please…!”

“All right. But how are we going to communicate with them?”

Tom shrugged. “I’m not sure…”

“But you’ve got an idea I hope?”

“Well, I thought that kid could lend us a hand.”

“Kid?” Edmund looked at the faceless people again. “What kid?”

“Oh, she’s not one of them… Honestly, I don’t think she’s a demon, either.”

“Who on earth are you talking about?”

“The one on that train! The girl with the sleek, long hair!”

“The tra—that train?”

“Hmm!”

“But we don’t even know where that train went off to!”

Tom stepped aside. Now that he no longer obscured the view, he noticed that the train parked only a few steps away from the gigantic building in front of them. Moreover, the undead passengers were all getting off.

Lo-and-behold! Tom was right. There was indeed a girl not much older than them departing the train among the sea of undead. With her sleek hair, fair complexion and white gown, she looked more like a fallen angel rather than a sinner sent to Hell.

“Hey, Tom! Hold on a sec!”

But the blond guy sprinted towards the passengers before Edmund finished his sentence. When he finally caught up to his new friend and the peculiar girl, they were already on great terms and laughing hard.

Did those two know one another?

He couldn’t tell even if they did. But it sure did look that way – so much so that a strange feeling grew in the pit of his stomach as soon as he noticed how their smiling faces turned expressionless as he closed in.

Was that girl really inside the train? Now that he thought it over, he wasn’t so sure anymore. He didn’t see her inside the train. And as far as he was concerned, she didn’t actually depart the train either, she just… she just was there all along and pretended to join the crowd of undead.

But that wasn’t all. The way Tom stared at him… It was so weird.

Now he recalled why the other kids back at Gaddon Township told him not to play with the blond guy. There was something strange about the way he stared at people.

It was almost as if he tried to pierce through their souls and read their minds with his sinister eyes.

He stumbled backwards without really knowing why.

“Hey, is everything okay Edmund?”

A subtle smirk played on the girl's mouth as Tom reached out to him with a concerned look on his face. Edmund pushed his hand away as gently as he could, afraid that the other would catch onto him.

“I’m… I’m doing okay. Don’t worry.”

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost or something…”

This time, the girl wasn’t even trying to hide the wolfish grin on her face. He grabbed Tom’s arm and pulled him away so that the girl couldn’t hear them.

“Do you… know that girl? Tom, you gotta be honest.”

Tom stared down at his feet. Edmund was right.

“Actually… I do know her.”

“H- how do you know her? Tom, look at me! How do you—”

A wicked grin crept on his face. Edmund stepped away, startled more than anything, as he tried to digest what he was seeing.

But as soon as he took a step back and tried to make a break for it, Tom snatched his arm with such speed and strength that Edmund couldn’t break free. This, he thought, was not a human being.

“Hey, Edmund, isn’t it?”

He glanced at the approaching girl.

“Who—what are you people?”

“Do you believe in fairytales, Edmund… Keyes?”

Tom, “You better do! ‘Cause you’re about to join one!”

“W- what are you—”

The steel gates swung open and the demonic creature exited the towering building. When it caught sight of them, its round eyes focused on Tom before shifting to the girl. Before he knew it, the demonic creature leapt forwards and paid his respects to them.

“My Lord, forgive this poor slave who failed to recognise your grace!”

Tom rolled his eyes. “Get up! How many times am I gonna tell you not to call me that in front of other people?”

“Forgive—”

“Enough already! You’re making our guest uncomfortable!”

The girl, “You just had to come and disturb the fun! We were just getting to the fun part!”

Confused beyond anything, Edmund observed the strange conversation going on, trying to make sense of how and when things got out of hand.

Tom dismissed the demonic being with a swift move and cleared his throat.

“You asked me why I believed in the Gospels, right?”

Edmund couldn’t even nod his head.

“But let me ask you one thing before I give you a reply. After all, nothing in this world is for free.”

“I…”

The girl, “Just answer yes or no, stupid human!”

