Under the Radar

Photo by Andy Li on Unsplash

“The law of supply and demand is crucial for our understanding of the free market. If the price is too high, supply will exceed demand. But if it’s too low, demand will exceed supply. Remember, the market always seeks equilibrium. Any other questions?”

A female student Professor Ismael recognises from a previous class shoots her hands up in the air. She is one of three female students who wear the symbol of submission, the hijab, and proudly show their religious upbringing.

He waits for a few seconds before addressing her. He knows from his vast experience as a senior professor that students sometimes ask a question they already know the answer to and want to give her a few seconds to come to her own conclusion.

“Yes, you over there.”

“Isn’t the law of supply and demand too simplistic to explain real-world markets, sir? What about markets with monopolies or oligopolies?”

“Good question! The law, of course, helps us understand general trends, but it’s not meant to explain every nuance in every market. In monopolistic or oligopolistic markets, where there is one dominant seller or few sellers, the law of supply and demand can still apply, but it behaves differently. You’ll learn more about how these kinds of markets work in greater detail in your next class. Anything else?”

Silence. This is a good sign. The clock reads 3:57 p.m., and not only is he drained from having classes back-to-back, but so are the students at the University of Baghdad, who have had classes since early in the morning.

“All right, then, that’s all for today’s lecture. Please make sure to pack up your stuff and I’ll see you next time.”

A former fighter pilot for the Iraqi military during the Cold War and an honorary member of the Chair of the Board of Trustees, he is one of the most respected professors at the university. Adhering strictly to the rules, he is described as both “book smart” and “well-rounded” by his colleagues in the Faculty of Microeconomics.

After answering the remaining students’ questions about today’s lecture, he waits five more minutes until the last student finally exits the auditorium.

According to the schedule, however, he still has one more lecture left for the day in the same auditorium, so he briefly leaves his belongings and goes out to grab a cup of coffee before the start of the next class.

It is during this time that the fire alarm goes off.

Given the large size of the Microeconomics department and with no fire or smoke in immediate sight, he decides to return to the auditorium and take his stuff with him. Theft has been a huge issue over the past couple of years, and he can’t afford to lose his lecture notes and slides due to, what he assumes, is a prank at that point in time.

The alarm keeps ringing as he puts his laptop computer into his leather bag and sets off towards the emergency exit staircase, which leads to the faculty emergency exit grounds. But as he descends the emergency exit staircase, he notices a smell he recognises as sulphur from his time as a fighter pilot.

Now this isn’t a smell he’d pay any attention to on any normal day, but the unusual circumstances, coupled with the nostalgic inputs from his subconscious, make him follow the foul and sharp odour as he continues to descend towards the lab floor.

The first thought taking over his mind is a malfunction of the air conditioning system (HVAC) located in the utility room. But when he fails to unlock the room, he decides to return to the main floor and give maintenance a call.

As he inches closer to the emergency exit door, however, he realises that the temperature has risen too abruptly. This prompts him to return to the utility room and follow the sharp odour for a second time. It is also at this point that he notices something he missed the first time. The student lounge room, located farthest back in the corridor, is cracked open.

The student lounge room, as well as all other non-staff rooms, is part of a new system the university has employed over the last few years to ensure the safety of the students after a particular incident occurred back in 2003.

The previous safety system employed a one-way access protocol, where students had to physically bring a staff member, often the administrator or receptionist, to the student lounge to physically unlock the door. The staff were, however, required to register this in the safety log to prevent the system from setting off an “unauthorised access” alarm.

But they weren’t the only ones with a working access card – the professors, as well as all other staff members, also had similar access cards for obvious reasons. These, however, did not trigger the said alarms.

The safety protocols at the time of the accident did not consider these entries as safety hazards. But to err on the side of caution, the professors, as well as other staff members, were instructed to refer the students to the reception in case they requested entrance to the student lounge rooms or other kinds of group study rooms.

The new system, of course, now works vastly differently. Each staff member now has limited access to certain floors, rooms, and areas. A staff member with access to floor 1 thus has no access to floor 2 and needs access to that floor through another staff member’s access card.

What set off this new system, however, is a case that Professor Ismael only heard about through the grapevine in the professors’ office over the years. Although it is an incident that should never have happened or been allowed to happen, the aftermath of the entire ordeal now ensures that better and safer protocols are employed. As they say in the aviation industry, “every protocol and safety measure is written in blood.”

It is the 26th of October 2003, approximately eight years ago from today’s date.

Over the course of a few weeks, the weather has deteriorated severely, and it is the first day of the holy Ramadan. Due to these external factors, the university is unusually empty, and only a third of the students and staff members are present.

An undisclosed female student, referred to as victim K in the official police records, enters the Faculty of Microeconomics around 1:15 p.m.

This timestamp, as well as all others following this, is undisputedly correct. The investigators know this because the student used her student ID card extensively on the day of the incident.

Investigators also later discovered that the victim planned to enter the main auditorium, H134, via section B, after texting a friend that she’d lost her keys, possibly in the auditorium where she’d had a lecture the previous day.

This female friend becomes a huge lead later on and helps the investigators timestamp the victim’s last moments more accurately. But at the time all this happens, of course, neither the investigators nor the said friend knew this.

At around 1:29, the security camera in the emergency exit staircase captures victim K, shaken, as she descends the staircase and keeps going until she reaches the lab floor. Seconds later, the entire faculty goes into a blackout and all subsequent records perish.

The first message that establishes the victim’s whereabouts comes around 1:34. From this message, the investigators know that the victim is now hiding in the student lounge room and urgently asks her friend to call the police.

Half a minute later, at around 1:35, the female friend replies with something along the lines of, “Why?” and shortly afterwards, “You okay?”

To this, the victim does not respond for about five minutes. The time now shows 1:41. But the tone of the subsequent messages after this makes the investigators suspect the victim is no longer the one responding.

“I’m okay” is the victim’s second-to-last message, followed shortly by “Don’t call the police.” Investigators link this to the fact that, at that point, the perpetrator or perpetrators had gone through what the victim had sent to her friend and were beginning to panic.

At timestamp 2:56, power returns to the faculty. All working security cameras show no anomalies. The few people who have been trapped inside the building at this time, both staff members and students, now exit the faculty.

When the timestamp shows 3:18, another blackout occurs and is later noted by the security system as an “induced blackout,” disclosing to the investigators that someone has manually shut down the entire building. This second blackout lasts no more than two hours.

At this point, the victim’s parents contact the police and a missing person search is initiated – but only after seven more hours pass. Due to the faulty policies employed by the Baghdad police force at the time, a 24-hour policy is strictly followed, and no missing person report is accepted.

That’s when the victim’s exchange with her friend reaches the police officers, and a formal missing person report is filed. But it’s too late – by about three hours. The victim’s half-naked body, with her underwear stuffed into her mouth, is found by the dispatched team led by lead investigator, Detective Achmad.

A junior investigator is later reported to have said in subsequent interviews with the press that “the body had deteriorated way more than what it should have” considering the time of death and the time of discovery.

This discrepancy in the rate of deterioration, which the autopsy report describes as “non-normal swelling of the internal organs due to external factors,” leads the investigative team, particularly Detective Achmad, to consider one possible scenario.

The HVAC is now a major lead, and the investigative team sends the output and input data recorded in the system log to Forensics for further analysis. This takes approximately two weeks. The system log records abnormally high temperatures and manipulation of oxygen levels, which aligns with the reported hypoxia symptoms recorded by the dispatched team upon entering the lab floor.

