Chapter 35

Finale Part 1: The Misery Mire

"Let me take you to the hurting ground
Where all good men are trampled down

Just to settle a bet that could not be won

Between a prideful father and his son."

"Sorrow," Bad Religion

(The Process of Belief)

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The lighting inside the "control room" was no improvement over the previous areas, nor was the smell. The latter was familiar to Douglas, but he couldn't quite pinpoint what it was. Almost a smell of decay...at first Douglas wondered if it might be a corpse, but that conclusion was soon tossed out (it wasn't quite as powerful as the smell of a dead body, even in early stages of decomposition). No, it was more like...rotten food of some kind, perhaps vegetables. It had a natural-but-not-quite-natural flair to it, as if something pleasant and natural had been tainted by artificial means (for some reason, hot dogs came to mind).

The room wasn't very large--it extended forward about fifteen feet in a perfect square shape, capped off at the far end by a wide podium. Stacked on top of the podium was an upright four-by-four grid of monitors. Two in the far right column appeared to be operational--both projected differing perspectives of what appeared to be a meat locker or freezer--but the rest were riddled with static, save for a couple in the left column (exactly parallel to the ones in the right column, incidentally) that showed only blackness. For just a moment, it crossed Douglas' mind that the darkened monitors might not be broken--they might simply be broadcasting from somewhere out in that black ocean--but he quickly pushed the idea aside. Now was not the time for aimless speculation; Heather was in danger--possibly immortally so--and he had a sinking feeling that was growing with the passing of each second. It was like a far less pleasant version of the sensation he'd gotten on the first day of his first job, five or ten minutes left before clock-out time; as it had then, time now seemed to be both racing and crawling.

Maybe that's what's happening, he pondered. Time is pretty funny in this place. Already I feel like I've been here a month, maybe longer.

But that probably had less to do with how "funny" time was than it did with all that had happened in the past few hours. Especially with what had happened to John.

Shaking his head, Douglas approached the podium. The filthy linoleum floor tiles echoed his footsteps, filling him with an urgent paranoia, as if he were being followed. Even though he felt foolish doing so, he shot a cursory glance over his shoulder before stopping at the podium.

The podium was sparsely decorated; four brown-colored buttons, each of which appeared as though they might have once been backlit, marked the respective corners of the panel, and a much larger button--a square red thing emblazened with a tiny, unfamiliar golden crest--held center, surrounded by a frame of tiny blue buttons. There were white labels beneath each button (save for the blue ones) on the podium, but the words printed on them were illegible to Douglas--they appeared to be in some cryptic foreign language.

Wait...

He leaned closer, examining the symbols printed beneath the red button. He didn't recognize any of them, but all the same...they looked familiar. He thought he might have seen them before.

But where?

It was impossible to tell at the moment...but all the same, he felt that to forego this examination might be risky. He felt like he was playing one of those puzzle-games, where none of the puzzles were logical so you had to try everything in every room, even the ideas that made no sense. With this in mind, he produced the notepad and pen from his coat pocket and began to etch a crude diagram of the panel before him. He labeled the buttons, what color they were, and the labels beneath each.

Taking a closer look at the monitors, Douglas realized that they, too, had labels beneath them. After comparing them to the labels on the control panel, he determined that they were not associated with the buttons on the panel in any visible way.

Right there, from the corner of his eye, something moved.

He pivoted to the right, setting his hand within reach of the armament in his shoulder-holster.

Nothing was there.

"Bull," Douglas muttered. "I saw it."

There it was again. Not from the corner...from the monitor. The far right one on the top row. Douglas felt panicked anticipation well up in his chest.

Is someone in there?

Not quite. And the other question...were the monitors feeding live, like security cameras, or were they broadcasting pre-recorded material? The former seemed more likely, but he supposed the latter was possible, as well. All the same, he--

There it was again. Only for a second, and it was gone again.

This time, Douglas got a good look at it--well, as good a look as could be gotten in the shoddy lighting and low quality of the monitor's view. It looked to be about the size of a grown man, wearing a short black coat and tattered pants. He couldn't tell if the hair was short and spiky--or if the shoes were shoddy white tennys--just by looking at them, but he didn't need to.

But where is he?

His mind echoed, Watch Station Access.

He turned back towards the door, entering into what was almost a jog...and recoiled with an adrenaline-filled surge of phobia just a few feet in front of the door through which he'd come. It was now closed, but that was to be expected; he'd heard it drift ever-so-slowly closed on its ancient hinges when he'd come in. No, what really surprised him was the newcomer taking refuge before him, sprawled across the metal door like a nightmarish blanket.

It was the largest, furriest piebald spider he had ever seen in his life. Its white-speckled body alone covered almost the entire door, and its legs sprawled out a few inches past it on all sides. From the tip of its abdomen ran a fine silk thread, visible only in the direct beam of Douglas' flashlight, that ran straight up into what appeared to be a venting duct.

"Has this been here...?" he began.

The whole time? his mind finished. He couldn't help but feel shaken by the possibility that this thing had been sitting on the back of the door when he'd opened it and had remained there, waiting, watching, as he reviewed the podium and its monitors. Or perhaps the spider had sensed his presence when he'd come in and lowered itself through that venting duct?

