Here's hoping the formatting stays nice on this one....fingers crossed
Me no own Konami, Silent Hill, Vincent, Alessa, etc.; I'm not particularly inclined to claim the nameless dog-beasties right now, though they're not game-beasties they're a variation on a theme.
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Vincent locked the doors of the historical society at about 4 am, humming smugly with an armload of books and folders. A few hours and he'd be eating pancakes at the rest stop down the road, then come tomorrow he'd be HOME and away from this town of secrets and religious psychopaths. He almost didn't notice, on his way out, the dark-haired girl in the blue dress leaning by the lamppost out front.
"Town's not gonna let you leave now, y'know."
He stopped, raised an eyebrow at her, and started putting the books in the back seat of the old beat-up grey sedan. The girl had been showing up for a few months now - probably a really bored local kid who'd heard a few two many stories, or one in on a prank or scare-attempt; if nothing else, she was probably a figment of his imagination and another sign it was well past time to get out of town. He ignored her, finished putting the evidence in his car, then got in, and drove off.
She showed up again, sitting on the "Welcome to Silent Hill" sign in the fog that'd rolled in as he was driving out; he didn't even slow down. The fog thickened in over the car....then his headlights caught a sign by the road.
"Welcome to Silent Hill", with the same dark-haired girl in an old-fashioned blue dress sitting on it watching him dully. He slowed to a stop, staring at it, then put the car in gear and slowly turned it around, and took off again, heading out at the speed limit, fog be damned.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". Slowing to a stop again, he glared at the town, at the sign, at the road ahead in general, adjusting his glasses in indignation. There was a reasonable explanation for this, there had to be. He turned the car around again, and floored it; the car was old, but he'd cared for the insides fairly well, and he hit sixty in a matter of moments.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". Not only was the damn sign in front of him again, but it'd taken exactly as long to reach it at 60 as it'd taken at 30. He slowed down, almost stopped, then a wild idea entered his head - sped back past it, did a fast bootlegger's turn on the other side.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". Not even slowing down, he passed it, hitting another bootlegger and racing on. This was probably Hell on his car.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". He slowed to a stop again across from the sign, muttering under his breath. "There's got to be a way out of this fucking Hellhole...The road is straight, I should just be able to drive right out Damnit...this is a trick, it has to be, Claudia's trying to scare me, that has to be it, crazy bitch..." If going straight didn't work - he put the car in reverse, driving backward as fast as he could and still keep the car going straight.
"Welcome to Silent Hill" in the rear-view mirror, approaching. His foot almost fell off the gas limp as the car slowed, then he stopped it across from the sign again. Why did God pick now to acquire a warped sense of humor? He came from a good Catholic family, he'd done his confessions for years; what this place needed was a good exorcism, and maybe a fire-truck of holy water. He wasn't going to be beaten by this insane place now.
He got out of the car, pulling his duffel bag out of the trunk; it was more important that he get the documents out than anything, and once he was out of town he could call for help, so he dumped his clothes and personal effects into the trunk, locked it to retrieve later, and put the books and papers recording the drug ring, the sacrifices, everything the cult had been up to into the bag, tossing it over his shoulder, and heading off into the woods, where there was a walking trail that led out of town. He barely favored the girl sitting on the sign with a suspicious glance. She was either a figment or part of some plot more sinister than a simple prank; bored local girl or Halloween joke had dropped off the list.
"Toldja it wouldn't let you leave." He kept walking. "That's not a good idea."
"Shut the Hell up.", he tossed back over his shoulder, drily, and kept walking, muttering. "Bloody figment of my bloody imagination...." The girl jumped down off the sign and followed behind him about ten feet. "I wouldn't suppose you know how to get out of here?" Sarcastic, biting, and not even looking back as he asked.
"Get in your car, and drive back into town.", she stated succinctly, as if it were obvious.
".....'Town' is not 'Out of here'."
"It's not going to let you out, not until you've done whatever you came to do."
"I can't finish what I came here to do unless I can get out of town and deliver these.", he snapped, patience fraying. He was going to be late for the meeting, Damnit.
"In that case, you're pretty fucked."
He stopped, turned, and adjusted his glasses looking down at the girl. "Strong language for someone your age, isn't it? Do your parents know you talk like that?" Figment or threat, he wasn't going to let her get to him -
She hissed through her teeth, glaring at him with more malevolence than should've been possible on a fourteen year old. "If you don't know who I am, then you need to do more research." He raised an eyebrow; so she was playing at being Alessa. He didn't believe in ghosts.
He turned and kept walking on, reaching the path and taking it.