The profile of the suspect or suspects is now clear to the investigative team. They are dealing with someone with vast technical knowledge, who can manipulate both the HVAC and blackout systems, while also having greater-than-average knowledge of pathology and the degree to which the body deteriorates in different scenarios and extreme external configurations.

A thorough background check of the entire staff and attending students available to the investigators at the time, however, does not yield the kind of niche profile they are looking for. The criminal profiler in the US, to whom the investigators sent the translated documents, states that none of the listed individuals could be the perpetrator or perpetrators.

As this lead goes cold, Detective Achmad now decides to focus on the staff and students who were inside the faculty building before and during the two induced blackouts.

They focus their investigation on suspect A, an employee who had been kicked out due to undisclosed reasons, and suspect C, a male student who is the last and only person the victim engaged with before the first blackout.

The investigators know this due to secured footage from the hallway of section B by the main auditorium, which shows the victim trying to unlock the door but fails repeatedly before suspect C appears on screen for approximately half a minute.

During his witness statement, suspect C is recorded saying he had had no interaction with the victim and that he wasn’t aware she was in the building at the time of the first blackout. But the footage shows suspect C engaging in small talk with the victim, which the suspect initially denies during the subsequent hearing – now as a prime suspect – before he finally confesses.

When asked by the lead detective why he denied interacting with the victim during the witness hearing, suspect C does not give an immediate reply and requests a lawyer instead.

This event prompts the press to announce in the local newspaper that the prime suspect is the perpetrator of the case and that the police are trying to secure more evidence to bring forth to the attorney in charge.

This is not an outcome the police expect, and as the public demands the prime suspect’s arrest and trial, this puts immense pressure on the investigative team, who are not wholly convinced suspect C is the one they are looking for.

But why do they think that? As mentioned earlier, the profile they are looking for is someone with an above-average IQ, a vast knowledge of different technological and mechanical systems, as well as an interest in pathology.

Suspect C, however, during his initial health check-up, is reported to have an IQ just below 90 and no other reported hobbies but football and video games, according to his two roommates and family members.

Things, however, are out of the investigative team’s control, and the authorities disregard Detective Achmad’s complaints about the lack of evidence. They now force the attorney in charge to issue a formal arrest warrant. The evidence required for such a procedure is manipulated, resulting in the arrest of suspect C on the evening of 18 November 2003.

Now, this is a time of massive public unrest, and only a few months after the invasion of the US troops to secure oil for Uncle Sam under the code name “Operation Iraqi Freedom” has come to a belated end.

It is in the ruling authorities’ interest to put down any public outrage, arrest the suspected perpetrator, and focus all leads on the capture of The Butcher of Baghdad who’s still on the run.

The investigative team, due to these circumstances, is now pressed to obey orders from their higher-ups, and suspect C is officially recognised as the prime suspect.

Detective Achmad, however, continues the investigation behind closed doors and through his own means. His close-knit team members, consisting of two junior detectives and one investigator-in-training, now focus on suspect A, who has not been interrogated formally as a suspect up until this point.

Suspect A’s witness statement and recorded hearing show high stress levels in his voice and body language, especially when the lead investigator asks about his relationship with the victim, to which he firmly denies having any relationship.

After sketching a timeline of suspect A’s proposed alibi and securing evidence of his whereabouts, they note something the first team of investigators missed – most likely due to the public’s ongoing outrage and demand for the death penalty, as well as the pressure from their higher-ups to conclude the investigation as soon as possible.

At around 1:27, two minutes before the first blackout is recorded on the security log, suspect A is caught heading towards the malfunctioning CAM03, near another emergency exit staircase that is not commonly used by students but is frequented by staff members.

This staircase is therefore not an uncommon route for the suspect in question to use. But the circumstances are abnormal.

Suspect A has been formally discharged from his service as a janitor due to undisclosed reasons by HR and is not supposed to have access to this part of the faculty at any time at this point.

But the system records show that he has used his ID card extensively, a whopping 15 times in the course of half an hour. This unauthorised use later causes the HR department to investigate their failed adherence to the safety protocols. This interim investigation later reveals that the Head of HR at the time of the crime is a friend of suspect A.

These findings prompt Detective Achmad to formally request an arrest warrant from the attorney in charge, but his requests are dismissed and the reasons recorded as “insufficient evidence provided.”

The lead detective, after complaining about this unfounded dismissal, is let go from his position as lead detective and demoted. His untimely transfer and demotion raise eyebrows within the police force, but no one comes forwards to defend the detective.

The case closes.

Until now.

As Professor Ismael enters the ajar student lounge room, holding his breath from the increasingly foul odour taking over, a horrific sight unfolds. A young woman, naked from the abdomen down and her hands bound together with duct tape, lies on the lino floor with her back turned to him.

That’s around the same time he experiences the first signs of low oxygen and the increased temperature that keeps surging. Startled, he storms out and ascends the emergency exit staircase close to the student lounge room. As he fumbles to pull his phone out and dial the emergency services, he forgets all about the fire alarm still blaring in the backdrop.

The entire faculty has been evacuated by the time he reaches the main floor. That’s when the power shuts off and he loses his grip on the phone. He runs towards the nearest exit, but due to the blackout, the automatic doors do not open.

He realises soon, as the sirens blare in the background, that he’s not only in a full-blown lockdown, but that the building is on fire and the smoke is now visible to the naked eye.

He knows from previous experience that it takes the firefighters ten minutes to get to the faculty, but this is not any normal day. It’s the last day of Ramadan and time moves slowly when it’s 33 degrees Celsius outside and with unusually high humidity levels from the Persian Gulf.

He figures soon that it’ll take somewhere between 20 to 30 minutes before the firefighters arrive. But with the heightened levels of smoke he sees, coupled with the low level of oxygen he just experienced, he figures that it’ll take no less than fifteen minutes for the concentrated Carbon Monoxide levels to knock him out.

And from what he observes, the fire originates from the second floor, which means the colourless smoke is more concentrated on the second and third floors of the building but will quickly spread uniformly throughout all four floors as it cools down.

This observation leaves him with two options. He either has to break the bullet-proof glass and flee in no less than fifteen minutes, or he must navigate to the lab floor where the oxygen level is manipulated and hope the firefighters arrive before whoever configured the oxygen levels returns it to a normal level and feeds the fire.

He chooses the latter option.

While this is an unorthodox choice by any means and one that is very much reckless by any normal standard, he knows from his time as a fighter pilot that Carbon Monoxide poisoning is more lethal and immediate than hypoxia.

The lab floor is just as vacant as earlier, only this time he sees that the utility room is cracked open. By then, however, he’s halfway down the corridor and closer to the student lounge room than the emergency exit staircase on the other side of the corridor.

But he doesn’t want to take any chances and decides to take the other emergency exit staircase when he notices that someone’s on the move in the utility room.

This prompts him to quickly enter the student lounge room rather than get caught by whoever is hiding in the utility room, which he now believes could be no one but the perpetrator himself.

After sneaking back into the student lounge room, now re-experiencing the returning symptoms of hypoxia, he studies the victim, whom he recognises as the female student who challenged the law of supply and demand earlier in his class.

But his surprise doesn’t end there.

The victim snaps her eyes open and screams.

He sits on her and covers her mouth, in a state of panic, as she slowly stops moving. Only when she’s completely incapacitated does he realise that he has smothered her to death in the chaos that broke out.

While this unfortunate outcome could’ve been prevented, he acknowledges that his lack of situational awareness is due to the low levels of oxygen as well as the fight-or-flight response of his body, but also due to what he now suspects is Carbon Monoxide poisoning coming in through the vents.