But its sudden visibility (and stunning size) was not the only unusual quality of the spider; it was missing a leg. One sprouted from its head on either side, another from each side of the thorax...but while two more legs protruded from the left side of the abdomen, only one took root on the right. There was only a malformed stump where the eighth leg should have gone.

As soon as he felt the edge of the control panel jab into his backside, Douglas realized that the moment had gotten the best of him; he was still backing ever-so-slowly away from the thing on the door. He stopped, pressed as far away from it as he could be.

"What are you?" Douglas asked, blindly attempting to assert power over the situation--a classic tactic from his policework days. Amateur, but classic nonetheless.

The spider did not respond. Did not even move, in fact.

Is it even alive? he wondered, managing enough power over his own body to take a meager step towards the intruder (or perhaps that was incorrect--perhaps it was he who was the intruder?).

"I don't want to know," Douglas mumbled out loud. "But I guess there's only one way to find out." And with that, he started--very slowly, albeit--towards the spider.

You're crazy, he thought to himself. What if it's alive? What will you do then?

Closer now. Just a few feet away.

Only now did Douglas notice how hot it felt in here. Sweat was creeping down the nape of his neck, and all of a sudden his coat felt extremely heavy on him. He felt it slide against the nape of his neck like an unwelcome second skin.

Three feet away. Two feet.

Nothing; it still wasn't moving.

If I can just reach the doorknob...

Before he could react, the thing on the door burst into life, issuing forth a loud, elongated hiss that was almost a howl. It began to thrash wildly in place, disturbed from sleep. Douglas cried out violently and fell backward onto his ass; the immediate pain convinced him that he had probably bruised his tailbone.

"Damn it!" he exclaimed, scooting backwards, trying to distance himself from the thrashing entity. He could only watch, mystified, as the spider's fit would carry it up into the air ever-so-slightly, only to send it crashing back against the door hard enough to rattle the frame time and again. He was disgusted to notice the greenish-yellow foam gathering between its unsightly mandibles--probably either acid or some particularly potent poison--and had time to wonder if the spider was going to somehow spray him with that stuff before its tantrum abruptly ceased, and it resumed stasis against the door.

A moment passed, and Douglas was able to regain his footing. As he did, though, he felt his heart jump into his throat when a heavy, layered baritone sound issued from somewhere in the room. He glanced all around, expecting to see something worse...and saw nothing.

That was when he realized it had come from the spider, as well.

It...growled at me?

The spider's multitude of eyes were now open, all staring at him with apparent malicious intent. And yet it held still, waiting not to leap forth and attack but, apparently, for Douglas to try to pass through its domain once again. Douglas remembered that strategy from a video he'd watched in high-school about spiders; they didn't seem that bad when they were small and easily dispatched with the heel of one's boot, but the way those close-up camera shots had presented those things had made them seem malevolent, somehow...menacing, evil creatures. The camera had well served the purpose of putting the viewer into the shoes of the insect being fed upon, and seeing a feeding spider's face close-up--in the act of murdering something small and helpless--had put the world of arachnids in a whole new terrifying light for Douglas, a light that shone on to this day.

Enough of this, Douglas said, wishing his actual feelings reflected the conscious thoughts in his head. Just shoot it, and let's be done. I don't have time to wait around here being afraid of a giant stupid bug.

Douglas reached into his coat, unholstering his revolver, and locked eyes with the offending creature. He hesitated for a moment; for any potential onlookers, that moment might have seemed much longer than it was, for it would have seemed that Douglas was searching for the proper one-liner to execute before doing the same to the spider. However, the tension of that temporary faux-drama was abruptly torn away by the crash of the revolver's hammer--or rather, by the explosion caused thereof.

The spider's abdomen burst on one side, dropping the gimp leg and several of the internal organs beneath it. A fluid which seemed to be white, red and green all at once issued from the wound, provoking another thrashing fit; the spider threw itself at the door multiple times, seeming to try to escape through it, and then, eyeing Douglas with an emotional fury that was so human it was disturbing, the thing retracted onto the thread extending from the remainder of its abdomen and began a slow, staggering effort back up into the duct through which it had presumably come in the first place. Its pained, furious screams echoed for some time within the narrow walls of the duct, seeming to hypnotize Douglas with their ferocity.

Wake up! Wake up and move, before it comes back!

He smacked himself in the forehead with his empty hand, and in an adrenaline-pumped fugue he seized the handle on the door and flung it open, fleeing back into the tower-like well from which he had come.

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The ground was wet, and it smelled awful...but none of that had Walter's attention at the moment. His right hand was wrapped across his body, grappling with the searing pain from the wound in his waist.

But there shouldn't be any pain! he insisted. I shouldn't be able to get hurt at all, much less feel pain!

But somehow, he could. Which could only mean one of two things: Either it hadn't worked after all, or he had missed something.

I haven't missed a thing, his mind snapped.

"Well," he mumbled out loud, pausing to spit out the bead of sweat that had crept onto his upper lip from his brow, "it's either that, or..."

Either I'm completely incompetent--which, while a pain, can be fixed--or it's impossible altogether. Which can't be. It just can't be.

"Just...shut up," he groaned. "Just--" But before he'd gotten as much out of his mouth, an unseen shockwave paralyzed him from the base of his spine.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGGH!

Walter recoiled, almost fell over, caught his balance at the last second in spite of the pain which lit up the left side of his body. That noise...that could only be...

