Author: Sparktank
Date: 04/26/06
Disclaimer: the author (Sparktank) acknowledges that the orginal concept, storyline, idea, and theme of all that involves the Silent Hill video games/comics/movies are entirely the works of the original authors. Sparktank does not proclaim the idea and all that encompasses the story (people, places, things, or other) as his own work. Any creatures that appear in the following/current series will go unnamed, and if are similar to any of those apparent in any existing Silent Hill work...is strictly coincidental. Capatilised creatures will be references to existing Silent Hill work. Note that there are also references to other works originally created by thier original authors, and NOT sparktank!
Author notes at end of chapter.
"Nightmare Complex"
A Silent Hill Fan Fic
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'NON COMPOS MENTIS'
Part I
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The water was lukewarm, warm to Adrienne who had fallen under another blackout. Adrienne Callen was 31 years old but her hands made her look 71. The rest of her fair physique was untouched by the effects of long-term submersion. Her hair was almond-brown, to match her eyes, and slowly drip-drying as she lay relaxed in her tub. The suds and bubbles had already disappeared by the time she awakened so abruptly.
Gasping for air, not from being under water but from waking up from her nightmare, she flailed her arms to grab hold of anything sturdy. When her eyes focused on reality, she scanned her environment to adjust to reality. She looked at her hands to see the wrinkles from being in the tub for God knows how long.
"Not again," she whimpered as she slowly began to reach for a towel sitting on a side table.
The air was cold to her as she began to quickly dry herself off. Moving about and draining the water triggered a faint memory of her nightmare as she listened to the water.
Breathing slowly, she calmed herself from the sudden coldness of getting out of the tub. She stared at the water spiral down the drain hole and focused on blurry images that came to her mind.
"S- -nt -il- is wh- -e -ark- creeps" was all that she could make out from what she remembered hearing in her dream, her nightmare.
LINE BREAK
A notebook, old and worn, sits promptly on Adrienne's desk, ready for a new entry, as always. The notebook had already been customized with previous entries, sketches, clippings, and puzzles of her fragmented memories.
Her latest puzzle was incomplete sentences and broken words she hears often in her dreams, her nightmares.
December 17, 2007"Sy-n -ell -z hair th- dar- -ss- -ps"
February 12, 2008"-ilan H- eh -air the d-k n- -ss- creeps"
Newest entry to her enigmatic puzzle:
February 13, 2008"S- -nt -il- is wh- -e -ark- creeps"
Taking a glance over all the pieces she's collected over the past few months, she tries to recognize a common factor or pattern that would reveal much about herself she has yet to learn. Her hand slowly places the pen down, her eyes focusing on the materialized clues of her dreams, her nightmares.
Still only faint images of blurred figures come to mind's eye. The same whispering sounds, the broken words she hears in the wind blowing through her hair. A cold and piercing wind thrashing against her.
Her thoughts were suddenly interrupted by her cell phone alarm ringing. She opened her phone to read the message displayed on her screen.
"Shit!" she cursed under her breath, knowing that she was already five minutes late of being en route to her appointment.
"Five minutes fashionably late, Adrienne," she scolded to herself as she ran down the stairs to her garage.
LINE BREAK
Closing the car door, placing the keys in the ignition, she began to think to herself what a day she's had so far. First the dog had gotten into the mail again somehow, she was late for work when the power went out over night, another black out which left dinner out of the equation for the day, and she's more than five minutes late her for appointment with her doctor. Last thing I need, she thought to herself, is for the car to--
She let out a sigh of agony and defeat as she brought her head down to rest on the steering wheel. She slowly shook her head from side to side as she couldn't believe that this was happening to her all in one day.
She let go of the keys, knowing that turning them a thousand times would not convince the car of its purpose as though it had a conscience to know how she felt. "Damn it."
She raised her head to relieve some of the tension that began to accumulate comfortably in her mind. With her eyes closed, she breathed and focused on her breathing. She soon calmed but when she opened her eyes, she was quickly startled as she saw a shadowy object sitting in the passenger seat.
She gasped and swallowed her breath, frozen in the sudden appearance of her unknown guest. Quickly, she turned on the light to see her guest but to her unsettling amazement, there was no one or no object that possessed the leery silhouette that stopped her breathing.
She turned on the garage lights with her remote control and still nothing could be seen anywhere. Both doors to the garage were completely closed with no signs of tampering. There was nothing behind her on the seats, only her shadow. She became bewildered at the disappearance of the darkly apparition.