Covering the victim with his blazer, afraid of what his body is now capable of, he recognises that whoever did this to the victim in the first place is probably now approaching to check on her. With this still fresh on his mind, he sprints out of the student lounge room and into the restroom across from it.

But this relief is short-lived.

The blazer.

With his heart in his mouth, he returns to the student lounge room and takes his blazer with him, storming out of the lounge room without once looking back and locking himself into one of the stalls.

The first thing he hears seconds after this quick manoeuvre is footsteps. What he doesn’t expect at this point, however, is how abruptly they stop. He calculates that the perpetrator has stopped in the doorway of the student lounge room, not fully going in to check on the victim.

The footsteps move away soon afterwards and grow fainter with each passing second, until he recognises the thud of the nearest emergency exit staircase opening and closing.

This unexpected event sets off a lot of questions in his mind, and while trying to figure out what’s going on outside, he hears the emergency exit staircase door opening and closing for the second time. All these sequences of events take no less than three minutes in total.

Then, the emergency exit staircase door opens and closes for a third time.

A subtle click reverberates through the empty corridor, telling him that someone has locked the emergency exit door and trapped him in there.

But he has stopped feeling panic at this point.

His sanity deteriorates, and so do his erratic body movements. He recognises that he’ll soon lose all control of his body and needs to act fast.

As the first signs of outside help reach him from the vents, sending blares of sirens all over the vacant lab floor, he takes off his belt and secures it on the tap. It’ll take the Carbon Monoxide to off him somewhere between seven and ten minutes, and the hypoxia will render him unable to control his body in less than three minutes, but keep him alive much longer.

He feels his body stiffen and his lower extremities harden with the surge of blood increasing to his lower half.

After making sure the belt is fast and won’t break on him, he ties a knot around his throat and, after a moment of hesitation, lowers himself.

As the saliva drips down the side of his mouth, the first crack from his thyroid reaches his ears, the only organ now picking up signals. By the three-minute mark, he’s on a full-blown erection, and his body now fully reacts to the effects of the hypoxia before he loses all vital parameters that have kept him alive up until this point.

When the firefighters, the first to arrive at the crime scene, find the victim and Professor Ismael, they soon relay to the investigators in charge the nature of their findings and the semen they’ve found on the tiled floor.

However, due to the rapid and extreme deterioration of the victim’s body, no semen can be secured on her body, although signs of forceful penetration are noticed by the pathologist in the initial autopsy report. The cause of death is recorded as “loss of oxygen to vital organs leading to heart failure.”

When the identity of Professor Ismael as the prime suspect reaches the press, a witness soon comes forwards and recounts the events leading up to what the local press refers to as a “copycat of the sexually motivated rape and murder case of 2003.”

The witness is a reinstated janitor and former military officer who played a key role in leading the democratisation process under the U.S. administration during the 2003 invasion. He had unfairly lost his job that same year following accusations of improper conduct made by a female student.

The key witness tells the interviewing journalist during a TV appearance that he’s witnessed the crime in person and recounts his horrific encounter with Professor Ismael as “bone-chilling” and one which he does not want to “repeat ever again.”

He concludes the interview by saying he hopes “a day will come when the women of Baghdad can live without fearing for their lives at the hands of savage men,” – a statement that gains nationwide recognition and applause, prompting the international media to label the now 66-year-old as “the Guardian of Children and Women’s Rights for Liberation and Equality.”

Meanwhile, mass applause breaks out in a municipal police station outside of Baghdad, cheering as the 66-year-old receives a joint award from two of the most internationally renowned charity organizations.

Detective Achmad looks at the milling crowd of officers applauding all around him with a hardened look on his face before exiting.

This imposed democracy has once again failed to protect women, and instead of holding the perpetrators accountable, those entrusted with upholding the democratic system now celebrate them.

Pulling up a pack of cigarettes, he inhales the poisonous smoke before drawing a last drag and putting it out with his foot. As the cheers continue in the background, he pulls out his Glock 19 and puts the barrel under his chin.

The Boole Reservoir

Photo by Yann Allegre on Unsplash

Part I

The Boole Reservoir stretched across a lush woodland that supported three villages on the outskirts of a snow-capped mountain.

Hikers climbed to the summit to look over the vast vicinity enclosed by a great forest and quenched their thirst with the ice-cold water flowing down to the reservoir.

What the locals knew, but outsiders did not, was the legends that circulated in this godforsaken place shrouded in mystery. This was why the locals never set out into the woods after sunset and warned their children to return home before dusk.

They believed that a lonely spirit roamed this reservoir blanketed in crushing ice. She dwelled in the ominous body of water and lured unfortunate souls to their ill-fated demise.

She preferred unsuspecting children it was believed, and she took her sweet time to gobble them up alive, relishing in their tender flesh and screams for their mother.

But this was only a made-up tale to scare miniature humans. The truth was much more sinister and unsettling.

Like many similar legends passed down from generation to generation, the myth about the lonely spirit haunting The Boole Reservoir was based on a real story – a story long forgotten in the bygones.

And whatever the truth was back in those days, it had now become a faint memory. Like everything else in this mundane life with no purpose, the truth dispersed and only the made-up parts remained as a distant token of its existence.

I first heard about the reservoir and the stories surrounding it through a good friend of mine, Mark Ryder. He and his family were from one of the nearby villages the reservoir provided clean water.

Mark and I both studied mechanical engineering in our early twenties but didn’t become close until the last semester. He was somewhat of a recluse back then and hardly spoke a word unless he was required to.

He said most of the villages in that area were now ghost towns and that only a handful of people remained, most of which were too old to move or too stubborn to leave everything behind and start anew somewhere else.

I asked him why and that was when he told me about the rumours and myths surrounding that place. And to be honest, these rumours failed to deter me from taking an interest in the reservoir – on the contrary, they piqued my interest.

I was a city boy, all right, and grew up as an only child. My parents were both workaholics, so I never set off to the countryside like the majority of my peers.

Growing up, I always imagined myself leading a dull but peaceful life in the country, taking in the pitch-black night sky and watching the twinkling stars too shy to show their head in the city.

Besides, the only thing I was remotely afraid of was the darkness. But not the one that came with the darkening welkin. I’m not sure how to put this into words: like when the temperature plummets without warning during a hike and distorts your thoughts, that kind of creeping darkness that comes out of nowhere is what chills me to the bone.

I led a normal life up until that point in my life, but I didn’t have anything to look forward to. It was the same routine day in and day out. Like a robot without its own will, I slaved through each day without a purpose and goal in life.

It wasn’t that I did not enjoy my life. That wasn’t it! I met my partner, Ann, during work and loved every single moment I spent with her. We had the same taste in music, enjoyed fishing during winter, and even came from the same background.

But something was missing. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was; I only knew that my breath became more and more laboured with each passing day.

It’s silly, I know, but these are the reasons I did what I did next. I shouldn’t have, I…

Why couldn’t I just be satisfied with my mundane life and lead a normal life? The answer eludes me, perhaps you’ll figure out the reason by the time this story ends.

Part II

One evening, as we were heading home from the gym, sweaty and exhausted beyond words, I asked Mark something I now regret deeply – I asked if he could show me it. The Boole Reservoir.

Mark didn’t want to at first and droned on about how dangerous it was, but I insisted and he threw in the towel on one condition: he was not coming with me.

I didn’t mind as long as he provided me with a solid address, and he did. I told Ann that I was travelling for work and that it would be hard to reach me. Mark promised, albeit reluctantly, he wouldn’t breathe a word about my whereabouts to Ann should she ask.

Unlike me, she was superstitious and a real hippie gal. I knew she would talk me out of going to the reservoir if I told her. So I packed my stuff – two days’ worth of clothes and whatnot – and set off on my journey in the dead of night.