"Not him," he begged--though, to him, it sounded more like a whine. "Not him, not here...not him, too...dammit!" Things were already going badly; what with the one who was already down here, probably hunting him as these very thoughts ran through his head...and on top of that, the apparent fact that the aglaophotis had gotten to him--

Wait...that's it! Of course, it's the aglaophotis! Has to be!

The aglaophotis must've gotten to him! He'd created it with the intent of using it to destroy the kid's Center, but he'd never even thought of how it might affect himself. And why should he have? Who would have known that the thing would have turned around and used (literally) the same ammunition back at him?

He laughed out loud--a bad move, he knew, for the Wizard would surely find him if he drew attention to himself in this condition, but the following surge of joy was too much to contain--and removed his hand from his injured side. "Maybe things will work out," he said, straining against the throbbing in his side. "Maybe they will...just yet."

Then, turning his head back towards the way he'd come, he shouted. "Come on, Receiver! Detective! Mother! Happy hours are...almost...over!"

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In the darkness, something woke up.

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He knew that he shouldn't have relied on any information found in this place to set up his expectations, but Douglas realized that he'd done no less in being mislead by the term, "Watch Station Access." In his mind the phrase had conjured images of an aerial platform, or perhaps a runway. Anything but...this.

It was a decrepit green room, made of bricks from floor to ceiling. A pungent aroma sailed out from the passage before him--a single narrow corridor, proceeding onward into the bowels of this strange place. The darkness took over in there, and Douglas actually felt his heart speed up a little; he wasn't claustrophobic, but the thought of going on through that dark and cramped space still managed to set his blood afire.

If that weren't enough already, the beam of his flashlight took that moment to settle on the phrase--apparently spray-painted onto the wall just to the left of the passage, along with a guiding arrow pointing towards the passage itself, by someone possessed either of limited motor skills or panic-driven insanity--"A Wizard Lives Here."

A wizard? Douglas mused. What the hell kind of kiddie thing is this?

There was the part of him that held to that...but then there was that deeper part, that almost-instinct. It sprung to life once again in a flurry of rebuttal: Maybe it's the kiddie stuff you should be most afraid of. This is seeming more and more like one of those murder-mystery novels where the killer is obsessed with some childish folktale.

Casting the thought away--but not forgetting it--he adjusted his grip on the flashlight, took a deep breath, and wriggled into the corridor.

Heather...just a little longer. It can't be too much farther.

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He'd found a way. A difficult way, but a way nonetheless.

As he was now, though...it would be nearly impossible to perform the correct operations without drawing attention to himself. And the Wizard was coming--he could feel its breath on the air. It knew this place as well as he did, if not better, and it would surely find him if he stopped long enough to save himself.

But the bullet won't wait long, Walter thought, staggering, holding tight to the wall on his left side with one hand. It's working fast. If only there were a way to...

Wait...maybe there was. If he could somehow...

"Yeah," he mumbled, spitting a bead of sweat off of his bottom lip. "Maybe...but how?"

God provides, he answered in his head. Just wait. Wait and watch, like you always do. Things will work themselves out.

"But I don't have time to wait," he moaned.

To this he could think of no response, nothing to reassure himself of the original plan. He guessed that was it, then--he would just have to wing it from here on out. He hated to admit it, but for the next little while, he'd be riding on a prayer as much as the ones pursuing him. It was just a good thing that the detective didn't know the other two were coming--if he did, he might be willing to do something a little more drastic in their interest, confronted with the knowledge that he was not Heather's one-and-only chance anymore.

Hell, under any other circumstance, I'd be glad to watch him die for her...I wish I didn't need him so badly.

"Pay attention," he half-whispered, gently patting one side of his face. "There's painful work to do."

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He hadn't gone more than a few feet into the corridor before its cry froze him in his boots: SKREEEEEE!

Douglas' heart rate tripled for a second--he could feel it pattering against his chest, so anxious to leave this place that it might just rip through his chest and flee to safety on its own--and his hand fell to the butt of his gun, solely out of reflex.

It's here?

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Walter wished like hell that he'd gotten his hands on a tourniquet and a scalpel before heading into town. Of course, he hadn't known his real reason for being here--his original plan had not allowed for a situation like this. But even though he felt he'd made every reasonable decision in getting here, he still felt inadequate; perhaps that resulted from the obssesive nature by which he idolized his storybook heroes, in all their superhuman perfection. Other people might have seen that as a weakness, but in it Walter only saw strength; it was that insatiable desire to be perfect, to always make every right decision in every possible case, that had driven him to be as successful as he was.

But...was he really successful? Hell, he didn't even know what he did for a living--or even if he did anything at all. The "knowledge" that he had a hundred thousand dollars stored away in multiple bank accounts across the state could simply be another one of his tricks, of the memory-jogging variety. Perhaps that memory had been placed there simply to cause uncertainty, to bring the contradiction of what he thought he knew in his heart to light?

"Forget the philosophical crap," Walter sputtered. "I've got to get these bullets out of my gut before I drop." He hesitated, keeled over...and fell to his knees, nearly bashing his head against the wall before him.

There's no time, he thought. I have to do it now, or else...or else it'll be too late.

"Great," he mumbled. "Now I'm thinking in staggers."