There was a strange, wet growl in the trees, that he stopped at; he wanted to believe it was a dog, yes, a dog, or maybe a cougar down from the mountains, or...it didn't sound like any of the above. Something limped out of the trees ahead of him, vaguely a dog, thin transclucent skin stretched over sickly muscles, one eye glowing balefire green, the other bleeding as if it'd been pierced out. The world was out to get him. He wasn't going to believe in monsters, it was probably some very, VERY sick stray, snarling and probably insane, possibly rabid. His gun was in the duffel bag. He moved to unshoulder the bag enough to reach the gun, slowly enough to hopefully not startle it -
It lunged, snapping and giving off strangled barks; he turned and ran, shifting it back where he could carry it without losing it. He went off the path, using the underbrush to try and slow it down, dodging as it narrowly missed his calves, then his arm, as he reached his car, still patiently sitting next to the sign; slamming the driver's side door, he dropped the duffel bag in the passenger side as the dog-thing ran began beating itself against the window, leaving layers of damp, thin skin and streaks on the glass. Starting the car, he floored it, the tires screaming as they spun, then caught the ground.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". The dog thing was waiting in the middle of the road; he swerved around it as it lunged, then took off chasing the car, barely clipping it with his front bumper as he pulled another bootlegger's turn. There was a yelp, then in his rear-view he could see the balefire green eye pick itself up in the fog before it vanished...
"Welcome to Silent Hill". Its left foreleg was a shattered, bloody mess, its lower jaw scraped to bone on the left side, but it still stood waiting in his path. This time he swerved to catch it sidelong with the bumper, the car jolting as it went under the wheels with a wet crunch. Another bootlegger's turn and he went over it again, heading out of town, the corpse disappearing into the fog, the girl leaning against the sign watching dispassionately.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". The dead dog-thing was a smear spread across the pavement, entrails and parts scattered, jagged bits of bone sticking up in places that he had to steer to drive around so they wouldn't pierce his tires; the red streak went for a good twenty feet. The girl was still standing by the sign. Speed past, bootleg, out.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". The body was gone. The girl was still there, watching the road. Speed past, bootleg, out.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". There was a balefire gleam on the right side of the road, loping out of the woods, another on the left ahead past the sign; the girl stood, unbothered by it all. Speed past, bootleg, they hit the road screeching mad howls, he hit one, the other gave chase.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". The demon-dog was waiting by the sign for him come back, its compatriot was in a shattered pile twitching to stand just off the road. He caught it with the other side, it rolled over the car and fell by the roadside. Bootlegger's turn, floor it out.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". The first one he'd hit had drug its shattered body into the road, one hind leg hanging off by a thread of flesh dragging behind it. The other one was up on all fours, its head dangling by the windpipe. A third one had appeared, sitting obediently next to the girl, who was absent-mindedly scratching behind its ears as she watched. Straight over the almost-headless one, bootlegger's, pull out his pistol with one hand, roll down the window, floor it.
"Welcome to Silent Hill". Aiming out the window, he fired once and the somewhat-three-legged one's head exploded; a second shot to its chest, and it fell over, twitching. Bootlegger's, slow down next to the sign, aiming at the girl.
"What the Hell do you want?!"
She gave a cracked chuckle. "What do I want? I don't know, a life would be nice."
"Let me the fuck out of here!"
"Or you'll what, shoot me?" She chuckled again at the threat. "Sorry, but I can't let you go; it's the Town that decided to keep you. Did you really think you could just drive out of here with its secrets?"
"Are you telling me that everything that crazy witch has been ranting about is true?!" He noticed the muzzle of the gun wobbling - his hand was shaking.
"Crazy - Oh, Claudia? I wouldn't say that ev-ery-thing she's ranted about is true....but you're not in the world you think you know anymore." She patted the dog-demon's head, and just let her hand rest across its skull. "I can't speak for the Town, but maybe if you're a good boy and go back into town, if it's what It wants, it'll let you spend your time on the waking side. Maybe. Or maybe it'll just leave you in my world..."
For a moment, the fog pulled back; the sign rusted, part of it falling off, the trees withered to black that twitched and jigged unnaturally as if the branches were clawing at the sky, grass withered away to dingy blood-stained gravel, the highway crumbled and cracked with jagged metal, glass, and bits of dead things melted into the pavement, and in his rear-view mirror, he could see it drop off into a river of lava behind him, blocking the way out of town. Then the fog returned, the sign was itself if a bit dingy, the forest was dark and shadowed but a forest, and the highway stretched into the fog that looped back on itself.
He put the pistol down on the seat next to him. "How do I beat this?"
"What?" She blinked and stared at him strangely.
"So all the occult ramblings are true. So there's demons and some nightmare world here. How do I beat this so that I can leave?"
She continued staring at him strangely; both hands on the steering wheel now, he stared ahead at the town, gone from a near-panic to a shaken, cold resolve. "Do some research. Kill God."
"Is that all, now...." He gave a cynic laugh, put the car in gear, and drove forward. Into town.
"Welcome to Silent Hill".
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Oh, as for Vincent's little mission - He wasn't exactly given much background or explanation in the game besides that he worked as the cult's financier. ; I got the feeling he'd been working at odds to the cult all along, and have him here as undercover FBI, with the finance job as a cover identity gone very wrong. If there's some canon info I don't know about that contradicts this...oh well. :P