I worked part-time as a deliveryman on the weekends so driving in the dark was not enough to scare me. But as soon as I approached my destination and turned left into a roadway obscured by trees on either side, I slowed the car down a notch and decided to be safe rather than sorry.

It was pitch-black: no streetlamps, no nothing. I was essentially on my way into the depths of a forested vicinity, and there were no signs of life anywhere.

I hit the brakes and lurched forwards. The roadway came to a sudden end and my car tipped over the edge of an embarkment.

My eyes shifted towards the dark and blank body of water in front of me, and I quickly put the car into reverse and barely managed to move it away from the edge.

I glanced at the GPS before turning off the engine and realised belatedly that I had reached my destination. Visibly shocked by the near-death experience, I hesitated for a few seconds before stepping out.

It was the seventh of August and the weather was chilly, but not to the point where I needed to wear two layers of clothes or a beanie.

I let the doors stay unlocked and closed in on the embarkment. Had I not slowed the pace earlier, I would’ve plunged right into the reservoir and drowned to death.

The strangest part, however, was the fact that the GPS did not say anything. Not a single peep, whatsoever. It usually did, mind, when I neared my destination, but it didn’t breathe a single word this time.

It wasn’t on mute just a few minutes ago when I turned left and continued down the shadow-shrouded roadway. Something did not add up at all, but I didn’t know what to make of these strange occurrences.

I wasn’t superstitious like Ann or as easily frightened as Mark to believe the rumours about this place. But now I wasn’t so sure… I just escaped death by a margin and was still trying to recollect myself and think straight.

I observed the babbling reservoir the entire time, perhaps to make sure I was alone and the rumours were nothing but made-up fairytales.

It did the trick.

My heart calmed down a tad and I drew a deep breath when nothing out of the ordinary happened for the next five minutes.

I fished up my Canon from my backpack in the trunk and captured the serene reservoir to prove to Mark that the rumours about this place were nothing but a hoax. “Look,” I wanted to say when I returned home, “nothing happened to me.”

But the quality was off due to the ridiculous darkness that only seemed to deepen the longer I stayed here. Since I had enough food for two days, I decided to spend the night here and then capture the reservoir in the morning hours instead.

It became colder than I anticipated as the night deepened though, so I placed a chequered quilt over my shoulders, which I had forgotten in the trunk from my and Ann’s last outing a few days ago.

I slept soundly for the most part. I did wake up a few times, slightly confused as to where I was, but then fell right back into dreamland.

But what woke me up? I’m not really sure, to be honest. I thought I heard a faint din come through from the outside, right next to me and on the other side of the window, but when I turned my head towards the din no one was there.

At first, I brushed it off as part of my lively imagination and the biting cold, but then it happened two, three, and all of a sudden six or more times throughout the night. Ignoring it became increasingly difficult.

I spent the last two hours before sunset fully awake and did not allow myself to fall asleep again. These things bothered me so much that I decided to send a message to Mark. I told him to hit me up as soon as he saw my message first thing in the morning.

What I expected would strengthen my disbelief in the supernatural turned out to have the exact opposite effect on me. I just wanted it to be morning and then get the heck out of this place for good.

That was when someone banged on the window. I turned my head to the left, in a daze, and the phone slipped through my fingers.

An elderly man in his seventies stood outside my car and kept banging on the window with his fist.

Purple and brown-grey spots covered his bald scalp where strands of whitish hair hang loosely. He wore a patched-up shirt, a brown vest from the fifties and berry-coloured, striped trousers from god-knows-when.

The stranger slouched forwards and seemed to have a difficult time standing up straight. I rolled the window down, and as soon as I did that, he seized my throat with both of his hands and held me in a chokehold.

I fought him off and rolled the window back up. It was harder than it looked from the outside. The man, despite his old age, was as strong as someone in the height of his youth, and it took a great deal of strength to push him away just enough to roll the window up.

He bared his rotten teeth and hissed like a snake from beyond the window, then he calmed down within a heartbeat and looked around himself before whispering something I couldn’t read from his chapped lips mixed with thick saliva.

I followed him until he disappeared into the woodland and then gasped for air, unaware that I held my breath up until that point. I wiped the sweat off my forehead, ditched my plan to capture the reservoir and did a total U-turn.

For good reasons, I was confused but not to the point where I would hallucinate things. But the harder I hit the gas, the longer the roadway became. It felt like I was going in circles and all roads led to the starting point.

I hit the brakes halfway through the vicinity and reached down for my phone, swearing under my breath repeatedly in the meantime.

Although I nudged something under the seat, it was too far away for me to reach without having to physically step out and get hold of it through the passenger seat.

I glanced at the rear-view mirror, made sure I was all alone and then stepped out.

When I finally found my phone, I noticed it was dripping wet and no longer functioning. I touched under the seat again but it was as dry as could be, and I had not drunk anything inside the car so that could hardly explain why my phone became drenched. Besides, it was dry just moments before that old man started to act like a freak.

Still out in the dark, I tried in vain to revive my phone. For a few minutes, I forgot about the old man and why I was in such a hurry to get out of there.

This would end up being my biggest mistake.

As if by magic or with the help of the Devil Himself, the driver’s door slammed shut and locked me out.

The car key was, of course, inside.

I tried to force the door open, but it did not budge. Several minutes passed like this. When I realised there was nothing I could do, I kicked the wheels and swore out loud. I had just fucked up really badly and was frustrated as hell.

Now I stood there, in the middle of a godforsaken roadway with a useless phone, and my only option was to advance down the lane and hitchhike – if I were lucky.

I strode towards the end of the roadway, determined to get the heck out of this place no matter the cost or consequence when I came to the realisation that I indeed went in circles. I hadn’t hallucinated or lost my mind. Not yet.

There was a logical explanation for this occurrence, and it had less to do with the supernatural than the natural. I was so preoccupied with trying to get the hell out of this place that I missed how close I was to the reservoir at some point along the roadway since it ran almost parallel to it.

The blank body of water was still and the current non-existent, so the roadway was reflected off the surface so clearly that I was seeing a mirror image of the roadway this entire time.

Apparently, there was a two-way fork and the reflection I saw made it look like there was only one path, perhaps due to the dim lightning. This other pathway kept leading back to the embarkment.

I ventured to the left this time and, lo-and-behold, I was back on the highway. It was still too early in the morning hours for cars to pass by, but I knew which direction I had come from and figured it was best to carry on than stay put this close to the reservoir.

I recalled passing by a guesthouse and decided to hit up Mark when I arrived there instead of hitchhiking in some stranger’s car. Again, better safe than sorry.

Time and again, tirelessly, I looked over my shoulder to make sure no one was following me in the shadows.

Fifteen minutes later, I reached the guesthouse sign written on a wooden plank on the highway and turned left. Another five minutes passed in the dark like this and I finally reached the two-floor building.

A doorbell gave away my presence as I stepped into the warmth and ambled to the reception in front of me.

This place looked much smaller than from the outside. There was a single winding staircase to the right of the reception, while the entire right side was riddled with old-fashioned settees, ottomans and whatnot. It was as if I had slipped into a time slip and gone back to the seventies.

The atmosphere left a bitter taste in my throat and this sinking feeling worsened as I approached the clerk, who showed up from a cracked door beyond the counter.

The clerk, a middle-aged man from the look of it, sniffed as I closed in and eyed me down. He didn’t look or act surprised despite how dripping wet I was from the downpour outside.

I figured he had seen his fair share of peculiar guests coming in, just like me, and seeking solace in the only place close enough to the reservoir to reach on foot.

