Chapter Two: Something Awful Follows Behind and Something Awful Slumbers Below

September 12th, 1997

"I'm so sorry. Snivel."

It's all just a bad dream. You'll wake up.

"Please wake up."

"I'm sorry Lilly."

It's just a long dream a bad dream.

"I'm sorry mum. I'm sorry dad."

The bad men will stop chasing me, its all a dream. Two days of a nightmare.

"Please brother, help me." I whisper.

I grip my victory pin tighter.

I see the lights flicker above me. No they're coming.

I here them! How did they find me? How did they find me? I was thinking too long. I cant think they will find me if I think.

They followed me from my house, through the village, followed me through the fields, into the woods, and to this ruin. Don't open the door. Don't open the door.

"Please brother, make the bad men go away!" I whisper.

I hear them shout from behind the door with broken words as hounds bark among them. I begin to walk as silently as I can down the hall. The door thump and splinter angry curses and that broken language flow forth, and then I hear him shout. I rush down the corridor it grows dimmer once more. Around me are countless locked door that taunt me as I attempt to open them. They're getting closer. I'm tired of running; I can't keep running I have to hide. Far off I hear the hall door shatter. Don't think just run.

I push deeper into the hallways, the lights begin to dim and then disappear. I'm in the darkness I feel relief, I can finally breathe. "Thank you brother." I whisper. Raging footsteps and barely coherent shouting echoes' through the halls, a shimmer of a light illuminating the tattered wallpaper. Keep running… running… running. I don't dare look behind me. The hallways feel so cold and lifeless I can't see a single thing must be a nightmare this cant be real. My foot catches an old halfway broken table; I trip crashing into a massive black void. I stumble my shins and knees are covered in cuts and splinters. The air is foul; the ground is covered with rotten wood debris and mold from the newly formed hole above me. The torn wallpaper and old oak have given way to smooth dark grey stone. It is almost pitch black down here, it's so cold, and I can barely breath, but I need to keep running I have a chance now.

No doors, no furniture, cold lifeless walls and endless catacomb. As I approach the far end my heart fills with hope, a door. As my eyes adjust and I continue my advance hope is crushed. Another door to taunt me. It is a door of solid steel wrapped in iron chains. The single lights above my head begin to flicker, on they are near. I sink at its base onto my raw knees, I do not fear, I do not anger, all I feel is the purest form of depression as all my hope is crushed in one fell swoop. There is comfort in accepting your fate. Don't think just accept.

I jump upward as sharp burning sensation envelopes my legs. I furiously brush my wounds and feel grit, salt. In the dimly light my eyes can just barely make out a circle of salt that encircles the door; it's more then just a semi circle odd shapes and lines create a network of patterns like crochet. I feel tears begin to well up again; Lilly loved crochet. Stop thinking! They're going to hear you idiot.

My blood on the ground it isn't just being absorbed into the salt, it's moving. Droplets roll across the floor and red stained grains salt are dragged toward the door. This can't be real. It amasses and proceeds to trickles toward a single black stone at the side of the door. I slowly walk toward the stone covered in odd glowing red symbols. The symbols are strange it isn't any kind of speak they taught in school.

I touch the stone with my hand; new legible letters begin to glow. Don't think, don't think just read, and just don't think. Stop thinking just Read the words; if you don't think they cant hear you. "The Bird… of Hermes… is my…name… I eat… my wings… to keep me… tame." What kind of speak is this? No stop thinking.

The stone pops out instantaneously; instead of a loud grind or screech it is absolutely silent. It's surprisingly light in my hands. But, it isn't just a stone it's hollowed out. I reach in and feel paper and something metallic. I bring the stone up to the warm light; a slight glimmer twinkles within, a key. Yes! A key!

I fumble with the key for a moment and then remember the other content within the stone. I struggle to read the paper in the dim light; luckily it is the old speak, I was always the best with old speak.

'Whom ever should find this,

By the time you are reading this I have long since fled. I have failed my family, my country, and a friend. I have failed and betrayed my mentors two times; I thought if I just followed orders I wouldn't be able to betray them again. I was not brave enough to go against my new mentor's wishes, I was not brave enough to stand and fight, and now his country burns.