She gasped once more as her car started. Without questioning, she put the car into gear and opened the garage doors to back out.
Within minutes, she'd be on the busy streets with moderate to heavy traffic. Cars driven by teenage couples who were looking for parties, mothers doing late night shopping for the children's lunches - enough traffic to keep her mind occupied until she reaches Doctor Watts.
LINE BREAK
"So," Dr. Watts started. She was shorter than Adrienne, shorter than any of her patients but that never bothered Dr. Watts, she never saw it as a drawback. But to Adrienne, and many of other patients of the good doctor, she seemed smaller in her chair.
"Would you like to discuss now what happened two days ago? I know that progress forward has been showing since our last session, perhaps now you'll be more comfortable after thinking about the events on Sunday night. As you have said before our break, 'Today is a much better day.' Releasing what's inside is always the best. It gives us the relief for even a short moment, which on worse days, it adds up for the best." Dr. Watts reached over to reposition her mini-cassette recorder and pull out her ball point pen.
Adrienne did feel more confident about her progress in the past few days, but she still did not feel entirely comfortable discussing her apparition on Sunday night.
"Well, as you know, I had another black out on Sunday night. I hadn't mentioned to you that I heard the voices in my dream again."
Dr. Watts was already taking interest in the topic, as she knew of the dreams Adrienne had frequently.
"They were broken again, in whispers," she continued. "I managed to write down what I remember, and I believe I'm getting closer to the whole phrase."
"The clues you have, how have they left an impression on your past? What feelings do you go through when you read about your dreams? Do you feel comfortable or perplexed?"
One thing about Dr. Watts many are quick to learn is that when she helps, she asks many questions. However many questions she'll ask, everyone is able to answer and cooperate with her, which is what makes her reputation highly valued amongst the psychiatry tables of human sciences.
Adrienne crossed her hands and began searching for the words.
"It seems like the more clues I get, the less I understand. Nothings seems to add up, nothing tangible or seemingly acceptable anyway. I feel more confused with each new clue, and more frequently these days..."
"Yes," Dr. Watts encouraged softly.
"I feel more scared."
"Of what you think your past life may involve?"
"Yes--" she paused on that thought. "I sometimes think that I have forgotten everything because there was a reason, a good enough reason to wipe out my memory."
"Adrienne," Dr. Watts comforted, "it is normal to feel this slight tangent of fear. You are making a collage of memories, and at first they will seem to be out of place or incoherent. But once you have enough of the picture, everything will make sense, your past conscience will trigger once more and you'll lose that fear. If your past has a dark shadow, you will come to grips with it you'll be able amount to that without fail."
Dr. Watts leaned forward to hand Adrienne a glass of water.
"Thank you," Adrienne accepted the water, but only to listen to what Dr. Watts was getting to with her speech.
"Remembering the past can put a scare into us, if it reminds us of something we don't want to remember. In your case, like others as well, it can especially put a scare into you. It is the same as walking into unmarked territory. You feel as though you should know the path already but since you don't it frightens you that you may get lost."
Adrienne understood the doctor's views but felt that Dr. Watts wasn't anywhere close to how she felt about her past.
Then Dr. Watts said what really frightened her.
"But," she fixed her glasses and continued in a different tone, a lower and assertive tone. "If you continue your advance and find that the path leads you astray and brings forth unseen danger, I can imagine what fear you would be manifesting. You are right, however, that we forget our pasts on purpose sometimes so that we may forget to move on. This may be true for divorced families, dysfuntional relationships, or even people with a past they wish to redeem upon. Turning a new leaf or living a second life, figuratively speaking.
Adrienne was struck with silence as she believed what the good doctor had just said was the absolute truth as to what the fragmented memories added up to. She was frozen again, with that same slight touch of fear that grew in her stomach.
"It is natural to feel scared about your past, especially if you don't want to remember it, Adrienne," the good doctor pressed on. "Forgotten memories are what really distinguishes ourselves from our own images. Sometimes we may delude ourselves with fashion and attention that we forget who we are. To forget by will is going to develop with serious repercussions at hand.
"We fear for a reason. We are also curious by nature, so it natural to venture into unmarked territory and fear it. But remember that you are never alone. You have friends and family to help when they can."
Adrienne calmed down with those words. "And you know my office hours."
"Now, if you're concerned that you may have a recorded history, Adrienne," the good Doctor resumed. "I've finished with the background check on you through the Raccoon Police Department."