“You stay out of this, Mary. I’ve got this.”

She dropped her head. “Yes, brother.”

Edmund briefly averted his gaze upon hearing the name of the peculiar girl.

Mary…?

Mary as in—he looked up.

“Mary Magdalena. You’re right, Edmund.” Tom paused before adding, smiling wide as if bemused by a sudden thought taking over his mind. “I thought you didn’t believe in the Gospels… but seems like you know more than you let on.”

“I…I…”

“You, what? You seriously thought the Gospels were a made-up fairytale? Come on, Edmund! You can do better than that!” He paused again, taking his sweet time and teasing. “You know who I am, don’t you? I bet you do…”

“You’re… you’re…”

“There you go. Come on, you can say it. Loud and clear, so everybody can hear. Say. My. Name.”

“You’re…”

“Yes! Who am I, Edmund? Come on, say it already!”

Edmund dropped his head with a peal of laughter, turning bright red and wiping the tears of joy away all at the same time.

Tom and his sister exchanged perplexed looks fraught with horror upon observing his maniacal laughter.

“If you so will, I’ll call you by your birth name, Lucifer…. my son.”

Tom and Mary fell on their knees, pleading with him for mercy, as did the demonic creature that observed them in the corner.

“What did I say about luring humans into Hell?”

“It won’t happen again, Lord! Forgive me—”

“And you, Mary, being punished for making foolish humans think you’re the Voice of God wasn’t enough?”

“Forgive me, Father! Forgive this poor spirit and grace her with your divine—”

“And here I was thinking my creations were going wild when it was your doing all along. But I gotta admit, son, opening the Gate of Hell in such a peculiar place, was a clever move indeed.”

Tom wet his lips as he took a gander at him.

“It- it won’t happen again! I- I swear, Father!”

“Since things have boiled down to this and what’s done cannot be undone, I’ve prepared something I think you’ll both like.”

Tom, “Please, Father! I- I won’t do it again! Father!”

“Neither will I! Please, Father, forgive our sins!”

Edmund turned his back to his son and daughter made of the finest fire. As he walked away, slow and deliberate, each step caused an earthquake and turned every nook and cranny into dust.

From their hideouts, the faceless people, once the youngest residents of Gaddon Township, stormed out of their hideouts and charged forwards.

Ripping Tom and Mary’s faces off and exposing their true selves, the faceless people regained their humanity one piece at a time.

When nothing was left of the two wicked siblings made of fire, and Hell no more, the angels descended to the heart of Hell and escorted the children to the only place they belonged.

Gate of Hell - Part IV

Image by kalhh from Pixabay

“Tom! Tom, wake up, already! Come on, dude! You gotta wake up before they come!”

Edmund stooped over him when he warily opened his eyes.

“What’s… what’s going on?”

“You passed out,” said Edmund before letting his eyes shift to the shadows all around them. “Can you walk? Tom! Can you walk or not?”

“Yeah, I- I think so.”

When Tom stumbled up on his feet and looked around, the last thing he expected to see was the suffocating darkness. Where in the whole world were they?

Then he recalled the mysterious shipwreck and the ablaze portal.

His eyes grew wide with terror and he was about to say something aloud when Edmund placed a finger on his lips and hushed him.

“Scchh! Be quiet!”

Tom followed the boy’s darting eyes that settled on the surrounding shadows. That was when he noticed them, too – those faceless people watching their every step.

Gulping hard, Tom whispered, “W- what are those things?”

“Don’t look at them! You never should!”

“W- why?”

Edmund took his sweet time replying, visibly pondering something before speaking his mind.

“You said you believed in that nonsense, right?”

“The Gospels?”

“Hmm! The Gospels…”

“Yeah, I do… somewhat.”

“Then, you must believe in the hereafter I suppose?”

Tom knitted his brows. “The hereafter?” He briefly looked away. “Like… Hell?”

Edmund nodded. “Yes, Hell.”

