FadedScribbles: Hello again, and I'll try to keep my soliloquy short. Thanks to those who have been reading and giving good marks to these writers, and I hope you will enjoy what is yet to come. I'll leave the rest to you. Please enjoy the work of Temarcia.


Author: Temarcia

William Snippy, The Writer

It had started with a dream. No, it was not an ordinary dream. It was a nightmare, so vivid, so horrible. It was one of those nightmares that made you feel like you would never fall asleep again.

The blood, the pain, the horror of dying slowly. Not just dying – being consumed by the death. Being a fly trapped in the web of a merciless spider. Helpless.

After that, the insomnia came. Sleepless nights full of fear of closing my eyes even for a second. No, I don't remember how long it lasted. Weeks? Months maybe? Who would have counted? It was like a restless dream back then. Everything I did, everything I said, it is all a blurry memory by now. The only thought that wouldn't leave my head was writing it down, writing about those nightmares. The idea of putting those terrifying images on paper seemed like the only way to free my mind from them once and for all. That was, how I started my first novel. And that was, why Susan left me.

I think, I understand her. She must have thought that I was going crazy. I was obsessed with that story. I was typing every night, rarely talking to her and never going anywhere with her. We didn't even sleep together anymore. I guess, it was meant to end up like that. But I really needed to write. It wasn't what one would call being inspired. It was something different, more like a curse and a cure for insomnia at the same time. I couldn't go to sleep before I finished a few pages. And every new page was more disturbing than the previous one. The Dead World from my dreams was slowly growing bigger with every abandoned place, every grotesque monster and every deranged character I created. And somehow this imaginary world became more real to me than the real one. The part of me already lived there and the Dead World lived in me. I worked on the book for almost two years. When it was finally finished I realized that I was alone. Without Susan, without the story to write – the emptiness surrounded me. There was a hole in my soul; I was missing the Dead World.

That was when I decided to get some help. My psychologist diagnosed depression. Syndromes were rather obvious: spending half of the day in the bed, lacking appetite, avoiding other people, not doing anything productive. Thank god, I got published so I had money to survive. But I didn't have much will to survive, it felt like I was already dead. The psychologist advised me to get back to writing. I tried, but words didn't come to me as easily as before. I wasn't able to write anymore. All I could do was type the single sentence over and over again. "In his dreams he saw this place and one day as he opened his eyes the Dead World awaited", there was only that. I desperately needed inspiration because, unlike the character in my unwritten story, I couldn't wait forever for something to happen.

In search of inspiration I stumbled upon pubs, dumpy night clubs, cheap hotels and many other run-down hellholes where the alcohol was nasty and so were the costumers. In the one of those godforsaken places I met her. It was a rainy morning and I was sipping my morning coffee after another wasted night. I didn't know or care how the bar was called, but I remember the latest hit of Red Hot Chili Peppers playing. She was listening to that song while cleaning tabletops. She worked there as a waitress – not really my type but after breaking up with Susan I wasn't very picky. I thought she was just an ordinary girl with the ordinary brown hair and not so ordinary accent. But it was she who told me that story. The story that changed everything, the story about the truth behind the Chernobyl disaster.

According to the waitress, the accident had been caused by a man who had spilled his tea on the reactor. He had survived the explosion but he had become radiated so badly that his whole face had melted. However, with the radiation poisoning had come some mysterious power. The man had possessed paranormal abilities and nothing could physically harm him anymore. The scientist had become interested in him believing that his powers would help them find the cure for the cancer or maybe even for every incurable diseases. So, they had locked the man with no face in some secret laboratory in Moscow. The poor thing would have probably spent the rest of his live there if not for the coup d'état attempt that had taken place in USSR last year. Rumors said that during the event the strange-looking man with the black gas mask covering his face had been seen riding a tank on the streets of Moscow. He had disappeared afterwards.

The girl didn't know what had happened to him but he was believed to have gone to Canada most likely in the company of the other test subject and befriended Russian scientists. I asked no more questions, she had me intrigued and I didn't want to show it. Some other clients entered the bar, the radio playing another sad song. Before I left, she turned to me and said: "You won't find him but if you're looking for the purpose, he will be the one to find you." And after the moment of silence she added: "Just remember – BEWARE THE MUG!"

I didn't get that weird warning but strangely enough, it didn't matter. All that mattered was the fact that I found what I was looking for and from that time I knew exactly what to write about.