Alright my first Silverwing story. I've been wanting to write one for a long time. I will start by saying that the first two chapters won't really be Silverwing themed as they just introduce my OC. But we'll get there soon enough.
Disclaimer: I do not own Silverwing
The year was 1997 and the location was a small town about twenty miles south of the Canadian border in upstate New York. The town consisted of some small buildings of various businesses, a church with a cemetery on the hill, a number of houses, and even a junkyard on the edge of the town. It was late spring and the day felt nice. But unfortuntely it wasn't a beautiful day for everyone in the town.
Twenty-one year old Mike simply stood beside the open grave and watched as the casket was lowered in. He could feel the spring sun beating down on his back as he watched the coffin disappear into the hard earth as the preacher presiding over the service continued to read from his book aloud. Mike could hear him talking, but he didn't care what the man had to say. His younger sister was gone and there was nothing he could do about it except watch the box that held her body being placed into the ground and try his best to keep his tears that were falling from his brown eyes from being observed by the rest of the onlookers. The time dragged and he continued trying to drown out the sound of the preacher as he continued to read from the good book. He could only sigh in relief as the preacher finally said, "Amen" and closed the book.
As the gathering around him finally dispersed, Mike could finally walk away from the grave site. He watched as his parents were comforted by friends and coworkers. But Mike didn't care for any comfort at the time being. All he wanted was Sarah back. His sister had been one of the best things he had in his life or in anybodies life. She had the personality that could lighten anyone's day. Especially his own.
He ran a hand through his short blonde hair as he walked the nearby hill and took a good look around the cemetery. What he saw were two other groups of mourners as they buried their loved ones as well. For you see, Sarah had not been alone when she had had her accident. She and two of her friends had been on their way home from school when they were caught in a car crash. The official report read that their brakes had malfunctioned and this is what caused the accident as their car went off the road and slammed into a tree. It was hard to believe that was just a couple of days ago. It still felt like it was only a couple of hours ago that he had hugged his sister and telling her that he'd see her after school.
Mike himself had been at work at the town's diner when he got the call from home. He could recall very little of the following few minutes except for the sound of the phone slipping from his hands, clattering on the ground, and then being curled up on the ground as his tears fell to the floor below him. Her death had hit him hard, but the deaths of all three girls had hit the community as a whole. He couldn't help but wonder how much of the town had come out to say goodbye to the three of them.
The town itself was a rather small one with a population of less than five thousand. The memorial service at the funeral home had been open to the public, but the actual burial had been private for the family and friends. Mike was at least happy that much of the town cared, but it didn't take away from the emptiness that he felt inside of him right now.
Mike stood at the top of the hill and looked down at the town itself. He watched as cars continued to pull away from the funeral home and went elsewhere. Where to? Mike didn't care in the slightest. He just leaned against a random grave stone and watched the people of the town go by and carry on with their day to day lives. As far as he was concerned, his life would never be the same again. Even as a few people came by to offer their condolences to him, it didn't matter. Sarah was dead, yet the emptiness remained inside him. Their words were just that. Words.
Sometime later his parents came by and it was time for them to leave. Mike cast once last glance back at his sister's burial site and watched as the grave diggers began shoveling the dirt into her grave. With a heavy sigh, Mike turned away and followed his parents out of the cemetery.
A month passed and Mike and both of his parents were finally able to build up the nerve to enter into Sarah's old room and start moving some of her stuff out of there. After a couple of days they had donated all of her clothing and even found some people to buy her furniture and belongings. Soon all that was left was whatever was in the old cupboard at the back of her closet.
The house that they lived in had been old when his parents had moved in before the two of them were even born and a few of these old houses had cupboards built into the walls of the rooms for some reason or another. Mike wasn't sure what they were used for, but all he knew is he had found the key to it and decided to see what Sarah had had inside. When they were smaller, she liked to take things from the rest of the family and would usually hide them in the cupboard in her room. He had always wondered what else she would hide inside and decided that now would be the best time to see. After all, no matter what was inside she wouldn't be needing them anymore.
He walked into her room and looked around at the barren remains. Gone was Sarah's bed, gone was her dresser and bookcase. Gone were the curtains that hung on the windows. It was as if they were removing all traces of her. The only thing that remained of her was the pictures that hung on the walls in the hallway. At least it was better than nothing.
Walking into the room and over to the closet, Mike pulled the key out of his pocket and went inside. He flipped the closet light on and let out a few coughs as the air was still dusty despite the cleaning they had been doing in here.
Mike tried to clear the air with his hand and said, "Jeez Sarah. Didn't you ever clean in here?"
He held the door open for several moments to get the bad air out and for his coughs to subside. When at last he could breath properly again, he took a few breaths and faced the cupboard once more. He quickly unlocked it and pulled it open. Thankfully there was much less dust in here. Probably due to the fact that it hadn't been opened in a month and had little to no contact with people at all.