The key with which you hold unlocks a great power. My mentor would have said to anyone who stumbled upon this door by accident, to leave what lies within caged and run far. But if you are in your darkest hour, if you are hopeless and in fear, if you are angry at the hell that I and so many other good people failed to stop, open the damned door. But, prepare for what lies within, it will be your ultimate salvation or doom. Once the door has been opened it cannot be contained. Choose wisely.'

Don't think. Just do.

I hear a loud thump down the catacomb from the collapsed hallway. The dogs howl.

I jam the key into the padlock, I twist and the chain clatters along the ground.

"Overdown hearloud."

I push the key into the lock on the steel door twisting once more, the weights and tumblers shift behind it. Slowly the door creaks open. Immediately something feels wrong. It is so cold, unnaturally cold. I can feel death. I touch my victory pin. Don't think. Just walk.

I hesitate, a loud series of gunshots echo down the hallway, and a couple of rounds scrape by the door. I struggle to shut the behemoth but it's so heavy. I feel its surface looking for some lock to close it, but there is nothing it is perfectly smooth. Stumble down the stairs into the pitch-black abyss below. I made a mistake. I need to go back. I begin to run back up to the door, maybe I can find another way out and sneak around them and then I heard his voice echo down the hall. "Nobody shoots her except me."

I rush as frantically down the steps. A sharp pain grows in my stomach, it increases with every step down; my side feels wet, blood. One of the bullets must have hit me, damn it hurts. I grip my pin tightly. Brother, if you're listening, please help me. I reach the base of the stairs panting and frantically looking around, where is this weapon or power the note promised. My barely adjusted eyes make out something along the wall. I cautiously approach.

Long white hair stretches down to the floor, complimented by ghastly pale leathery skin. It wears a black leather straight jacket wrapped in chains of steel. It has a hooked Eurasian nose like men in the film reels, on either side two hollow eye sockets stare back at me. I kneel before the corpse before me. "No. Why?" I whine. False hope, false promises, it doesn't end, why can't things just go right.

"I'm sorry." I whisper to the corpse.

"I'm sorry mum and dad." I clutch my pin.

"I'm sorry Lilly."

"Please come back please don't let the bad men take me."

"Please brother, I'm sorry brother."

The door begins moan.

"I'm sorry brother! Please let them be alive! Please let me see them again! Please don't let me die brother!" I scream. I clutch my pin as tightly as I can.

The door slams. I see flashlight beams dance around the room.

"BROTHER PLEASE!"

I hear blast from behind me, and my back erupt into excruciating pain once more.

Oh Brother! Brother! It hurts. I try to push my self up and immediately collapse. My leg, it feels like broken glass and erupts with throbbing agony. I… I've been shot again. No it can't be. No.

I pull myself along the floor closer to the wall, there has to be somewhere to hide. I'll wake up soon.

"Double plus good comrade, shots much…"

"Shut up and get the bitch!" It's him.

"No! No! No!" I scream.

I hear boots clatter across the ancient stone. I scramble to pull myself up to the corpse. I reach out to see my hand covered in blood; I look behind me toward the two men illuminated from behind by several harsh flashlights. A trickle of blood follows behind my path. Then I feel a force pull me from behind. I hopelessly claw at the stone to try and pull myself away, but its no use. Staring at the slick maroon trail I leave behind I shiver in shock. I feel something thick and soft press into my side; gauze meant to stop the bleeding. We reach the end of the stairs his nine other lackeys tower over me. All dress in dull greyish brown and maroon trimmed of the civil constables of the surrounding villages. At the edge of the staircase I feel myself raised and spun around. And I see him. His jet-black uniform blends almost seamlessly with the darkness of the chamber, while the various crimson party patches seem glow in illumination of the flashlights and cigarettes. Slung on his shoulder is not a victory rifle or machine pistol but a Sten. The gun of the revolution, the gun of the party defends us with, the very same gun brother used to liberate us during the dark years. He should be proud defender of the party and every thing brother stands for; but he's not he's a wolf wearing the coat of a sheepdog.

"Can your dense prole brain even comprehend what you have done."

My head remains low. I can only stare at my dangling feet and the blood that drips down from my tattered grey school dress. I cant even bare to look at his uniform let alone his face. Don't think he will hear me.