He pulled his cowboy hat down a tad and then rested his arms on the counter.

“Your car brok’ down, ye?”

“No, I…” I didn’t know what to say, so I changed the subject. “I’m sorry, can I use the phone? It won’t take long…”

The clerk squinted and leaned forwards. I could tell that he didn’t buy my excuse but still pushed the analogue phone over and let me phone Mark.

As if to make sure I wasn’t trying to pull his legs, the clerk observed me intently as I dialled Mark’s phone number and eagerly waited to hear his familiar voice in this unfamiliar place.

I kept my eyes fixated between the counter and the beat-down floorboards, swearing under my breath as no one answered the phone. Unbeknownst and as time ticked by, I clenched my jaw and grew impatient. Come on, Mark! Answer the damn phone!

But the line was dead.

I excused myself again and was about to dial Ann when I stopped midway and hesitated. She didn’t know about my little adventure and god forbid she should ever know I lied to her! I raised my eyes without meaning to and locked eyes with the clerk.

“You want me to tell you when?”

“I’m sorry?”

He pointed at the phone.

“Do you want me to tell you when your friend calls back? You can stay here until he does. I got an empty room—”

“No… no, that won’t be necessary. Uhm, do you perhaps know where I can get help, sir?”

“Oh, you wanna fix your car, ye?”

I nodded. The last thing I wanted was to return to the reservoir on my own. Besides, I did not have enough cash on me to pay for my stay here, either.

Moreover, Mark had a habit of not answering phone calls from unknown callers, and even if he eventually figured I was the one who called him, it would take far many hours for him to notice this than I wanted to stay here – this close to the reservoir, that is.

“Where it at? That car of yours.”

I gestured in the general direction of the reservoir and he knew way before I opened my mouth where I had been. I could tell right away. Something in his eyes changed – something that made him shudder.

He grabbed his beard and fell into a solemn silence. He wasn’t going to help me. I could almost hear his thoughts: “You brought this upon yourself.”

The clerk was one of the locals and he knew something wicked lay there, in the dark body of water surrounded by towering trees and dense thickets.

I stepped back, dejected, then turned my back to the reception and twisted the doorknob. The doorbell rang again. I barely stepped a foot outside, when the clerk asked a question I did not know the answer to.

“What were you thinking goin’ there, son?”

I stepped out.

There was no point in responding to the man. I was doomed either way. The door never slammed shut behind me, though. The clerk followed me outside and grabbed my shoulder, demanding to hear what made me come here and seal my own fate.

“Speak if you have a mouth! Why? Why did you come here!”

“Will you help me, sir, if I tell you the reason?” I briefly looked away. “Do you… do you think you can help me in that case?” The clerk averted my gaze and I broke into a bitter smirk. “See, you can’t answer—”

I never finished my sentence.

The clerk shoved something in my hand, tugged me closer and whispered.

“Get away from here and never look back. Do you understand? Never… look back.”

I knitted my brows and stared down. A car key? With my heart in my mouth, I raised my eyes to ask the stranger why he was giving me this but ended up watching him return to the guesthouse instead.

My eyes shifted to the only vehicle in the otherwise vacant parking lot. Without wasting more time, I rushed forwards and unlocked the car.

The inside smelled just like I imagined it would, like rubbery leather and people as old as the hills. I didn’t know why the clerk gave me his car keys and helped me, but I was forever grateful to him.

I started the motor and hit the road.

My heart raced out of control. All of this felt like a dream. A bad dream I was now waking up from.

I was going back home! I was safe from whatever lurked in the shadows and lay in wait! Tears of joy welled up in my eyes and trickled down my face.

I let out a cry, then another. Crying and laughing at the same time, unable to contain the mixed emotions taking control over every fibre of my being.

I was miserable.

But still alive…

A wide grin curled up on my dry, pallid lips as I drove through the bustling city and drew a deep breath.

Everything slowed down – even my tears.

Then it all became blurry. The city lights faded away and plunged everything into darkness.

I looked behind me through the rear-view mirror.

Before I knew it, I hit something and lurched forwards. My skull broke in half as I smashed my head on the steering wheel and a gush of blood washed over my face and obscured my view.

I blinked. Repeatedly.

Someone banged on the car window. I raised my half-open eyes covered in crimson and rolled the window down. Slowly. It required all my strength.

The old man did not attack me. He pointed to the left, across the windshield, and to something right in front of me. I never managed to twist my neck and take a look at whatever it was, although its presence was so strong that I felt its icy gaze on me with every fibre of my body.

My Ford tipped over the embarkment and the reservoir swallowed me into the depths.

This place, I never left it. That elderly man wasn't out to get me after all, he was trying to warn me…

Voice of God - Part VII [Final Part]

Photo by Mateus Campos Felipe on Unsplash

“Ms Carlton…? What’s the matter?”

I tried to contain my tears, but it was easier said than done. 

“They… they’re going to—these people, they… I don’t know where to begin, I… I just want to get away from this place but… but…”

“I’ll come pick you up, okay? Do you think you can meet me in the woods? Ms Carlton?”

I shook my head. “No, I- I can’t. They—you don’t understand, they’re…”

“I’m calling the police.” He took a short pause. “It’s… Everything’s gonna be fine, okay?”

“… Okay.”

He hung up.

I packed my stuff in haste and set out into the darkness.

I had two options: I either did as Nath told me and played God or made a break for it and wished upon the stars that the police find Vera before it was too late.

The woods were as lonely as I recalled.

Closing in on the spot where I met the retired journalist for the first time, I got the feeling that someone watched over me.

I looked around me in the murk, trying to discern something – anything – out of the ordinary.

This delayed me for about half a minute or so.

When I noticed the flashlights to the right, I hurried towards the roadway only to baulk.

David Chapman was there.

But he was not alone.

The guy I saw in the church, the one who was with Nath, was right beside him.

They were whispering; they were looking for me.

As the beam of blinding light pointed at me, I cowered behind a clump of bushes and held my breath.

The duo neared.

I was losing my mind trying to figure out what was going on.

That was when I overheard their bizarre conversation and knew the police were not on their way.

“You think she figured it out?”

The journalist, “No, she sounded clueless. She must be on her way; I’m sure.”

“What do we do with her when she comes?”

“I’ll have to ask Mary that, but we need to find her first. Here, hold the flashlight. I’ll call and see if she’s on her way.”

I fetched my phone and tried to power it off. My hands, however, lost their functionality.

I shook out of control, in a cold sweat, but my hands did not move the way I wanted them.

I switched the thing off at the eleventh hour and took a deep breath.

But my relief was short-lived. 

My heart sank and my breathing became increasingly shallow and irregular. 

“Did you hear that?” asked the guy.

“No, what did you hear?”

“I’m not sure. I keep hearing things these past few days. It must be the spirits…”

The flashlight turned direction.

The duo disappeared into the night.

I turned my phone on and put it on mute, then called the person who dropped me off here.

The chauffeur.

It was past the wee hours.

He did not pick up.

I left a desperate voicemail and asked the driver to come pick me up as soon as he received the message and call the police.

I was going back.

It was no use in calling the police at this point.

The retired journalist and the others would manipulate anyone who stepped foot inside this place. I was certain. 

Nath’s words rang in my ears.

He said there were more people like him, people who believed Mary was a fake prophet pretending to be the voice of God.

It was written in their Gospels that I would challenge her throne, that I would denounce her as the voice of Satan.

And… that was exactly what I was gonna do. Did I even have any other option? 

If doing this meant I could keep Vera safe, then I would join this wicked game of pretend this very second.