"Now what do we have in here?" Mike asked to no one but himself.
At first he found a couple of magazines that she had been saving, mainly travel stuff as she had always wanted to go traveling. A few books that she had wanted to hang onto. But the thing that caught Mike's eye the most was large cardboard box that was shoved into the back of the cupboard. As he reached in to grab the box and began lifting it, Mike could feel the weight to it and realized just how stuffed this thing must really be. Well he'd let his parents sort that out as like everything else, it would have to go.
As he carried it out of the closet and out of her room, he looked down at it and saw that something was written on the top of it. He looked and saw that it said 'TO BE DESTROYED'. Mike looked at the writing and made a wondering look on his face. He didn't have any idea what Sarah wanted to get rid of or why, but knowing his sister, if it was worth destroying it was probably something big. Or it could have been a prank she'd been planning to pull on them before the accident. Either way, curiosity got the better of him and so he turned away from the flight of stairs leading down to the living room and turned towards his bedroom.
After slipping into his room silently, he looked out to make sure that no one could see what he was up to. Heck he wasn't even sure what he was up to cause he had no idea what Sarah had in here. So making sure that no one could see him, he set the box on his bed and opened it up. The first thing he noticed was a picture of him and her in the park. With their arms draped around each others shoulders. The two of them had been as close as siblings could be and did a lot of stuff together. He let out a sigh and folded the picture up and placed it into his pants pocket.
Next he found several notebooks sitting on the top of a large pile of other stuff. He carefully took these out of the box and set them aside and dug deeper into the box. He mostly found a few small wooden or stone statues of beings of Mayan folklore.
Mike couldn't help but let out a chuckle. Since she had entered high school, Sarah had been very interested in geography and she had had a little obsession with South American culture. Especially the Mayans and their range of folklore. The statues she had placed in the box he recognized from various museum gift shops they'd been to when they went to visit the different exhibits that she had wanted to see. How'd she'd pester him for some extra cash when she couldn't afford what it was that she really wanted. No matter how much he resisted, Mike would always give into her demands. Of course she would always pay him back afterwards so it didn't bother him too much.
Mike couldn't hold back his laughs now or keep from looking at the little statues as some tears slid down his face. He started digging into the box again, but this time he felt something scrape against his finger with a sharp pain.
"AH! Dammit what was that?" Mike said as he pulled his finger back out.
Thankfully his finger wasn't bleeding, but he could see the damaged skin that resulted from the scrape. This time he removed the other items that sat on the top of the pile and rummaged through the box to see what had pricked his finger. Soon though he found his answer. It was one of the tiny statues that Sarah would always get from their little museum excursions. He looked closer and discovered that it indeed had been smashed to bits resulting in some jagged edges, but that was unusual.
Sarah treated her little statues well and would never do something like this to them.
He took a closer look at the broken statue and wanted to see which one it was. As he observed it and tried to piece it back together again, he began to notice that it had a bat like structure to it and it had a look that screamed evil. He seemed to recall Sarah getting this one because of it's fascinating appearance and she had stated that it looked right for a demon of death. That was only a couple of months ago.
Oh how innocent she had seemed then.
He looked down at the remains of the statue and put it back in the box along with the others. He was about to put the notebooks back into the box when he saw the one that sat on top. It simply read 'CAMAZOTZ' on the cover. He'd heard that name before, Sarah had mentioned it several times in the couple of months leading up to her accident. Acting on curiosity, he flipped open the book and began reading the first pages.
In the pages, she mentioned that she had started reading about the demonic bat god regarding his position in the Mayan world and the rituals of human sacrifice for him. Mike gagged a little as he read about the rituals themselves, but it didn't stop his reading. Next she talked of some absurd notions regarding the reasons for the sacrifices and as to the concept of such a being being considered good at all, but regardless she was still very interested in it so she kept it up. As the weeks go on, the writings got a little stranger. Right to the point where she mentions claiming to hear some strange voices in her sleep. But she passed it off as a product of studying too much. That was something she did plenty of and yes it did sometimes affect her sleeping habits. He couldn't help but wonder what college would have been like for her.
However in the last week before the accident, she brought up seeing the god Zotz in her dreams now. That she smashed her Zotz statue because she believed that it was haunting her dreams. But they wouldn't cease and it was effecting her to the point where she was actually afraid to sleep. She wrote several times that when she fell asleep even during the day, she'd hear him speaking to her. Then he came to the final entry of the notebook and as soon as he saw the date, it filled him with dread.
March 24, 1997. The same date as her death. With growing dread and sorrow, he gazed down at the entry to see what she had to say.
