Pyromaniac

Part One

Chapter One

The Red Devil

It all happened so fast. The explosion, the blood, the screaming... I'm not really sure how I ended up here, in a graveyard. It's so dark and foggy I can't hardly see a thing. All I can make out are tombstones and a shadow walking away, into the fog. Something... inside, brought me here. I have to find out what. Maybe that shadow... has something to do with me being here... it looks like a person, a man...

"Hey! Wait!" I called out to him, but he did not hear me and did not turn around. For a second he was there, then he was gone, swalloed up in the fog. No matter how much I squinted to try to penetrate the thick mist, I could not longer see him. Was I imagining things? Was there even somebody there? I must be dreaming...

"Who are you talking to?" A voice behind me made me jump. I bolted around to see a girl, maybe my age or in her early twenties, with short black hair and a pale face. She looked at me weird, as if concentrating on something very difficult to understand.

"Who-?!" I said, my hand on my heart that had just skipped a beat. "Don't sneak up on me like that-!"

"Oh, I'm sorry, did I scare you?" She seemed to be teasing. Then I noticed the oddest thing. Her clothes... She was wearing a white gown, like they make you wear at a hospital. The strings were loosly tied behind her, so her entire bare back was showing. Near her lower back it was tied tighter, however, as if she tied it herself and couldn't reach all the strings.

"No. I just... didn't see you there..." I quickly replied "Who are you anyways?!" I demanded.

"What are you doing here?! Don't you know this place is dangerous?!" Her mood changed so fast, like a twig being snapped in two her face suddenly became scared and scornful.

"What are you talking about?" I asked, confused at her sudden mood swing.

"This town... Theres something... 'wrong' with it..." she paused, looking around as if about to tell a big secret and chacking that no one was within hearing range. "...and it's not just the fog either.... it's kinda hard to explain, but if you have a choice, go back-"

""I don't." I inerputed sternly.

"The Red Demon has returned..." She just barely whispered, her voice low and muffled. I tried to ignore her statement, but something about her... the way she spoke of the 'Red Demon'... sent chills down my spine.

"So what are you doing here?" I changed the subject fast, steering the conversation away from the 'Red Demon'.

"Me?" She seemed to snap out of a trance. "I...uh...i'm looking for my mama..."

"I hope you find her," I nodded once to her, slowly, and began to walk towards where I saw the shadow dissapear into, following a path that led into town.

"You're not going in there, are you?!" I kept walking , lifting my hand and waving behind me without a backwards glace. Something about her, about the way she spoke of the 'Red Demon'... something pulled me towards the town, harder than ever now... Maybe because I am so close, I didn't pay attention to the girl's warning. I felt her eyes peircing my back as I left the graveyard.

I came to a narrow road, stained with blood in someplaces that made me wonder what had happened. It's better off I dont know, I guess... the blood has long since dried anyways. As I walked down the path, I heard noises around me. Someone's following me, crunching in the twigs and leaves beyond the path and hidden in the forest surrounding the road. The footsteps stopped abruptly when I did, starting up again every time I continued on. Maybe i'm just being paranoid... I took out a silver lighter from my pocket and began to flick it open and snap it closed nervously, trying to calm myself down, a habbit I had aquired from my brother ages ago and never even tried to break it. It's all I have left of him now...

After what seemed like hours of walking, I came to the entrance of the town. The fog seemed to only get thicker and thicker the closer I got to the gates. I walked up to the iron bars, they seemed just barely attached to the hinges, old worn and rusted. When i tried to push them open, the entire gate fell over with a loud, ringing clash.

As I examined my surroundings, what i saw left my mouth hung open in confusion. I seemed to be in... a ghost town... Straight from a movie it was, completely run-down, filled with dilapidated old houses. There were no people anywhere, no sounds of cars or birds chirping, or children playing, just a shrill, soft howling wind in my ears and pure silence... complete and utter silence...

I couldn't stand it. I reached into my pocket, feeling for the cold metal handle of a precious item i've had since I could remember, kept hidden away from everyone but him... I gripped my fingers around it and pulled it out of my long jacket. A split second later I pointed a heavy, beautifully crafted sawed-off shotgun at nothing. It's only minor flaws was the hasty job at sawing off the tip, for it was very sharp, even though it had worn down slightly. I just aimed it recklessly into the fog, and pulled the trigger, listening to the emptyness echoing in the cool, wet air. Then it hit me... this town, where I had somehow traveled to without even realizing it, was Silent Hill...

Old memories flashed back all at once, of here, this town, Silent Hill... I was there so long ago...

As I walked along the road, a strange noise broke the silence. It sounded like static blarring on a radio, and other disturbing ambience. It was distant, but getting closer. Unable to tell what direction the noise was coming from, all at once it was directly behind me, ripping a hole in my eardrums and causing me to drop my shotgun and clamp my hands over my ears. I whirled around backwards to find a giant glowing red body no less than three feet away. Convered in layers of old, dried blood, he was dragging a giant knife. It's head reembled a huge, unproportional rusted metal doorstop that streached out in the front. Petruding a foot from the tip of the long triangular metal head was a long, drooling and bloody snake-like tounge stuck out of a hole and and slithered cose by my face. I jumped backwards, staring dumbfounded at the thing as ilanded on my butt, my shotgun just out of reach. The metal-headed monster slowly trudged foreward, closer to where i sat petrified on the ground. It dragged the great knife behind it loudly, the metal scraping the rough road deafeningly loud. It made a discusting sound, like it was trying to talk in an extremely low, inaudible tone.

"Com...to...me...eed...blood......youshal....eetsamefa....te....asorbr....ther...." The sound of its attempted speech, the gurgling noises coming from him drowned out his words. I froze. I tried to run, but I couldn't move. The white stacticy noise was now behind me, but to my left. I heard footsteps running closer, the bloody thing almost touching me. I stared up at him, unable to stop him from slowly bringing his great knife up over his head, ready to bring it down into me.

"Get away from her!!" A male voice yelled deeply. I turned to see a man running towards us, wearing a dark green jacket and a handgun outstreached in his arm. He started shooting at the thing, distracting it from me temporarily. It turned to him, great kife still held above me. The bloody living corpse pulled back, and as i reached for my shotgun, grabbing it and turning back to him, gun ready, I was a second to late. The great knife was already in the midst of cutting through the air, towards me. I tried to move out of the way, but the knife hacked into my left leg, and stayed there, my blood pulsing out all over the blade and the ground. I let out a cry of pain, and pointed my shotgun at him, firing it once. At such a close range, it nearly knocked him backwards, he slid the blade out of my leg and tried to bring it up above his head once more. The man still shot at him, unsure of what else to do. But his gun ran out of bullets, he frantically tried to reload before it would be in two peices. I fired my shotgun again, the force of the blow and the many bullets firing at once hitting him in his chest and head, producing high metallic sounds where the bullets hit his head. It finally gave up, dragging it's knife away, and dissapeared into the fog. The mist around it was breifly illuminated in a dark blood-red color from it's body, until the reflection of red faded too. The static white noise faded as the monster left. A slow throbbing pain flowed freely through my leg. My ears were pounding from the unbearable pain as well. The man who saved me bent down close to me and was taling, but I was not hearing anything but the pulsing or blood in my ears. All I was concious of was my heart pounding out of my chest, and a low, droning noise; the man talking. Soon my vision blurred and the pain began to numb, as well as all my senses as everything faded to black...