Shaking his head, grimacing against the migraine which chose that moment to reveal itself with startling ferocity, he fumbled with his coat, allowing it to slide over his shoulders and onto the ground behind him. He started to slide his shirt over his head, but was unnerved by what he saw. He shouldn't have been startled by the bloody spatters stretching across his chest from his left hip to his right shoulder--he was well aware that the aglaophotis had weakened the essence of his power, perhaps even reversed it altogether--but he found that he was, anyway; he had to fight to conceal a horrified gasp.

What the hell is happening? he thought.

"Nothing," he whispered dryly, breathless. "Nothing. Everything's...gonna be fine. Just...get this stuff out of you, and everything...will be back to normal."

But how?

"Damn," he hissed, staring at the three gaping bullet wounds--one just above his left hip, one dead in the center of his chest--surely no more than a millimeter or two from his heart--and one just below his right shoulder.

The fuckin' thing had shot him like a target in a carnival game; it seemed almost as if it had known its shots wouldn't kill him right away, and so it had decided to play with him a little bit--it wasn't a coincidence that the three shots lined up perfectly, of that Walter was sure.

"Oh, he'll get what's coming," Walter said and, sharply narrowing one eye in anticipation, applied a small amount of pressure on the flesh just beneath the wound near his shoulder. The pain was immediate and all-encompassing, and this time Walter couldn't catch the cry of agony his reflexes threw at him.

Damn it, he cursed in his mind. You want that thing to find you, or what?

"It's now or never," he managed to croak, his face already drenched in sweat. "Alright...here goes."

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The path eventually widened up enough for Douglas' body to catch up with his racing mind; he couldn't quite run yet, but his sidle had reached a pace befitting of a wild game in the heat of a life-or-death race. His gun, clutched tightly in his right hand, occasionally barked its discontent as it scraped against the stone wall--each collision was followed by a short flair of discomfort as Douglas' knuckle raked against the wall, taking a small amount of skin with it (though not enough to make it bleed, thankfully--who knew what kind of infection he might carry with him if and when he finally left this place).

Up ahead, the path opened out a little to either side, finally allowing Douglas enough room to enter a steady jog. He made sure to mainain a tight embrace on the revolver--that spider was sure to show up sooner or later. Although its cries had tapered off, one of them had been enough for Douglas to feel its rage, its hate, its utter discontent for Douglas as a living thing. It wanted to hurt him...not just to kill him but to break him, to tear him, to destroy him. It wanted him to regret ever setting foot in its domain. He didn't know how he could know that--or how the thing could feel that, really--but he knew. That cry of outrage, that horrible screech of desolation, had been enough to drive the point home.

Now, he could only hope that he had enough time to drive the bullet home, if and when that furry bastard reared its nightmarish head once more. It wouldn't be hard to kill, he felt certain--the shot to its leg seemed to have pissed it off quite a bit--but that wouldn't matter if he walked into its trap.

And on top of that, there was Walter to worry about. And, insofar as the warning had any substance, this so-called "Wizard."

Maybe Walter is the Wizard? he wondered. He's got all kinds of crazy, impossible tricks up his sleeve. I figure any guy who can tackle dying twice is capable of almost anything...people build religions around guys like him.

As was usually the case in Silent Hill--at least, in Douglas' experience--just when he thought he'd finally begun to grasp what was going on, just when he'd finally begun to piece what little information he had together to form a small portion of a great big picture, something else happened, something that would topple the very foundation of what he thought of as his understanding.

The figure might have been standing there all along, or it might have simply appeared there out of nowhere--that seemed to be the tradition here--but all of a sudden, there it was. Douglas barely had time to register the all-too-familiar shape before he crashed into it, almost at a full dash. The two were sent tumbling head-over-heels, Douglas scraping his nose and forehead on the wall before smashing face-first into the ground. The smell of mildew and something rotten immediately flooded his nostrils, and when paired with the panic of having crashed into what he thought he'd just seen, his heart leapt into his throat; he jerked himself to his feet as if he had just fallen not onto his supposedly dead partner but into a pit of giant, furry spiders.

"John?!" Douglas nearly shouted.

Herring did not respond; he gagged, hacked, spat--there was blood in it.

"John, here," Douglas said, lowering the tone of his voice as he knelt to his partner's side. "Stand up. Come on!" Slipping one arm around the cop's shoulders. Raising him up.

"Douglas," Herring said through a mouthful of blood, his voice barely more than a chalky whisper. "We meet again."

"I thought you were dead!" Douglas said, not even realizing the grin on his face, so huge that it threatened to pull his face apart. "I saw...James, he shot you!"

"And it hurts like hell," Herring wheezed. "Right under the heart. An inch higher, and..."

A closer look showed Douglas that the wound was, indeed, still there, just below the heart--it had been wrapped in a criscross of blood-stained bandages at some point, but there it was, clear as day. Perhaps Douglas had mistaken the intensity of the wound? Perhaps Herring had survived, and...

But disbelief had already overtaken Douglas. "I saw him...you...in the heart...you fell...nobody could have survived that!"

"Doug," Herring said, patting him on the shoulder. "Pull yourself together. I thought I was dead for sure, especially with that...that thing...running around down here, but...I don't think it saw me yet--"

"Wait, you mean--"

"I couldn't tell--" he paused, coughed a little more, spat a little more blood onto the wall. "--couldn't tell what it was in the light, but I saw it. Something, moving really fast. I think I lost it, but who knows for how long--we need to get moving."