(Sam's journal entry)
The dream came again early this morning, only now it was different. At first I heard just his voice calling out to me as usual only it sounded different. There was more venom to his voice than what I was used to. This time it sounded like he was very angry, like I had done him some wrong. I tried waking myself up as usual, but I just couldn't get out of it. So I decided to follow it this time into the darkness and gloom. It soon felt like I was lost, like something was blocking my attempts to escape. It was only then that a deep red light appeared and I could make out something stirring in the shadows. I first thought that there was some salvation for me, but instead as I got a better look I saw it for what it truly was.
It was HIM. The demon god himself stood over me and said that he wanted me to join him. Join him for what? I didn't care though. I said no, but he threatened me with death. I still didn't care, I just wanted out and that's when I came out of it as he yelled the name Fergus over and over again. I don't know what that means and I don't care. I've had with these dreams and it's because I got involved in this Zotz obsession. Tonight I'll be burning all of it, but I'm going to keep this notebook to remind me to never get involved with the dark side of folklore again.
(End journal entry)
Mike saw this and slammed the notebook back down on the bed and covered his eyes tightly. He could feel the hot tears of his eyes begin to ooze out of his eyes and down his face. He didn't believe a lot of this demon stuff, but Sarah sure seemed to think it was real and after her. It pained him to know that his sister was tormented in her final days like this. But if this thing did exist then why her? If this demon bat did exist, why go after a regular girl who just wanted to study him? Well she had mocked some of his character and even those who had worshiped him. He could imagine a higher force being angry over something that, but it'd be small compared to what the rest of the world did.
Mike tried to move it out of his head as just his mind going nuts from grief and that his sister may have been going mad in her last days. From what Mike remembered, she hadn't been sleeping very well and she'd even been a little jumpy as well. It may not have felt real to Mike, but it was real to her. And then there was something else that bothered him as reopened the notebook and reread the entry.
Fergus?
They knew a mechanic in town named Fergus who had diagnosed the problem with Sarah's car as brake failure as the factor that led to the crash. He knew a lot about automobiles and had the knowledge to determine it as the leading cause. However that also meant that he could sabotage a vehicle just as easily.
Mike started shaking his head and said, "Nah that's crazy. Mr. Fergus has been here as long as I can remember. How could he even be involved with something like this?"
Still though the feeling wouldn't shake off of him and it resulted in a sour feeling in his stomach. He tried to get it out of his mind and walked out of his room to get something to drink. This whole thing had him feeling thirstier than usual and he needed a cool refreshment to help him feel better. He went down stairs and headed straight for the kitchen. As he entered in, his father who was sitting at the table, looked up and saw him.
Mike had inheritated his looks from his father seeing as they shared the same hair and eye color except that his father's hair was longer. However Mike was of a shorter stature. His father stood at least six feet tall with a few more inches Mike guessed while Mike was only five feet nine. He too had been hit hard by Sarah's passing, but he seemed to be recovering from it now while Mike just seemed to get worse and worse.
"Mike? You feeling okay son?" his dad asked as Mike went over to the kitchen sink.
Mike stood at the sink startled by his father's question. He wanted to turn back and face his father, but he just couldn't muster the courage to do so.
"Yeah dad I'm fine. I'm just feeling thirsty is all," Mike said as he grabbed a glass and turned on the faucet.
His father stood up and walked over to Mike as he filled the glass.
He placed a hand on his shoulder and said, "Are you sure? Your eyes look flushed."
Mike tried to explain it, but before he could say anything his father let out a sigh and turned Mike's head towards him.
"I know what's wrong Mike and I understand. You've been crying again and you know what? That's okay," his father said.
This time Mike couldn't help but look back towards his father as he wrapped his thick arms around Mike and patted his back a little.
"I know it's been hard. Both you and Sarah were so close. And I bet looking at the stuff in her cupboard got to you. Don't worry. As long as we have our memories of her, she'll never be truly gone," he said and Mike sniffed a little bit.
His father released him and patted his shoulder one more time.
"Just wait. It'll get better in time," he said and went back to sit at the table.
Mike sniffled a little bit as he drank down his water and placed the glass in the dish water. This new wave of grief only added to the new wave of anger that began to build. What if the things that he suspected were true? Sarah had never been a superstitious type and if she actually believed that something in her dreams was going to get her, then he figured that something wrong was going on. He figured he could at least go to see Fergus and put his theory to rest.
"Hey dad I'm going to go for a walk for a bit. When mom gets home, tell her I'll be back in a little while," Mike said.
His father nodded and said, "Don't stay out too long. It'll be dark soon."
Mike looked out and he could see the sun was starting to go down. He nodded back and went back through the kitchen and living room. He grabbed a brown jacket and went out. He looked up the street and saw his route to Fergus' place. His neighborhood was small and the local mechanic shop was easily within walking distance of the house. He closed the door and began walking away from his home.
So how was the first chapter? Good? Bad? Or average? Next chapter things will start falling into motion as Mike goes to visit this Fergus guy.
Be sure to read and review please.