I returned to the gates of Hell.

The night was vivid.

All the villagers gathered at the dilapidated church for the ceremony – this sacrificial ritual that would claim Vera’s life.

I felt the rusty, cold doorknobs in my hands before I flung the door open and made my way through the aisle.

I locked gazes with Mary whose entire face was drenched in crimson in front of the altar. Before her, the catafalque stood, its lid partially open.

I felt the numerous gazes fixed on me yet all I could see was the distorted face of this person, who called herself the descendant of Mary Magdalene and the voice of God. 

My eyes wandered to the catafalque where I left Vera to her demise.

A pang of ache hit my chest.

I shifted my attention to Mary once more. Neither of us said a word. Then I turned to the mass, to these lost spirits who were ready to ditch their God for a new one.

I raised my hands high in the air; I didn’t have to say a single word. 

Nath stepped forwards and kneeled before me. The rest of the congregation Mary and those before her manipulated all these years followed suit.

I turned to face Mary again. As I did that, she charged at me with a crowbar.

I did not budge; I just shut my eyes.

A hoard of footfalls emerged from all directions and on either side of me, rushing forwards like brutes and screaming their heads off.

When I reopened my eyes, I saw a pile of lunatics on top of one another at the altar, tearing Mary apart and ripping her into pieces. Alive.

I backed away and almost lost my footing at the macabre sight.

My heartbeat picked up.

I grabbed the crowbar on the floor and pulled off the rest of the nails on the catafalque.

I broke off; the tears threatening to spill.

The poor thing greeted me with a stiff expression on her pallid child’s face. Her eyes shot open, her cheeks hollow, and her heartbeat no longer beating.

I snatched her out from her tomb and carried her out into the darkness from the backdoor.

I locked gazes with Nath as I rushed out yet he did not follow me.

But his face looked… How should I put it? Peculiar, like a wolfish grin unlike any other. 

It made my blood run cold.

I shook the dire thoughts away and plodded through the graveyard and took a detour to the woods.

David Chapman and the other guy weren’t prowling around.

I ran with all my might.

It was during this plight that I noticed that I sprinted in circles.

I had run in over ten minutes and I had not reached the end of the forested area yet. 

I broke off and put the lifeless girl on the ground.

She had no pulse; I knew that, but I still tried to shake her back to life.

She did not respond.

I stooped over her cold body and broke into tears, doubling over and crying my heart out.

It was over. Everything… was over. I came too late. I… I failed Vera. 

Even if I magically found a way out of this place – somehow – I would still have to live with the insight that I failed to save Vera when I had the opportunity.

Something seized my arm.

I stopped breathing.

I stared down at the child whose black eyes now stared right through me.

A hint of a harrowing grin showed up on her pale lips, and her nails dug into my skin.

I gasped and crawled away from her.

Vera, or whatever this was, got on four legs with her head twisted 180 degrees, and stared at me with her upside-down eyes.

I stumbled on something and looked up.

An identical grin plastered on my late mother’s ripped lips met my distorted face. 

I stopped breathing and forced myself up.

I did not know where I was running towards or in what direction; I just ran.

I only stopped when a sudden beam of light blinded my vision.

I covered my eyes. When I reopened them, I was back in the church.

The shredded and mutilated body of Mary lay in front of the altar I stood on.

The mass hailed me, rocking in place and praying like the mad people they were.

They were beside themselves.

Nath sat me down on an adorned throne in front of a disturbing painting of Mary as the Devil.

And he said something only I could hear amidst the chaos, something that would forever haunt me.

“You just killed the Voice of God.”

Voice of God - Part VI

Image by Michael Kauer from Pixabay

I sneaked out into the chilling night air the day after meeting David Chapman and somehow found myself in front of the crumping parish church. 

The godly structure arrested me as soon as I was close enough to feel its towering height, eye-like and menacing windows and the piercing tower obscured by dark clouds.

Unbeknownst to myself, I came to a standstill and held my breath.

It was locked.

I tried to budge it open with force twice, but it would not open and reveal the darkness it brooded on.

Thinking I had at least tried and that I now ought to return to the school grounds, I shifted my gaze to the churchyard teeming with stale and grim gravestones as far as my eyes could see.

Then I reasoned there must be a second exit or a hidden entrance from the back to the graveyard due to the nature of the beat-down and antique structure dating from the 1800s.

With these thoughts in the back of my mind, I set off to the churchyard where the undead lay still in their dark and filthy tombs made of sin. 

An earthly odour filled the entire yard. The soil was damp, although it hadn’t poured down and painted the premises dark.

I moseyed through the forlorn gravestones; most of them were dated two generations before I was even born.

Time stood still.

I was in a Timeslip of a kind and each step led me farther from my own world, although I could swear the gloomy night sky was still the same.

By the time I found the backdoor, I had forgotten why I had come here in the first place.

For a mere second, I thought of returning but knew I could not turn a blind eye to the sinister things happening in Dew Shire.

I found a rock and hammered it against the bolted door repeatedly until it unlocked.

A breeze of cold air chilled me to the bone with the grating of the rusted and stale backdoor which had not been used for ages.

I found myself next to the altar where I witnessed Mary’s unfazed speech a few days ago.

But this was hardly what caught my attention.

Far from view and the numerous rows of benches to the left of the altar was an underground passage. It was narrow and suffocating.

My insides turned upside down as I took the flight down from the creaking stairs only to break off.

I was not alone.

At first, the voices were faint and seemed to echo all over the place, but then they grew louder.

It was then that I saw two figures coming down from the second floor; I recognised one of the voices immediately.

It belonged to Nath.

The other voice, however, was unfamiliar.

I rushed to the closest row and hid as the two men, much to my surprise, made it to the altar and then entered the underground passage.

There was a hint of distraught in Nath’s guttural voice, and although I did not know the reason behind his distress, I knew it had something to do with Vera’s sudden disappearance.

By the time it was too late to regret it, I stood up and followed the two men inside.

But they were nowhere to be found as I entered the hidden chamber made of stones and seemed to be stuck in a time long since forgotten.

The first thing I noticed was the scent of incense, much like the ones I smelled at Mary’s home – only this time it was much more intense, almost thicker and more suffocating in this small, enclosed space.

Then I noticed the catafalques all around me and a shiver shot up my spine, unable to focus or wrap my head around what emerged right before me in all directions. 

Just as I forgot about the two men, their approaching voices reminded me of their presence and I got into a state of panic.

My first thought was to flee the underground chamber, but my eyes shifted focus and I found myself dashing towards another hidden passage inside the chamber in the opposite direction of the approaching voices.

That was when I found yet another catafalque, but this one was new and, much to my surprise, not nailed.

I opened it just in case Nath and the other guy approached and I would have a place to hide when I jolted back at the sight that met me.

The white, empty and expressionless stare of a pair of eyes.

I must have gasped, there was no way to tell if I had or not, but I noticed right then and there that the approaching voices faded away all of a sudden.

Without realising whose eyes I locked gazes with, I squeezed into the catafalque and closed the lid just enough to fill my lungs with fresh air.

A string of light was all that entered through the gap I purposely left, but it was enough to help me discern whose cold body I lay next to.

A shiver shot up my spine at the morbid realisation that I now held onto the corpse of the very little girl I had come to find.

I covered my mouth and stifled yet another escaping gasp.

“How sure are you about this? Mary doesn’t like surprises. You know better than anyone…”

It was Nath’s voice.

My quivering eyes shifted to the gap as soon as I heard him.

“It came from here, I’m sure. I heard footsteps, I tell you! Why would I lie?”