Douglas glanced over his shoulder, all of a sudden convinced that the thing of which Herring spoke was right behind him. It wasn't. Turning back to Herring, he spoke: "What we need is to get you to a safe place."

"That's not important," Herring rasped. "If we stop now, then...then that thing will catch us. Or worse--maybe James will stop by to finish what he started."

"John, James is dead," Douglas said, unable to prevent a gleeful smile from covering his face. "Harry killed him."

Herring shot Douglas a puzzled look. "Harry?"

"Yeah, you remember--Harry, Heather's--"

"I'm confused," Herring said, and slumped to his knees.

"John," Douglas exclaimed, sliding his arm under his friend's shoulder. "Come on, we've got to get you out of here."

"Wait," Herring said, struggling. "Just...wait a second, alright?"

"What?"

Herring brushed his sweaty forehead with one sleeve--a sleeve that, like his shirt, was blood-stained, to the wrist.

Something's not right, his inner voice beckoned. Something's...not right.

He didn't know why he should be so upset by the sight of blood, but for some reason he was. No matter--there wasn't time to lament newfound phobia. They had to hurry.

"Where's--" Herring paused for a deep breath. "--Heather? You were together earlier."

"There's not really time to explain," Douglas said. "Basically, Harry took her."

"Harry?"

"Remember?" Douglas prodded. "Heather's dad. She brought him back to life--or something that looks like him, anyway--and he took her away."

"That's...weird," Herring contributed.

"You're telling me."

"Where'd they go?"

"I don't know," Douglas sighed. "I have a feeling it's somewhere down here, but...well, I don't know which way to go. Running into you like I did, I'm surprised I can still tell which way I came from."

"Well, I'll tell you one thing," Herring wheezed, pointing back down the hall from which he'd come--a dark, narrow corridor, branching at a ninety-degree angle to the right of the path Douglas had been following before his collision with Herring. "That way's a dead-end."

"I don't think we'll be getting out the way I came, either," Douglas said, furrowing his brow. "I guess that means the only way out is forward."

Rather suddenly, he felt Herring break free of his grasp.

"What?" Douglas said, frantically re-adjusting his flashlight towards Herring. "Where are you going?"

"I think I see something," Herring whispered, and started down the hall in the direction Douglas had been moving before their meeting. "Down there. Come on!"

"John," Douglas said, staggering to catch up to him, "wait!"

"There's no time," Herring said, beginning to move a little faster. "I think...I think I hear her!"

"Heather?" Douglas said, halting in place...listening. He could hear nothing.

"Hurry up!" Herring called from ahead.

"John, wait!"

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Walter never heard the first bullet hit the floor in a spatter of his own blood; the echo its metallic casing produced upon contact with the hard floor was drowned out by his own howl. The corridor carried the sound off to either side, across an unimaginable distance.

He knew it was stupid, but he forced himself to look down at the work he'd done--one of the bullets had been removed, but the wound was still gushing blood. If he didn't hurry, he would bleed to death right here, passed out beneath the underworld, forever lost to his one and only cause.

He had to move.

He reached into the wound just below his heart, trying to clasp the bullet between the nails of his index finger and thumb as he had done with the first, but succeeded only in tearing off a piece of raggedy flesh, startling another cry of pain from himself. This wound was too deep to handle using his fingernails alone; he would need some sort of tool.

Like what? All I have is a gun. He'd already used the top half of his shirt for a tourniquet, on top of that.

"Damn it!" he barked, pounding his fist onto the wall behind him...and knocking loose a chunk of stone right at the base, where the wall met the floor. He recoiled, surprised.

The structure would have to be awfully weak to just give way like that...mold, perhaps? Or...

Maybe...hey, I bet I can--

"Walter," he moaned, his voice just above a whisper, "you're a freakin' genius. Remind me to thank you when we get out of here, alright?"

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Herring was moving fast. Too fast...especially considering that only seconds ago, he'd been staggering and hacking like the victim of a gunshot wound--which he should've been.

Something wasn't right...the problem was, did it have to do with Herring, or with this place?

Or both?

Not now, Douglas reprimanded himself. Maybe we'll get lucky and he really does hear something? After all, Herring's ears have always been better than mine.

But that didn't explain how he seemed to be jogging now--and faster than Douglas, at that. The detective was barely able to keep up; he had to grab the shoulder of Herring's shirt to slow him down enough to keep pace.

"Here," Herring said, and snatched Douglas' hand. "We won't make it if you keep dawdling like that."

"What do you mean, 'make it?'" Douglas asked. "Where are we going?"

Herring didn't respond; he only increased his running speed. Douglas had to flail wildly to keep his feet underneath him. He felt like he was being dragged behind a horse and coach.

"Herring, are you listening?" Douglas said, now shouting.

"Doug, relax," Herring said, his inflection seeming to imply that he saw Douglas as an incompetent child. "Stay with me, alright? I know what I'm doing."

They came to an intersection that split off to the left and the right. Douglas' forehead scraped the brick surface directly ahead as Herring dragged him around the corner to the right, and he almost lost his balance; his right shoe came down on the ground, but soon after scuffed up against a loose brick that would have been noticeable had they not been moving at such a speed as they were. The toe of his shoe pattered on the ground for a moment, skidding, and finally reclaimed its rhythm in awkward time with his left one.