"Look at me!" He shouts.

He grips my chin tilting my head upward. His face is curled in a sneer of rage and satisfaction. His mouth reeks of the stench of alcohol. His officer cap is adorned with the iconic red, white, and black V crossed by two friendly shaking hands. A clean gauze bandage covers the socket where his eye used to be, the eye I stole from him. The warm glow of a cigarette illuminates his greasy face. I turn my gaze away from him and up the stairs to three whimpering hounds scratching pulling at their handler toward the door. Don't look at him he'll know what your thinking.

He strikes me across the cheek.

"I'm inner party you stupid cunt! LOOK AT ME!"

"Big brother would be ashamed of you!" I scream back. No don't make it worse what are you doing?

"You're more dense then I realized."

I try to control myself but I can't hold it in any longer. I hate this man. I want to kill him and all those who dared call them-selves Inner party in that room!

"You and your friends were hurting Lilly! People like you shouldn't be in the party! Big brother don't like it when you hurt good people!" I shout.

"Proles aren't people. Your kind doesn't know what's good for you." He chides back.

"But Lilly… she was… she was only…why…" There were so many of them. So many inner party. I want to throw up.

"Oh she was fun for us. She was stupid like you walking in on other peoples' business. You stupid prole. You should know what's good for a party member is good for the prole. It was fun for my comrades and I so it was good for her wasn't any harm in me having fun. But all that fun had to be ruined because of her screams and your treason. See Big Brother loves me and those other party members for putting naughty little proles in their place. Big brother hates naughty little proles who try to massacre kids."

"W…w…what?" I stutter.

"You haven't heard about the little devil of cheddar? Oh yes the you're the Times' largest story right now, on the front page of today's edition actually. Are you not that little girl who brainwashed her friends to become pawns of Goldstein? Are you not that little girl who attempted to kill her own parent and half the school with Eurasian submachine guns and bombs? Are you not the one who plotted to murder dozens of inner party members volunteering to help miserable little prole children? Are you not that little girl who was only stopped by brave officers of the party who valiantly lost his eye to save the toddler you held hostage? Oh wait that's right your not a little girl according to the Times, just an elderly dwarf disguised as one."

Around me they have mixed expression shine through the orange glow, some sneer, some have faces twisted into hate, some look disgusted, and a one has the slightest hint sympathy. I shut my eyes. I can't look. I can't think. I can only snivel and cry on the floor hiding my face in shame. I clutch my pin. Please big brother.

"Oh what do I have here?" I feel him pry open my hands.

"No!"

He slaps me again. I feel him tear my pendant way with a small chunk of collar fabric. It glints in the flashlights before my eyes. He tosses it into the darkness. It faintly clinks across the floor.

"No! Please! No!"

"You've been a bad little girl, its a disgrace to have a monster wear that. You know only traitors could have raised such a nasty little monster like you…"

I feel rage return.

"DON'T you dare touch Mum and Da…"

A massive kick from his boot to my stomach shuts me up. I taste blood rise from my throat I gag on it. I feel the sharpest pain in my chest, even sharper then the stings of bullets. I think he broke something. I feel the wounds in my thigh and stomach re-open, trickling warm blood down my side.

"Imagine all the secrets they are hiding. Imagine all the things they will confess to once we bring them to see your interrogation. Imagine what they'll say to stop you from screaming like that other stupid prole."

How could this be happing to me? I'm a good girl. I worked hard. I was going to join the anti sex league. I was going to pass the test to become outer maybe even inner party. I wasn't good with new speak, but I was getting better. I was going to do my part for big brother.

I couldn't just report them. I just had to piss them off. Out of all the people I could attack it had to be the thought policeman. I screwed everything up. I can't breath. It's my entire fault.

I got my friend killed. She will never get justice because of me.

I'm going to die.

I'm going to get my parents killed.

It's my fault.

I'm sorry big brother.

I feel so cold.

I can't breath.

I'm a traitor.

I love you big brother.

"I'm sorry big brother!" I sob.

I feel so cold.

I feel a glove stroke gently across my cheek. I shiver.

"For a prole you have a pretty little face, much prettier then that other one. Yes we're going to have a special time down here… and then a special time in front of your pare…."

Clink clack clink...