“Must be the spirits then,” Nath said and added before the other could interject. “Surely, you don’t fear what’s already dead and gone with the unforgiven wind?”

There was a short pause after this.

The person with Nath remained hushed and wouldn’t respond to this.

My heart skipped a beat, and I fixed my darting eyes on the gap as Nath broke the prevailing silence.

“See, the lid’s open. We just need to nail it so the spirits won’t escape and play us for fools. Gimme a hand, will ya?”

“Don’t think that’s a good idea…”

“Well, you’d rather be alone with the spirits, then?”

Whoever was with Nath backed away. I could almost hear the frantic beat of his heart as he replied.

“I’m not touching that thing! You take care of this yourself, and…” The stranger paused as if he heard something out of the ordinary, before carrying on as if nothing happened. “… make sure it stays closed.”

The man left; I was sure.

There were no more noises for a while and I thought of sneaking out, when I realised someone was moving about in the silence yet did not approach the catafalque.

It was during this time that something unexpected occurred. The cold child who I thought was dead came alive.

My flickering eyes fraught with horror widened at the sight of the flailing child struggling to escape her ill fate.

Too stunned to move at first, I barely covered Vera’s lips and let my eyes wander to the gap where the string of light now was obscured.

Vera scratched me all over, unaware of why she was stuck in the dark and panicking. 

The lid closed and left both of us in pitch-black darkness. 

Vera stopped moving just as suddenly as she had come to life – turning cold and still anew.

Then I heard it: the clanger of something being nailed down.

How long I had been inside the catafalque I did not know.

At one point I lost all senses and perception of time and place and could only focus on my strained breathing.

Vera had not come back to life during this time.

I thought I heard the hissing of a snake, the chatter of laughter and the image of a babbling spring now and then.

After a while, however, I realised that all these hallucinations were nothing but the products of my deteriorating mind in this enclosed, tight and narrow space shrouded in shadows. 

By the time I gave up all attempts to break free, the lid opened and I stared blankly into a pair of green eyes I recognised.

I was hauled down onto the cold stone ground.

My eyes, which had adjusted to the darkness, were a blurry mess and it hurt to keep my eyes fully open and exposed to the dim-lit surroundings.

When I regained my vision and met Nath’s eyes, I recalled the little girl still inside the catafalque and forced myself up despite having no strength left in my body.

I could hardly stand up, but I pushed the lid aside with all my might and pulled the child out.

Even this time, as I held Vera in my arms and brought her out into the light, her body was as cold as ice. There was not a single sign of life in her.

Yet I somehow knew this was far from the truth. Vera was still alive. How, I did not know and had no way of explaining under these macabre circumstances, but I was certain.

I let the girl rest on my thighs and gently shook her back to life. Her cold body did not move and her eyes did not meet mine even for a second, but I saw her bruised fingers twitch at my desperate pleas.

This was enough for me.

As I was about to carry the girl out and flee the chamber, a figure calling my name made his presence known once again.

I flinched at the realisation of his existence and picked up my pace when he said something I could not ignore.

I came to a standstill and stared down at Vera. Her pallid face was stiff and blue, just like the undead.

But this child was not dead – dying, yes, that was obvious – but far from it as long as I nurtured her back to life.

I knew every second was worth this little child’s life and that we had to get out of here, out of Dew Shire, as soon as possible.

But his words were too difficult to ignore.

I, albeit unwillingly, turned to face him, and when he did not elaborate on his words, I pressed on.

“What… what are you, people?”

“We are human, just like you…”

“You expect me to believe—”

“Don’t you know,” he began, “that human beings are far more wicked than any other entity?”

I looked down at the poor thing.

Although I agreed, I wasn’t about to confirm Nath.

He, instead of telling me the truth he promised, kept beating around the bush as if to gain time for whatever wicked lie he intended to tell me.

I was not going to let him do this.

“What’s going around in this place? What were you gonna do to Vera?”

He briefly dropped his head. “And if I tell you everything, will you let that child go?”

“No! Never!”

“Then I can’t tell you what you want to know.”

“She’s just a child!” My voice cracked; the thought of abandoning a helpless child was enough to make me see red. “Vera, she’s… she’s just a child, for God’s sake! What did she ever do to you people—”

“Let’s say you bring Vera with you and flee this place, and then what? She’ll just be replaced by another child! Do you think you can save them all?”

“From… from what?” I asked. “From what should I save them – if that’s what I have to?”

“You don’t get it, do you? Saving them is beside the point here! You can’t save her, not like this!” He paused upon seeing my distorted face and softened his voice. “Listen, I know this sounds crazy, but… let the child go. That’s the only way you can save her…”

“No, I’m not gonna—”

Nath punched the wall.

“I’m telling you the way to save her, don’t I! Can’t you just… just trust me this once?”

“Trust you…?” A bitter smirk played on my lips. “Then give me something I can believe; tell me what you’re hiding.”

He rubbed his face; his antsy eyes fixed on the child I carried close to my bosom.

His flickering gaze then met mine as if he noticed how I studied him at that very moment and broke out into cold sweat.

He was desperate in his pleas; he wanted me to put Vera back into the catafalque.

“Listen, I- I can’t tell you anything before you do as I say, all right? I’m not…” He rubbed his face again, which turned pale and he wheezed as if he was stuck inside a catafalque himself and couldn’t breathe. “I’m not playing mind games, okay? I’m not trying to fool you, I just… Please, you gotta listen to me before it’s—”

“Nath…?”

We both turned towards the sudden voice echoing from the other side of the passage and the larger chamber.

It belonged to the man who was with Nath, I was sure of this and for a second I thought I had met my doom.

But Nath did not respond to the man looking for him, neither did he ask the other for help.

Instead, he remained silent.

I stared at the helpless child thinking this was the end of us, when the voice became fainter and then disappeared for good.

I caressed the poor thing and noted that she regained some colour on her cheeks.

Then I… put her back into the darkness.

I did not trust Nath, of course, I did not, how could I? But he just let go of a perfect opportunity to get rid of me and he did not take it.

It made me wonder whether there was any truth to the words he said.

He let out a sigh of relief and collapsed on his knees, rocking back and forth as if he were a toddler trying to soothe himself from a looming danger.

“Why are you like this?”

He stopped rocking and looked at me from where he stood on both knees.

For a second, it looked as if he had forgotten I was there and tried to wrap his head around how I had come to find him in this dismal state.

“What… do you think of Mary?”

I frowned. Didn’t he ask this question already? At the same time, I could tell that he didn’t actually want to ask me this very question, only that it was the closest thing to whatever lingered on the tip of his tongue.

I did not respond.

I thought nothing of Mary.

During my short-lived career, I had seen my fair share of peculiar people and Mary was one of the sanest people I had crossed paths with even if I did not want to confess to this at the time.

What I could not deny however was the way she pulled people in and the way her sweet, honeyed voice made everyone around her let their guard down.

It dawned on me then that this must be the reason the villagers listened and heeded her every word as if she was delaying the words of God Himself.

Immediately after this train of thought, I recalled what the children told me about their Gospel. I don’t even know why this thought occurred to me, but it did.

And before I knew it, those singular words escaped from my lips even before I became aware of their existence in my dismal mind.

“She’s… she’s the voice of God?”

Nath, horrified by the nature of my sudden confession, stood up and backed away as if he had seen a phantom.

“How—” He stammered, trying to form words and clear his mind all at the same time. “Did you just… No, it’s not possible! Yet you…”

“Is this why you call her that – Mary Magdalene?”

“Not only that,” he confided in me. “There’s more to her name than you can ever imagine.”

“Then enlighten me.”

