Chapter 14: Destruction of Innocence

There was no deception this time. Inside the building, it didn't look like a home at all. It was very dark, and gray, with an arching ceiling and a cold feeling to everything. In the center of the room, the creature, some sort of advanced Twin Victim by the looks of it, was standing. It was waiting for him.

Walter stepped forward to meet it.

The monster looked closer to the way the twins had in life than its smaller counterparts did. On this one, the bodies were longer and more distinct, and supported itself on curling feet as well as hands. While still joined together between a black, cloak-like cloth, he could imagine that it was the boy who had a complete body, with the torso of the girl fused to his, as though they were mimicking the twins' injuries. Their faces were detailed, now, looking human and more distinct, although still very close in appearance. They had hair, too, with the girl's trailing down in a brown braid.

He had the unnerving feeling, more than he had with the others, that it really was them—that his victims had returned to life to seek revenge.

That's nonsense, he told himself firmly. It's a monster, not Billy and Miriam Locane.

Still, he continued to stare at it, not even reaching for a weapon yet. He didn't have to look to know that the door had disappeared, and that killing this thing was probably the only way he could get out again. Perhaps dying was the preferable alternative. Nevertheless, he hadn't yet found the courage to die; in the glass room, he had struggled to save himself when Henry urged him to.

That, he didn't understand at all. He had believed in the alliance at a time when he had managed to distance himself from what he had done. Now, the past was being forced upon him, again and again, and he knew that everyone who had called him unforgivable had spoken truly.

He stared at the monster and wondered if Henry was helping him because he was afraid of him. It made more sense than anything else, by this point. He never actually had given a good explanation for his actions, nor had he expressed any sort of forgiveness.

Although he did say he thought I could be redeemed.

Did that mean anything? Had it been at all sincere? He felt something inside of him shriveling up and dying, that tiny part of him that had hoped for friendship, that had been sure that if he only kept trying as hard as he could, at least one person would look past who he had been.

He looked at the monster's faces that looked like the faces of the Locane twins, and he thought about how young they had been.

Was there ever any hope for me? he wondered.

The monster gave up on waiting for him to make the first move, and charged, arms swinging. It hit him harshly across the side of the head, and the blow knocked him several feet away. Shaking his head, he felt as though some sense had been knocked into him. He got to his feet and pulled out the handgun.

After all, it was just an enemy that was trying to kill him. He wasn't ready to die so soon.

That terrible laughter that had followed him through the town echoed around the room, as if to sneer at his new resolve. The monster cocked its heads as though it, too, could hear the sound.

Walter shot it.

It fell back with a roar, and then it looked right at him. Raising its accusing finger in the style of the Twin Victims, it began to whisper. Knowing that it could speak shook him up a little, even if it was only a single word. The word itself, once he made out what they were saying, made matters even worse.

"Murderer… Murderer…"

"No!" he shouted, glaring at them—at it, he corrected his thoughts quickly, because it was only a monster, after all. "You won't overcome me like this!"

He aimed the gun again and shot the monster several times in succession. He paused to reload it, and as he did so, he found himself thinking about the twins.

He was almost done. Just a few more deaths, and he would have the ten hearts. Then, he could go forward with the next step of the 21 Sacraments. The Ritual of the Holy Assumption.

Thinking about that made him more anxious to complete this part, and he began to walk down the street more quickly. Then he saw them.

Two children, playing in the road. He wasn't sure how old they were, just that they were young. They also were alone.

He fingered the axe he had concealed within his coat.

The monster knocked him down again, having had time to charge him while he was distracted. As he tried to recover, it struck again, smashing him against the wall. Walter groaned, both in pain and exasperation. He really had to stop zoning out like that. It was dangerous.

He shot the creature at close range and got to his feet. The twins' faces stared at him, while he aimed and shot again. He shuddered and tried to get a grip on his thoughts. It didn't matter that it looked like that. The rest of it was what mattered—the fact that it was a monster, and that it was intent on killing him.

Thinking like that didn't mean he was callous or heartless. He took a deep breath and aimed the gun. It didn't mean that at all. It didn't.

His conscience gave a sharp twinge as he approached them. They were only children after all, so how could he consider them sinners? How would their deaths be a blow against the evil of the world? How could this possibly help him be with Mother again?

He knew the priests who had taught him would have laughed at him for thinking that way. There could be no compassion for these outsiders who did not understand the Scriptures. They were all sinners.

And yet, he knew he would tear the Order apart easily to help the ritual along. They were no better than the others. Two of the highest priests were already dead. They had nothing to say when it came to these children. He could walk away and leave these two alone.

Mother wouldn't want him to delay.

He almost frowned at the thought, wondering about its accuracy, but then he felt a wave of shame for doubting what he had been taught. He knew the ritual. He knew what he had to do.

These children meant nothing in the face of that.