The good doctor walked over to her desk and grabbed the files from her desk, the only thing sitting on her desk. Adrienne was curious why nothing else was on her desk but the files. Then again, she always found Dr. Watts to be somewhat of a drama sport when it comes to work she loved doing.
"RPD found nothing incriminating about you, nor have they found any particular detail about your upbringing. Not here in Raccoon City and nothing from the investigators they sent out to our neighboring cities: Basin City, Brahams, Hobb's End, and Innsmouth. Your past certainly seems to be forgotten, Adrienne."
Upon receiving the files, Adrienne flipped through the pages, looking at each one with severe scrutiny. Yet she did not find a single sentence that depicted her past. It seemed futile to keep skimming through the pages for any solid evidence.
"I'm sorry, Adrienne," the good Doctor comforted. "We were unable to find anything; your records are in clandestine. I'm afraid there's not much else we can look for other than what's already in those files."
Adrienne looked back at the papers slumped in the folder and wondered how her entire existence can be as lost as her memories.
LINE BREAK
The house was empty, the house she had the ownership deeds and titles to that were left with her when she first awoke in Raccoon City Hospital. The house was large, larger than she needed as a single woman without dependants. To Adrienne, nearly every detail in her life is a torn piece of a dress she used to wear so comfortably. Her house was complete with four rooms, a basement, an attic devoid of any light or air, and a very deep wine cellar. Adrienne had explored her house, several times over, with her friends.
She had two best friends, presently; she could not remember if she had any from her former life. Whenever Adrienne felt like she was lost or needed to find some degree of comfort, she always looks towards her friends: Claudia and Gwyneth.
Claudia's first impression to everyone is that she is very accommodating, sometimes too much for her own good. She rarely gets into arguments with anyone and when she does, she often lets them win, but only to end the conversation and let them cool down. Her beautiful short blonde hair curved at the ends, just touching her shoulders. She wore glasses but often wears contacts to show her oceanic greenish blue eyes. Her smile would quickly become everyone else's smile. Perhaps with all those qualities, no one could ever be too upset with Claudia.
Gwyneth wasn't as tall as Claudia, but she stood very proud. She had curls in her black hair that came naturally, which often made all the other girls jealous. Gwen could handle a hefty fight if she felt the cause was worth it. She never believes that thoughts are meant only for self-talk. She always commits herself to getting the full story before she makes a strong judgment. This made her a very good listener that could provide the enthusiasm to finish the story, no matter how ill it may seem. Many agree that her traits as a good listener make her a good journalist.
Adrienne was already in the middle of a phone conversation with Gwen by the time the kettle on the stove whistled desperately.
"Sometimes I wish the RPD would knock on my door and tell me that the town I was born in was destroyed by a fire and all the records were lost. Maybe then I'd be able to ease my mind with that." She paused for a moment to maneuver with one hand working out a cup of tea and the other hand holding the phone. "I know it sounds like I'm just trying to finish all my problems with wishful thinking, but it can get pretty dark sometimes for me. It feels as though a part of me slipped away and faded into nothingness."
She stood silently over the counter, watching the tea bag sink into the hot water. She watched the color of the tea bag dissipate like vines throughout the whole cup. And, for a second, she felt like the clear water becoming tainted with the dark strands of color from the tea bag was as similar to her life. Slowly the color would consume all the water and all there would be left is a new image, perhaps one that is darker than the last image.
The kettle on the stove whistled desperately again, surprising Adrienne. This time steam erupted and shot a stream of condensed vapors towards the ceiling. The cloud of steam grew thicker as it began to spread across the ceiling. It slowly made its way to the other rooms and the rest of the house, creating a grey and ill-lit environment. Soon the whole house was engulfed in clouds of steam and the air was dense with mist sprinkling ever so gently and lightly. The mist of water sprinkled like snow over the furniture. With each tiny droplet of mist, the furniture, the walls, and even the floors would begin to lose their color and texture. It seemed as though the mist melted everything inanimate it touched and gave it a sense of life. The wood splintered, cracked and growled as it decayed and warped. Metal hissed and screamed like banshees as it shifted and expanded.
The entire house was shifting and shaping in agony, as though it resented the presence of the mist. It cried out as it became enveloped by the foreign touch. And soon, after its protest, it would succumb to the change of the mist and finally reach its silence.