Tom cast another look around upon realising what the other meant. But how could this be? How could two humans still alive and kicking be in Hell? It made no sense!

“Listen, you asked me about my mum, remember?”

“I- I did…”

Edmund drew a deep breath before he continued. “The truth is, my mum’s been dead for the last ten years. She caught a wicked disease and passed away shortly after giving birth to me.”

“What are you trying to say? What’s that got to do with—”

“My dad said she’s in Hell because she abandoned us! He said all womenfolk who die at childbirth are bound to rot in the bottomless pit and pay for their sins.”

“I… I don’t understand.”

“You said you believed in the Gospels!”

“I- I do, I just don’t—”

“It’s written in the Gospels, Tom! My dad said so!”

“What’s written… exactly? I’m- I’m sorry, I’m having trouble following.”

“That with the mist, opens the Gate of Hell!”

“Gate… of Hell?”

“And we’ve found it! We really—”

“You lied to me!” Tom backed away as Edmund tried to reach out to him. “Why would you do such a thing!”

“I… I thought you wouldn’t come here if I told you the truth.”

“Yeah, you bet I wouldn’t! Are you out of your mind! Gate of Hell!?”

Edmund dropped his head. “I’m- I’m sorry. I just… I just didn’t want to come here all alone.” He looked up. “Honestly, I didn’t even think the Gospels were telling the truth. I thought it was all some made-up story…”

“What now! What were you thinking coming here? Do you even know what your mum looks like? And even if you do…”

Tom couldn’t continue upon seeing the dejected look on Edmund’s flushed face.

“You’re right,” Edmund muttered. “I don’t know what I was thinking. We… we gotta find a way out of this place.”

“Well, the portal’s gone.”

“There’s gotta be another way out.”

“And if there isn’t?”

Edmund took his time replying. “There has to be! Tom, I promise you. I’ll get us back home no matter what, okay? I promise!”

Gate of Hell – Part III

Image by Rick Khan from Pixabay

The rusty shipwreck looked like a relic forever lost in time. Algae and other kinds of microorganisms had eaten through its metallic surface and turned it soft and rotten. It was a miracle it washed ashore in this poor condition.

“W- we should return now,” stuttered Tom, visibly fraught with horror at the sight of the massive ghost ship that washed ashore after the storm. “It’s too dark out here and so bitterly cold!”

“What are droning on about? Let’s go inside and take a look!”

“Wait, what?”

Before Tom could get another word in, Edmund rushed forwards and climbed the tilted shipwreck.

“Hold on! What are you doing! Edmund! Get down! Get down before something bad happens!”

But Edmund didn’t listen to a single word he said, and before Tom could make his trembling legs listen to him and advance, the boy disappeared into the shipwreck.

Reluctantly, Tom clenched his jaw and went after Edmund. Why was he so stubborn, he thought, before climbing up to the barely stable deck.

“Edmund! Edmund, where are you! Edmund!”

When no reply returned, panic set in.

What if something bad happened to him? Thinking of the worst possible scenarios, Tom picked up the pace and searched every nook and cranny while calling out to his new friend.

Seconds morphed into minutes, and before he realised it, several hours flew by.

Left with no option but to seek help from the grown-ups back in the market square, he made up his mind to return to the woods, when a sudden clamour arrested him.

It came from the captain’s cabin, which was blocked off by the mizzen and main mast, which collided and now looked like a cross. It was impossible to reach the captain’s cabin.

There was, however, a small gap where those two wooden poles crossed. Without a second thought, he squeezed in through the gap and entered the cramped chamber.

It wasn’t that he did not expect to see anything but the spectacle before him was anything but ordinary, or something a kid like himself could conjure up in his wildest dream.

A mighty portal ablaze with what seemed and felt like a miniature storm within stood before him. Taking a careful step forwards, he stretched out his hand only to retreat in the same second.

Like a black hole, the stormy portal sucked him in.