"Herring, slow down!" Douglas shouted. "I can't keep up with you!"

"We're almost there," Herring called back. "Just...hold...on!"

"Herring, I--" but that was as far as he could get before the beam of his flashlight--as ready to fly loose from his hand as he was from Herring's--briefly shot across the very hand from whose grasp he threatened to fall.

A few moments ago, the sleeve of Herring's shirt had been stained red with blood. In the light, the sleeve had been in tatters, and Douglas could see what existed beneath it.

That can't be, he thought. I...I must've...it has to be a trick. The light fell on it wrong, or something.

"Doug, why are you slowing down?" Herring's voice echoed from up ahead. It seemed to be getting farther ahead than Herring himself was.

That's because--

Before he could finish the thought, Douglas tripped over something and went flying. He raised his other foot to avoid hitting the object again--and in doing so narrowly avoided a head-over-heels tumble that surely would have ruined him--only to hit another such object. The first foot came down just in time to keep him moving, but it was just a second too late to keep him from tripping over another obstacle. It was only then that Douglas realized they were climbing a staircase. Not a very steep one, fortunately--had it been any steeper, there would have been no easy recovery from such a fall. He might well have broken his nose--was surprised that he hadn't, anyway--and wished he had a moment to be thankful that he hadn't.

Instead, he raised his foot in time to clear the fourth step, neatly settling back into the insane pace Herring had set as they topped the fifth and final step and swept past another intersection. Up ahead, Herring pulled him around a corner to the left, bringing them into a hall so narrow that Douglas' shoulders brushed against the walls to either side; if not for the thickness of his coat, the journey might have been much more painful for the skin there.

Douglas had almost completely lost control of his flashlight, mostly thanks to the decorative staircase they had just ascended; it had been everything in his power just to hold onto it for that short, horrible duration. He could only hope that Herring was taking him someplace closer to Heather than he was; he had no idea where they were going, or how he would find his way back if need be. They passed another two intersections--both four-ways--in the time it took these thoughts to race through his mind, and he realized with a rising sense of dismay that they could have passed countless other similar passages. He hadn't been paying attention to his surroundings at all; it would be next to impossible to determine with any accuracy which way he was going, especially if he were turned around, going back the other way.

But that was not the only stressor hassling him; he worked to focus the light on Herring's arm once again...and saw that the sleeve was intact once again.

There we go, he told himself, somewhat satisfied. A trick of the lighting, that's all. Nothing more. You probably just mistook the blood stains for something else.

But he hadn't; he knew what he'd seen. It had been there.

But it isn't now.

The thought should have comforted him, but it didn't.

It shouldn't he argued. Something's definitely wrong, here. Something's wrong with Herring. Maybe he saw something down there that did something to him, or maybe...maybe something got to him and--

"No," Douglas managed to assert out loud. "No way."

"What?" Herring hollered. "What are you saying back there?"

Douglas had only a second to respond, and he made use of it: "Sorry, thinking out loud."

"Heather?"

After a blink and a hesitation that felt far too long to go unnoticed, Douglas cleared his throat and answered: "You could say so."

"It's alright," Herring said. "I understand. You're probably worried sick about her."

"I am," he said, and that was the truth.

That depends on where you draw the line on "the truth."

Yes, he was afraid for her...but that was not all he feared, not now. Now, he had something more important to worry about.

"Here," Herring said, and began to slow down.

"What?" Douglas said, unsettled. He should have been brought to ease by the decrease in speed, but instead he felt an impending dread welling up in his chest--a more extreme variety of the dread associated with having a serious conversation with a loved one.

"We're here," Herring said, finally releasing Douglas from his grasp. They had come to a halt just in front of the entrance of a square corridor, resting gallantly in the wall. The word which crossed Douglas' mind as his flashlight caressed the shape emblazened above this new passage was Lion-headed, but that was not quite right. It looked like something that was probably supposed to be a lion's head, but several things about it were off: there was no mane, only a smooth roundness to the entire head and ears (the latter of which were a bit too small, resembling meager ring-shapes), and the eyes looked like beets without stems or sprouts--just oval shapes, pointed on either end, almost so as to resemble a heart. The mouth was a jagged line that was probably supposed to indicate sadness--it seemed to connote the "trembly lip" so often associated with an impending outburst of tears.

All in all, the design was remarkably plain. Something about that unnerved Douglas even further than recent events had.

"Just follow me down these steps," Herring called, waving from down inside the "lion's" mouth. Even without the flashlight directly facing him, Douglas could see Herring standing with one leg on the third step and one leg on the fourth step...but before long, the cop was moving again, and Douglas darted the beam of his flashlight towards the staircase.

"Wait!" he called, running after him...and, with the practiced ease brought forth by thirty years of efforts in the field, drawing his gun with his free hand.

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Walter assumed that this was the kind of thing people quoted as "proof" that a God existed; this kind of incredible luck, to stumble in his agony upon the one thing, the one needle in this haystack, that could possibly save him...and to both realize it and be able to utilize it. The piece of stone which had fallen loose from the wall was not strong, nor was it surgery-friendly; it was about half the size of his fist, soft and smooth on one end--the end that had been facing outward--and so narrow as to be almost sharp on the other. Its shape was reminiscent of a fancy diamond, so perfect as to seem supernatural.