"What on Earth…" She began as she watched in horror the changing of her house. She did not realize the phone in her hand had melted into liquid and joined the rest of the house in its transition. She fell silent to the unknown happening.
The clouds of mist that lingered along the ceilings began to lighten its weight upon the floors, creating ponds and puddles in the innocent house. The water on the floors increased in depth the more Adrienne's heart grew with fear.
"This can't be real," she tried to comfort herself. "This is just another dream."
The water flooding the house reached over several inches already and it didn't seem to stop. In the chaos of the transformation, Adrienne heard a shrill voice shout her name. Instantly, she remembered that was in the middle of conversation and began to bring her senses together so she may start looking for the lost voice in the distance. The crying voice shrieked out helplessly. A scream like that could only sound like one person she knows…
"Claudia, is that you?" Adrienne began treading through the water over to the black and green kitchen to look through the drawers for a flashlight, if any of the drawers were still the same.
Grabbing a handle caused the wood to cripple and crumble, touching any of the wood had the same reaction. No, she thought to herself. Everything was fragile and weak. Eventually in the clutter of the deceased kitchen Adrienne found a working flashlight.
Turning on the flashlight and quickly aiming it at several parts of the now-aged house, Adrienne would begin looking for the lost voice, hoping that it was her friend, "Claudia hang on, I'm coming. Just stay where you are, I'm coming towards you."
She hoped that Gwen would have realized something had gone awfully wrong and had called for some sort of help. What help could be expected for a situation she was living she could not fathom. She just hoped that Gwen wouldn't try to come over to see what's stopped their phone conversation so abruptly without notice.
Moving closer to the living room, she heard the crying voice scream louder, yet this time it sounded it like it echoed.
"Adrienne!"
"Claudia!" Adrienne began to move quicker through the water, listening to voice cry out louder with more terror each time.
"Adrienne, I'm down here – NO!"
"I'm coming; just stay put a little longer, okay?"
She finally reached a crooked door that leads to the basement, it was once locked. The door hung from its frame by a single bolt; it had been torn, unlike the rest of the house that morphed. Water created torrents swirling around the broken parts of the door and quickly escaped down the stairs to fill the basement, where Claudia waits.
"Claudia, I'm right here; don't be afraid."
Adrienne began to move the door clear from the frame so she can get a better view down the stairs. Lifting one of the pieces of the door, a wood splinter stabbed into her forearm causing her to drop the flashlight.
"Shit," she muttered and gasped at the same – mad that she dropped the most reliable source of light, but mostly mad that her house had hurt her.
The flashlight glowed under the water, emitting a white pyramid cone. The currents began to clench its grasp on the flashlight and slowly dragged towards the stairs. Adrienne reached through another shard of the door for the flashlight.
"Adrienne!" This time her voice rose with sheer horror, breaking at the end.
"Come on," she willed herself to reach further for the flashlight as the water increased in depth. At this rate, Claudia will have drowned by the time she gets to her.
If she can get to Claudia, that is.
The flashlight stopped between the top two steps and aimed downwards in the basement. Adrienne grunted in hopes that it would let out air to let her squeeze through the door.
"Adrienne, run! Run, run, run, run, run, RUN!" Each word came out longer and louder.
As the flashlight began to edge forward and before it was taken by the currents completely, Adrienne saw it. She saw what had terrified Claudia so dearly. The slithering and aquatic horror that came in silence. It moved like a predator, concealing itself in the water without attacking at first sight.
The scaly creature swam by in open sight once more then disappeared. Adrienne immediately grew with the same fear that Claudia had articulated. Before she could pull out of the mouse trap of a door, the creature had expanded its fins and took charge upwards towards the door.
"Adrienne!" Claudia watched from an enclosed area that kept her safe from the water creature.
Freeing herself from the broken door, she plunged backwards into the water as the creature slammed through the door. Shards of wood exploded, water poured immensely and the creature was agitated as it shrieked its taunt. Rising up for air, Adrienne coughed violently as the water escaped her lungs. When she came to, she turned around to face the creature that stood on its hind legs.
"Jesus Chr-" She was cut short of her exclamation as the beast shrieked once more, but this time sharper and louder than before. It had raised its pitch to cause Adrienne to fall to her knees, covering her ears from any significant damage.
The house began to rumble slightly in the wake of the beast's war cry. All the glass in the house began to crack and shatter. The house itself also began to yield contours of lines along the walls and ceiling. Everything started to crumble like glass as the beast continued to shriek.