The monster crashed into him as he hesitated, knocking the gun from his hand. He tried to reach for it, but the creature was in the way, striking him again. It was still whispering that he was a murderer. He hated it, hated himself, and he reached for his pipe so that he could keep fighting.

He could still hear that laughter, coming from everywhere at once. He wondered if that meant he was going to die here.

He came upon the boy, first. The child barely had time to look up and notice him before the axe was swinging. The sharpened edge hit, slashing through that slender throat. Blood flew, and the body hit the ground.

He couldn't afford to waste any time.

Kneeling beside the body, he pulled out the knife he had kept with him at all times these past few days. He cut away the shirt first, and then drove the blade into the chest of the corpse, with enough force to crack the bone.

Blood spurted as he forced the chest cavity open and reached inside. He dug with his hands through the warm flesh, knowing by now where to look. Once the heart was revealed to the air, he picked up the knife again and began to cut around it.

A slight shiver ran down his spine as he finished his work. The first time he had done this, watching blood spray as he separated the heart from the flesh that bound it, he had nearly been sick. It was such a gruesome, grisly task. Now, he almost felt excited. He had gotten one more. He was one step closer to Mother.

He had brought a bag with him, and he pulled it out of his coat now and slipped the heart inside. Putting it back in his pocket, he got out a needle and thread and pinched the sliced skin together. He began to sew up the empty chest.

The monster had reached him again, while remembered bloodlust made his mind shudder and try to hide from itself. It hit his face, and his head snapped back against the wall. He tasted blood.

Walter swung his pipe at it, rather ineffectually since it had already moved away. He tried to catch his breath, feeling all of his previous injuries aching alongside the new ones. This was going very badly—terribly, in fact. His opponent didn't seem to be faltering at all, and he already felt like he might collapse.

He raised the pipe and hit the monster hard in the side of the head when it returned. It fell backwards with a screech, and the blood that flew reassured him that he had at least done some damage.

The little girl screamed just as he was tying off the piece of thread. So, she had finally noticed that her brother wasn't coming back. She must have seen him, a stranger, kneeling so close to her house, and then she came to stand behind him, looking to see what he was doing…and then, she must have seen…

He turned around and smiled at her, her brother's blood dripping from his hands as he advanced towards her.

"No!" Walter shouted, trying to clear the images from his mind. That was the past; it didn't matter now. He wasn't a murderer anymore.

"I'm not," he whispered, feeling the world spinning around him. "I'm not a murderer anymore."

He repeated that softly to himself, trying to keep himself sane as the monster ran towards him. It lunged, and he met it with the pipe. It wasn't so difficult to actually fight, if he could only focus on it.

If only it didn't look so very much like those children. The monsters in the town were looking more and more human, reminding him painfully of the people he had killed. It was maddening. As if he didn't feel the weight of guilt enough already. He knew he was a murderer, so why did the town seem to feel the need to remind him?

His heart was pounding too quickly, and as he tried to swing at the monster again, he could feel the memories swirling up.

He grabbed her, holding a bloody hand over her mouth so that she couldn't scream just yet. Her eyes were wide with terror as he stared down at her. She looked so small. She wasn't very different from her brother, really, at this age, and it seemed odd to think that she would grow up into a woman.

She would grow up to become someone like those girls who had always picked on him when he was a little boy, frightening and mocking him as he tried to hide. Someone like Cynthia Velasquez, raising his hopes with false kindness only to destroy him.

Someone like his real mother who had abandoned him, all those years ago, denying him the love he so desperately wanted.

Mindless fury rose up in him, as he uncovered her mouth and got out the axe, fury born of hatred at the world that hated and tormented him, channeling itself into a surge of anger that could only be directed at this small, delicate thing that was screaming in his grasp.

He swung the axe into her shoulder with a vicious smile, throwing her down to the ground as he did so. She was trying to get away, but he was much stronger than her, the tiny thing that she was. Bones cracked and flesh tore, making wet, ripping sounds as he pulled her arm free of her body.

She screamed, agonized, wordless cries that called out to something deep inside of him and made a part of his mind flinch away. Anger at his own weakness fueled his hatred, and he began to chop at her other shoulder.

Walter grabbed his forehead and sunk to his knees, trying not to scream. No, no, why had he done it, why had he done such a terrible thing, and would it ever leave him alone? His thoughts were rambling, and he struggled to think clearly about what was happening.

The girl was…no, that was in the past. The girl wasn't here; all that was here was a monster, and that was what he had to focus on.

It had reached him again, but instead of hitting him, its hands had latched around his arm. Shockwaves of pain ran from his broken wrist through the rest of it, and he lost his grip on the pipe with that hand.

Wielding it with one hand, he tried to swing it across his body at the monster. It connected, but not with enough strength to make it lose its grip. He raised his arm to try again, and then the monster began pulling his other arm backwards.