“How well do you know your Gospel, Ms Carlton, that’s all it boils down to…”

“I have never been religious, I’m afraid. I only know what my mother taught me two decades ago.” Then added before he could reply. “Why’s this so significant?”

“Do you believe in God?”

I pulled a half-hearted smile despite the circumstances.

“As I mentioned earlier, I have never been religious despite my upbringing.”

“That’s not a reply,” Nath said and rephrased his question.

I frowned.

“Do you believe in the good and evil?”

“I already answered that…”

He paused for a few seconds as if to make sure I understood everything he said and left no stone unturned in my attempts to answer these questions he was asking instead of giving me the truth I sought.

“But you said she was the voice of God. What made you think that?”

“I…” I didn’t know what to say. Why this kind of thought popped up in my head, I couldn’t say even if I wanted to. 

“Have you considered then that she could be the voice of the Devil instead?”

“What?” He didn’t respond to this. I briefly looked away to gather my thoughts. This was getting ridiculous yet the person in front of me was dead serious. “As in the Devil disguised as God’s voice, is that what you mean? That she’s pretending to relay the voice of God?”

“Something like that, yes. But she wasn’t the first of her blood who started this game of pretend as a false prophet.”

“False prophet?”

“Mary Magdalene was the first. She tricked a great many Christians, saying she conveyed the voice of God, and in her footsteps followed her descendants.”

I smirked without meaning to. I couldn’t wrap my head around the nonsense I was hearing. Had these people gone bonkers or was I too abstruse for my own good to believe in these fairytales disguised as gospels? 

“So, let me get this right: you’re saying that Mary Magdalene, the first of her kind that is, was pretending to relay the message of God? And that,” I paused to gather my thoughts, “she’s in fact relaying the voice of the Devil?”

He nodded without wasting any time. 

“She’s been living off of these lies, her Gospels that is, since the dawn of time! She whispers evil and won’t stop at nothing!” As if to make sure I got everything right, he paused shortly before continuing in that same maniacal voice that made me shudder. “And I’m afraid only you can stop her…”

“Me…?”

“It’s written in the Gospels, Ms Carlton! It was prophesied that you’d one day arrive in Dew Shire, destroy the Gospels and save us!”

“That’s—”

“Have you never wondered why you don’t look like your mother?” he interrupted me.

I knitted my brows upon hearing this. He pressed on without waiting for me to respond.

“Seeing how you look at me right now, you must have wondered, after all…”

“This… this is getting—”

 “She’s not your mother, is she? Not the one who gave birth to you, that is.”

I briefly dropped my head. David Chapman’s voice rang in my head as he recounted the fate of Enis Fair and how her offspring was never found.

A pang of ache spread from the deepest chamber of my heart to my fingertips, and I backed away without being aware of it, horrified and beyond myself at this realisation. 

It then hit me that it wasn’t Dew Shire, which lured me into this trap but my own mother, whose fate I once heard as a child, and then as an adult from the very journalist who had last seen her alive.

But how was all of this possible? Why was I of all people prophesied to bring an end to the false prophesies? Just why…?

How would I even stand up against someone who whispered the sweet tongue of the Devil and brought the entire world to her feet with a single gesture?

“Why… why me?” I asked, unable to clear my harrowing thoughts and let my doubts put to rest. “I don’t believe in this nonsense, I never will, so why me? Why am I mentioned in the Gospels?”

“Mary’s mother, the prophet and former Mary Magdalene, let you live the day your mother was murdered. They ripped you out of her and you were brought up as the rest of us but everything changed when you became six years old.

“It was prophesied that you’d one day grow up and declare yourself a prophet to destroy the voice of God. You were ordered to be killed just like your mother, Enis Fair.

“But your mother, the woman who brought you up, fled with you the night they came for your head. I was ten years old at the time and my memory is no better than yours but I clearly remember you.

“And I have waited for you all this time, we all have. I’m not the only one who sees through the lies of the Devil and wants to break free. There are more of us who no longer want Mary around.”

“You’ve been waiting for me?” I could hardly believe what I was hearing.

Nothing made sense.

I was to declare myself a prophet to fool people? Then again, if all of this was true and these people really believed these things then—I lifted my eyes off the ground as Nath spoke once more.

“Please, help us! No, you must help us!”

“I don’t even know how!” I began, unsure of how to explain myself to this person who truly believed I was his saviour.

“I don’t know how to help you.”

“There’ll be a ritual tomorrow tonight.” He shifted his eyes to the catafalque.

“We hold a ritual every ten to fifteen years and sacrifice one of our own for the Second Coming. Vera’s parents pleaded with Mary to have her.”

“What do you mean—”

“She’s going to be killed in front of the altar,” he began, “we’re all going to eat a part of her to honour Mary and pray that her bloodline never dry up.”

“What in the—you’ve done this before?”

He shook his head. “This will be my first. Our last sacrifice failed since your mother fled with you.”

“How can I trust you? For all I care, you’re telling me all of this to gain my trust and then lure me to my death.”

“You… just have to take my word for it.” He looked around himself, fidgeting and anxious. “We need to go now! Mary’s gonna be here any second! She shouldn’t see us here!”

I shifted my eyes to the catafalque, where the poor child slept soundly, unaware of what was going on around her. 

“Are you going to nail it?” I already knew the answer yet it made me shudder, nonetheless.

“Only after Mary arrives and gives the go-ahead.”

“And then what?”

“I already told you,” he whispered and leaned in. “This is the only way we can keep her safe!”

“I…” I couldn’t tear my unfocused eyes off the catafalque. 

“As long as you do as I say and accept your role in all this, nothing’s gonna happen to that child. I promise.”

I briefly shut my eyes. “I’m not… what you think I am. I have no power to stop Mary or- or whatever this is about…”

“You’ll figure something out, I’m sure you will! Your name is written in the Gospels! I don’t know why or how, but if the Devil fears you, then I trust you with my life and so does everyone else!”

“You don’t it!” I said, raising my voice and unable to keep in the growing frustration. “ I’m not a prophet! I’m not God and I’m certainly not the voice of God, either!”

“I never said you were – you did. Just now.”

“I don’t even believe in the things you people believe in! I don’t believe in God or the Devil neither in Heaven nor Hell.” I took a pause. “And I’m not a bloody prophet; I’m not.”

“Then pretend that you are! If you really want to save that kid’s life, that is…”

I was flabbergasted.

“Then what… what do you want me to do, exactly?”

“You’ll know what to do,” he said, adding before I had the chance to press on. “Make sure to be here during the ritual. I’ll leave the backdoor open.”

Could he truly be trusted? As I was having these thoughts, now back in the office, I could not stop thinking of everything he told me with such sincerity.

I was certain of only one thing: I was not a prophet and I did not mean to fool people prone to be made a fool of.

At the same time, I could not explain how my name somehow became part of a prophecy and that this had come into existence and ignited hope in these people the second I arrived here.

Moreover, I could not sleep soundly when I knew Vera was dying in the darkness, afraid and perhaps disappointed that I abandoned her to die all alone.

But what if all of this was true?

What if…?

I couldn’t sleep a wink.

I was in the safety of my office, but I knew something terrible was going to happen soon.

As midnight approached, I could no longer bear the harrowing thoughts and phoned David Chapman.

He did not pick up right away.

I began to count the seconds.

And as soon as I heard his voice, I broke down in tears.

I was in a blind.

Vera was inside that catafalque, trapped in the suffocating darkness, and some lunatics believed I was some kind of prophet!

I was losing it.

I needed someone to tell me the way to go – what to do and how to do it.

David Chapman was the only person I could think of.