“E- Edmund? Edmund, are you here? Ed—”

Through the raging storm inside the portal, a hand reached out to him and a shrill scream drowned out as soon as it reached his ears. Before he realised it, his feet moved and the portal took him with it to the abode of the damned.

Gate of Hell - Part II

Photo by he zhu on Unsplash 

“Hey! Yes, you! Hurry!”

Edmund waved the blond boy over from where he hid behind the blueberry bushes across the churchyard. He had seen the kid working the field across Nanny Ruth’s farmhouse down the single-lane road before, but other than that, he hardly knew the boy.

Ever since the strange mist took over their settlement and took his friends with it to god-knows-where, he didn’t once consider that another kid survived The Purge – especially, not this scrawny thing made of bones.

“What do you want?” Tom said.

“The shipwreck! Let’s go see it!”

“What? No! Didn’t you hear what the—”

“Oh, come on! You really believe in all that drivel? Gospels? Hah! More like a made-up fairytale!”

Tom, acutely aware of how close they were to the communion members, hushed him before blurting out the following through gritted teeth.

“Are you out of your mind! What if they hear you!”

“Are coming with me or not?”

Tom sighed. “Do you even know my name, Edmund Keyes?”

Edmund’s eyes grew wide and sparkled.

“Wow! You knew my name all along and still ignored me during the sermon?”

“I wasn’t trying to avoid you…”

“Then what were you doing, then?” Edmund pointed at Tom so suddenly that the poor thing flinched. “You! You were clearly trying to avoid me back there!”

“It’s just… I’m not used to… talking to people, that’s all! Besides, when the other kids were around, you never paid me any attention – not that the others did, either…”

“Really?” Edmund paused for a second to jog his memory. “Now that you say that, I don’t remember ever talking to you…”

“That’s because all you ever did was play with Jordan and- and—”

“But why didn’t you join us then? It’s not like we’d tell you off or something…”

Tom’s mouth gaped wide. “Seriously? I tried, remember!?”

“Oh, you did?”

“You don’t remember, do you?”

Edmund cracked a smile. “I must’ve been harsh on you I guess?”

“Harsh? Harsh! You said I was a loser and told me to scram it!”

Edmund scratched the back of his head. “Hey, I’m sorry, all right? Let’s forget about the past and focus on the present, yeah?”

“After spilling spoilt milk on me, telling me to, quote, ‘go and die’, and then pushing me into the mud in front of your stupid friends?”

Edmund opened his mouth to defend himself, but when Tom continued, he realised that there was no point in defending the things he had done. Since when had he been such a jerk?

“Well, can we at least be acquaintances and explore whatever’s going on at the shore?”

“Only if you promise not to call me a faggot again—wait a sec! You don’t remember calling me that either, do you?”

Edmund, smiling wide, ran for the hills as his new friend ran after him to give him a beating. It wasn’t that he feared getting hurt, for Tom’s hands were literally made of sticks, but because he hadn’t had this much fun teasing someone ever since the fog rolled in.  

When they finally slowed down in front of the forest trail that led to the shore, Edmund glanced at the darkening sky full of twinkling stars. How long had it been since he last saw the stars and the moon?

“Hey, Edmund…”

“Hmm?” he said without looking at the boy.

“Maybe this isn’t such a great idea after all.”

He faced Tom this time. “Don’t tell me you really believe in the Gospels?”

“There’s no reason for me not to.”

“It’s just a fairytale, you know? To scare people.”

“How do you know?”

“My dad told me. He’s an atheist.”

“Ath—what’s that?”

“Someone who doesn’t believe in fairytales,” he said, adding. “Dad said my mum helped him open his eyes and see the truth for what it is when they first met.”

“Ah, I see. But where’s your mum? I don’t remember ever seeing her…”

Edmund hesitated. “It’s a long story.” He then took the lead through the thick woods and picked up the pace. “Hurry now! We shouldn’t be late!”