It wasn't much, but it was better than nothing. Hell, a pencil would have helped right now--he wasn't worried about precision, or even being able to see the damn thing. No, he was more worried about being able to withstand the searing agony of removing the second bullet by, in effect, carving the flesh away from the area around it so that he could pry it loose. The plan was simple: the bullet was too deep for even his almost affeminately-lengthy nails to remove in the same respect as the first bullet, so he would have to use the narrow end of the stone--which was, thankfully, about half the width of his pinky-finger at its thinnest point--to sort of press against the side of the round and ever-so-slowly drag it against the inside of the wound until it was far out enough to remove with his fingers. The whole idea reminded him of a suspense-movie cliche where some character, trapped in a locked cell, was forced to tie his or her clothes together and form a rope, which he or she would then use to latch onto a set of keys at some convenient location elsewhere in the room, drag them towards him- or herself, and unlock the door.

Thank God these little bastards didn't go any deeper, or I'd literally have to tear myself apart to get them out.

"I don't even know if I can do this," he moaned. The pain would be excruciating, he knew, for he had no means by which to dull it or even take the edge off of it. The only motivation he had was that all of this horrible mutilation would be undone when, at last, the final bullet had been removed.

Following a short gathering of will with a deep breath, Walter paused...and went to work.

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Because his flashlight was pointed at the floor for the moment, the first thing he noticed was how dry it was at the bottom of the staircase; every breath scraped the front of his throat like sandpaper, and he was reminded for the first time since eleventh grade what it felt like to have a mild case of strep throat. Every few breaths or so, he had to clear his throat in order to avoid the sensation of stinging dryness.

Preoccupied with that as he was, it came as no surprise when his foot slammed into something on the ground--no, not something; a pile of somethings. He immediately turned his flashlight towards the object(s), allowing a few seconds for his eyes to adjust...and then recoiled in disgust (though not surprise, honestly; he'd come to expect much worse from a place like this).

The pile of skulls into which he'd stumbled wouldn't have been so devastating to him if they had just been plain, dead skulls...but they were so much more. They were fresh. Some of them still had flesh on them, and one of them actually appeared to still have a brain inside it, visible through the hollow eye sockets. Douglas' harsh reaction had kicked a few of them out of place and sent them rolling across the floor or flying through the air and, in the case of the former, leaving a thin trail of blood in their wake.

"What...?!" Douglas barely had time to say before his breath left him. He knew it was probably a bad idea, but he turned his flashlight up in order to get a good view of the rest of the room.

By now his eyes had become almost fully accustomed to the new darkness, and he was able to see the real hurting ground spread out before him in true sinister fashion: chains, dangling from the ceiling, cuffed to dismembered body parts--mostly arms and legs, but in one case the decaying head of a young child, approximate age indeterminate--vile contraptions that could only be torture chambers of some unspeakable kind, placed at varying intervals up and down the walls to either side of the chamber; one, to the left and several feet up the wall from where Douglas was standing, a terrible thing consisting of five chains--one for each limb and one for the neck--that looked too small to fit anyone over the age of seven or eight. Blood ran in thick, pasty tendrils from all corners of the device, implying that its inhabitant's end had not come easily (or quickly).

Douglas almost dropped his gun; he felt the hand in which it dwelt become weak and loosen its grip, and only by a sudden and vicious exercise of will was he able to reassert power over it. Now slightly trembling, he leveled the gun, crossing his hands at the wrist to form a makeshift-spotlight target, the way he'd been taught by his superiors during his first few weeks on police duty all those years ago.

As sick as it felt to think so, he knew that he shouldn't be too afraid of this place with concern to himself; if nothing else, he seemed to be safe from the standard hazing process to which most newcomers seemed to have been subjected under normal circumstances. He was much older than any of the victims of this place looked to have been, and in spite of how empty such a thought seemed to him while he stood in this place, affirming its place in reality, there was that much to be thankful for.

Even if I wasn't, though, he thought, I would still have no choice but to keep going. The risk of dying here is nothing compared to what will happen if I don't stop Harry.

That was true beyond telling...for he didn't really know what would happen if he didn't stop Harry. He still wasn't entirely sure if this wasn't all part of a void between space and time, or if it was some other dimension altogether, or just something unfathomable and new, something that no man or woman had ever theorized. This place, this void beneath Silent Hill, might simply exist inside Heather's or Walter's (or even James') mind...or it might be real, super-imposed over reality through Heather's conscious mind. There were so many possibilities, so many things to consider...and not enough time.

Just move, Douglas told himself. Figure it out later, if ever. It's not important, anyway--by this point, if you fail you won't live to see the aftermath.

As he took the first step, though, he heard a noise that caused him to stop--a faint, tinny squeal, like an axle that needed oiling.

He turned, flashing the light around the room, and saw nothing new.

"Hello?" he said; in his head, it had sounded proclamatory and full of vigor, but it came out as no more than a half-hearted inquiry.

There it was again...not a squeak, after all, but a high-pitched whine. Somebody speaking?

Is someone alive down here?!

That was when the flashlight beam came upon the source of the sound: a young person, hanging just above the ground, suspended by two chains which descended from the ceiling. The person was completely nude, yet of indeterminate gender for one simple reason: his or her torso had been ripped off in a jagged line from just above the left hip to about halfway up the right side, and the remaining chest area was too underdeveloped to be gender-determinate. Everything below the waist was gone--as was the left arm from the elbow down. Its head was completely shaven, and a look of utter, agnoized despair plagued its face, begging, pleading with him to end its miserable existence. Whoever it was, they knew this was their end; they just wanted it to be over.