As his arm was forced to bend in a way it was never supposed to, the pain heightened until it was nearly overwhelming. He howled, trying to hit the monster through a haze of red.

Somewhere inside of him, a voice began to whisper that he was a fool to fight, and that he was a sick, twisted little creep, after all, and that this sort of pain didn't even begin to cover what he deserved to feel…

Blood was everywhere, as he tore the girl's other arm free. The smell was strong, and with good reason, as he was covered with her blood. The grass beneath them was slick and wet, and he was still going, hacking now at her left leg.

She screamed and twisted, and it felt good to hear her scream. No one had ever heard him when he had screamed for help, no matter what was happening, and no matter how terrible the world was being. Now, she would feel the pain, and she would scream, and she would know there was no help coming.

Gobs of flesh flew as he chopped at her with a fiery enthusiasm. A piece of her hit him in the face, but he didn't pause to wipe it off, because he had to keep going, and besides, his hands were covered in blood, anyway.

He was onto her other leg, now, watching the sharpened edge of the axe strike flesh and bone, hearing her scream, feeling a giddy sense of near-madness from the spray of blood as it flew into the air.

She was quieting down now, and that was good, because he had to finish. She had been screaming for too long, and he knew someone would be coming to see. He had to be finished before they got there, or they would stop him, and he would never get her heart.

Out came the knife, to be driven deep into her chest. Again, the cracking of bone, the soft flesh inside. He found the heart and cut it free, working quickly because there was no time to savor the job this time.

The heart went into the bag, and he got out the thread. He held the thin flesh together with one hand, and sewed her back together, hearing screams as someone finally came to investigate and noticed the blood.

He jumped to his feet and took off down the street, not caring that people saw him. He had killed today, he had killed two more, and they were children, but he kept telling himself that it didn't matter, that it couldn't matter, because at least it meant he would be with Mother again…

Walter's arm snapped and he let out a cry. Tears were in his eyes, although whether from the pain or the memory, or a combination of both, he was not quite sure. He was going to die, here, killed by this thing, and he knew it.

A part of him was happy at the thought.

He deserved to die.

As much as he tried to stop it, the whole scene was playing through his mind again, blinding him to the real world. The monster beat him into the ground, hitting him again and again, and he couldn't find the strength to do anything about it.

He was more of a monster than this distorted creature.

The memory was so clear, and so vivid, that he wanted to scream and run away from himself. The actions were terrible and sickening, but the emotions he had felt were possibly even worse.

And yet, a part of him wanted to fight back.

After all, this was his second chance, wasn't it? When he had died, he had accepted what he had done. This was his chance to prove that he could be different. It was his chance to prove that he didn't have to be a monster.

He stared at the thing that was killing him and wondered why he was forced into this choice—die a painful death or kill the Locane twins again.

Except that it's not the Locane twins, a voice argued in his mind. It's just a monster that looks like them. Even Henry tried to tell you that these things are only monsters.

He almost smiled. He could just imagine how Henry would be yelling at him if he were here. Poor Henry. He still thought he could be saved.

And he'll be waiting for me outside. He might not leave Silent Hill until I come out.

The last thing he needed was another death on his conscience. Even if he died before the monsters got Henry, he would still be responsible.

He struggled to his feet, hitting the monster weakly with the pipe. It fell backwards enough for him to steady himself, and then he hit it again, harder.

It became a mechanical motion, swinging the pipe against the monster's body and then raising it to repeat the action. He didn't care that it was still hitting him, because it wasn't enough to stop him.

He felt tired…so very tired…

None of this was fair. He hit the monster even harder, suddenly angry at it. He hated this entire town for what it was doing to him. He thought he might be sick, if he didn't pass out first.

Walter smashed his pipe into the monster with increasing fury, until the skulls cracked, and blood and gore sprayed onto him. Even then he didn't stop, nearly sobbing, needing to hit it until he was sure it was dead.

Finally, he fell to his knees next to the corpse. Something had fallen from beneath its clothes as it fell. It was some sort of plate. He picked it up and squinted at it.

It was, in fact, a ceramic plaque, with the word "Murderer" carved into it.

He flinched. That certainly was appropriate. He slipped it into his coat pocket. Then he looked down at the corpse. It was dead. Despite everything, he had overcome it and the madness it tried to bring. Unable to contain his relief, he laughed.

Then he knew why that terrible laughter had sounded so familiar.

Horrified, Walter was barely aware of the door reappearing on the wall. That made laughter that had followed him…it was his own. He had sounded like that, to his victims—insane, cruel, mocking. He thought again of the little girl, and how she had screamed, and then all of his victims' final moments began to run through his mind.

He was in terrible pain, everywhere, as he finally grabbed the weapons he had dropped and staggered to the door. He felt as though he might die.

He rather wished he would.