“Late?” repeated Tom as he tried to catch up to Edmund. “Late for what? Edmund! Hey! What do you mean?”

But Edmund didn’t reply.

His darting eyes focused on the narrowing path ahead swallowed by the depths of the dense woods. In the shadows, he could almost hear their soundless breathing and feel their icy touch on his bare skin.

The Gate of Hell finally unlocked.

Gate of Hell – Part I

Photo by Brad Switzer on Unsplash

It was the 21st of November 1829.

The storm raged on for over two weeks without respite and blocked off all roads to Gaddon Township. No one understood why or how something like this could happen in their serene settlement, where nothing out of the ordinary ever happened.

When the mist rolled in a fortnight ago and blanketed everything in patches of fog, the last thing the townspeople expected was to be trapped in profound darkness and not see the light of day for two weeks.

The crops wilted, the flowers stopped blooming, and the clear air grew thick with nauseating fumes. Children suffocated to death in their sleep, as did the livestock, the pregnant miscarried and those who tried to conceive were left infertile.

On the seventeenth night, however, the deluge finally retreated and the air cleared up. On the surface, everything went back to normal. It didn’t.

The stroke of ill fortune carried on, and before the townspeople knew, only a handful of them pulled through.

From the twenty-tree children who once resided in Gaddon Township, only two survived what the remaining townspeople now dubbed ‘The Purge’.

One of these two fortunate kids was Edmund Keyes and the other was Tom Baker.

Edmund was a year older than Tom and was the only son of broke homme d'affaires, who relocated to Gaddon Township to take flight from his debtors. The Keyes earned their living working their fingers to the bone as husbandry workers for good ol’ Nanny Ruth.

The elderly woman had never wed and was born and raised in Gaddon Township. She inherited a lot of riches from her parents when they passed away two decades ago. She was now the most well-off person in the entire settlement.

Tom, on the other hand, was the youngest of eight children, with seven of them being girls. The Bakers worked the corn fields for the other townspeople and earned a shilling or two slaving through the day.

Those two, Edmund and Tom, however, had never crossed paths before.

When the parish priest, Mr Gilbert, told everyone to meet at the churchyard the day after the storm faded, that was the first time they saw each other.

“This is a bad omen,” preached Mr Gilbert, taking a short pause to make sure he had everyone’s attention. “Goody Jon, can you please tell these good folks what you’ve told me.”

Goody Jon, an elderly man with a hunchback who miraculously survived what those in the height of their youth could not, stepped forwards.

“Aye, indeed, it is a bad omen, good folks!”

Everyone held their breaths.

“As you are aware, ever since my lovely Rae passed away, I’ve taken a walk on the shore to reminisce our dying memories. Yesterday, when the mist cleared, I found something washed ashore, good people! A shipwreck a hundred years or more old!”

“Why’s it a bad omen, then, Goody Jon? Something so harmless, at that!” someone asked.

“Fool! Don’t you know the Gospels!”

Mr Gilbert, “Please, take a seat, Goody Jon. I’ll take over from here.”

Albeit reluctant, Goody Jon returned to his seat.

“Dear friends, it seems the Judgement Day is upon us all. No, calm down good folks! There you go! Let me finish, ye?”

The commotion died as soon as it happened. The townspeople had a lot of trust in the priest and heeded his every word like they were from the Lord Himself.

“It is of utmost importance none of you goes near the shipwreck. I know it’s harder than what it sounds like. But you must stay away at all times. Is that clear? Goody Jon?”

The elderly man muttered something that sounded like something between a sneer and a swear.

“As soon as the hills of snow melt, I’ll send a word to Bishop Tomas and we’ll figure something out. Until then, no one is permitted to—”

“Aye, we get it! How many times will ya repeat?” someone interrupted. The others agreed, and yet another commotion broke out. This time, however, it took more than a few minutes for Mr Gilbert to calm down the communion and get his voice heard.

“All right, then! Good folks, listen up! Let’s conclude with a sermon and a prayer.”