No longer able to bear anymore of the shrieking, Adrienne cried out in pain as her ears began to suffer tremendously.
Claudia was downstairs yet suffered just as much as Adrienne, "Make it stop! Kill it!"
With nothing left to shatter, the house began to fall apart under the weight of the beast's war cry. The water drained in several parts of the house, creating whirlpools that sucked down anything within an arms reach.
Claudia's screams had stopped suddenly as the water nearly emptied from the house. The beast, too, had finished its war cry and began making its way to the nearest whirlpool. It hissed and growled viciously as it leaped into the watery tornado.
"Claudia!" Adrienne tried to make her way to the basement to see if she had stopped yelling because she had knocked herself unconscious or if she had fallen through the floors. "Claudia!" was the last thing she could say before slipping, before blacking out again.
LINE BREAK
"Adrienne, are you alright?" the concerned voice asked.
Adrienne lifted her head up, bringing her hand to her forehead to feel a small bump.
"You had me worried there for a minute. I came over after you wouldn't respond. What happened, was it another black out?"
Adrienne finally sat up to let her environment slowly sink in and come to terms of reality. She looked at her concerned friend, Gwen, and fell into confusion.
"Where's Claudia?"
"I tried to call her, but I just got an answering machine. Hey, are you going to be alright?" Gwen held out a small packet of ice wrapped in a towel. "I haven't heard from Claudia for over a week now. But, she's probably out with her latest fascination, Jacob."
Adrienne, still disoriented from the fall, looked around to see that she had suffered another black out. The broken cup on the floor had proved it; the phone was covered in hot tea and it had already been over twenty minutes since she blacked out. But she was still concerned for Claudia's sake. Was it all a dream, a nightmare?
"Oh, my goodness, Adrienne," Gwen reached for another towel on the counter. "You're bleeding."
Adrienne looked at her forearm where warm blood trickled. Gwen wiped the blood clean and used a fresh towel to tie around the wound.
"You should be glad to have friends like us, Adge. Reality is much worse than nightmares. What frightens you about what we don't see is just the same as about the things we do see." Gwen continued to clean up the mess as Adrienne sat on the floor dumbfounded by the series of connections of her nightmare with the reality of her black outs.
"I've noticed that these are becoming more frequent, Adge." Gwen stood up and reached into one of her pockets.
A small white business card with grey lettering and black stencils absorbed all the light in the room and the attention.
"I have some relatives that are going through similar nightmares, Adrienne." She handed the card over to Adrienne, who took it carefully. "He's a good doctor. He helped my niece a few years back. He's not cheap but he can work out any demons you have."
Adrienne held it in her hands with the utmost of curiosity. She looked at both sides to see that it was meticulously crafted with the sincerest heart. What caught her attention, what triggered a nostalgic feeling wasn't the name of the doctor or the design of the card, but the place of the clinic. Upon reading the name of the city, she felt as though the name had a place in her heart. The name was oddly familiar to her, in the most inexplicable fashion.
"Is something the matter, Adge? You've gone silent."
"No, it's just that the-" Again, she fell silent.
"Okay, I'm going to make you a fresh cup of tea; but, first, let me get rid of all this glass. Then we talk about what's on your mind." Gwen turned to rummage through a closet, "do you have a first aid kit around here?"
"It's in the bathroom. Upstairs," she pointed, still holding on the business card. She began to sit up and make her way to the bathroom, but she was stopped in her tracks.
"You just sit here at the table; I'll go fetch the kit. You shouldn't move so quickly after that fall. Actually, I should tend to you first then drive you to the hospital to make sure it's not a serious concussion." Gwen began to ascend the stairs but turned midway to add a firm note, "And that's final. We're checking you in, just to be safe. I don't want to hear a word about it. After that, we'll go rent some chick flicks" At that, she smiled and resumed her ascent.
Adrienne looked at the business card in her hand once more. She only stared deeply into the name of the city on the card and quietly breathed out the familiar name, "Silent Hill."
To be continued...
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Sparktank's roster:
Adrienne Callen
Gwen
Claudia
Dr. Watts (named after Naomi, who appeared in The Ring - Ringu adaptation, also horror)
aquatic beast
Reference roster:
Silent Hilll (Silent Hill)
Raccoon City (Resident Evil)
RPD (Resident Evil)
Basin City (Sin City)
Brahams (Silent Hill)
Hobb's End (In the Mouth of Madness)
Innsmouth (HP Lovecraft)