"Look," the person squealed in a weak, pain-ravaged voice, fighting not to gag on a wad of blood. "Look...out."

From behind, a long, low rumbling, like a distorted electric bass guitar playing a single drawn-out note.

Douglas turned, flashlight and gun in hand, ready to take on the intruder...but there was nothing. His flashlight highlighted the same disturbing craftsmanship he'd seen a moment ago.

"Shoo...shoot...shoo--"

Douglas felt his heart skip a beat when the person's voice was abruptly cut off, enveloped in tearing, searing fury. When he turned back towards the dying person, heart racing, he or she was no longer there--the only proof that he or she ever had been there were the two chains which had suspended him/her, and the hands and wrists which still clung to them.

The room was fairly large, but even several seconds of skimming could not relocate the victim.

Whatever did this...it's still here, he thought. The victim must have been trying to warn him.

Then, from right behind him, that long, low bass noise again.

Douglas felt faint with terror, suddenly very disheartened. He felt like the main character in one of those stupid Saw movies, the type of character who always seemed to get screwed no matter what they did. He was sure that he would feel the killer's hands (or claws, or whatever else it might have) sink into the back of his neck, sever his jugular vein, and end his quest right there. He only had time to reassure his grip on both the gun and the flashlight and pivot to face his assailant.

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The second round clattered to the floor, now as harmless as its cousin...but Walter didn't notice. He was too busy burying the agony in another scream. When the pain dulled to a somewhat-bearable level, Walter leaned his head back against the wall, exhausted. He wiped his face with one sleeve, and it came back drenched with sweat.

And blood.

"What?" He ran his exposed left hand over his face again, and it came back with a bloody streak from his wrist to the base of his middle finger. He wished like hell that there was a mirror somewhere nearby, so he could see how bad he looked...but another part of him, equally alarmed, thought that might not be such a good idea, anyway. He already knew that he was bleeding from his mouth now, too, probably from somewhere deep inside. The bullets hadn't appeared to have gone very deep, but who knew? They could have been spread-tipped rounds. He hadn't been specific in the details of their creation, so maybe someone else had filled in the blanks?

I'll have to be more meticulous next time, he thought to himself. Now...just one more round, and I'm home free.

He leaned forward, sucking in on his chest to afford himself the best view of his lower abdomen, and recoiled as a dagger of pain tore through him. It should have been common sense for him not to try to bend in his current state, but he hadn't been paying attention.

Damn it.

He would have to do the third one without looking--he wasn't going to be able to lean forward, or even bend at all, until that bullet was gone--but even so, he seemed to have made some progress; his head was starting to clear up a little bit, in spite of the fact that it seemed to be bleeding profusely from inside.

With all my luck, I'm probably having a stroke or something.

He squinted his eyes, bracing his entire body for the final agony that was sure to come...and began probing around the site of the third and final unsightly wound. He felt an unpleasant spark light up in that immediate vicinity, ready to explode into a full-blown inferno at a moment's notice, and then...he pulled away.

"I can't do this," he intoned. "I just...can't."

Yes, you can, he told himself. You have to, or else you'll die.

"It doesn't matter," he repeated. "I can't do it. I'm tapped."

Don't be a dumbass! You've come this far, across ten--no, thirty--years! Don't give up now, when you're so close to the end!

"I don't want to give up," he said, gasping for breath--his chest was tightening up; he was preparing to faint. He didn't have to be a doctor to know that it was probably from blood loss, and that he wouldn't wake up once he went out. "But I'm tapped. I'm out. I can't handle any more."

You're wasting time, the voice in his mind pestered. The next two minutes will decide the rest of your personal eternity. How do you want it to be? Pain...and then infinite glory? Or death, and defeat until the end of time?

"Until...the end of time?" he muttered, too quiet to be whispering. "But the dream...there is no end. It'll come around again."

This place is outside of eternity. There will be no end for you, if you finish here, now. This is the end of the line, for better or for worse--there will be no fourth day for you.

"But...what about the one with the...?"

He won't make it. He hasn't before; why should he now?

"But what if he does?"

He won't.

The utter certainty in that voice was enough to frighten him deeply; he was reminded of the dream he'd had, from which he had awaken lying in his own coffin--the sense of despair, of utter, certain finality, the sense that eternity was not an infinite loop but a roll of Scotch Tape, a roll that seemed to go on forever and ever but had finally reached the end and simply spun free of its core, hurtling into the emptiness of eternity. The sense that time itself was dead.

He didn't want to be a part of that. He wanted to be beyond that, transcendent of it. And the only way to do that--to spare himself the horror of total existence in a land of total desolation, the fate to which everyone was surely doomed if his guiding voice was correct--would be to reach and plead with God for mercy.

He gritted his teeth, seized the jutting stone in one impossibly tight fist...and approached the wound again, the last of his consciousness fading.

Soon, it would be over...for better or for worse.

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Douglas was afraid to pull the trigger; he had no idea how many shots were left in the gun, and he was terribly afraid of missing the first shot only to find that it had been his only shot. At the same time, though, he was afraid not to shoot, out of the fear that this would be his only chance to do so. So he took a gamble and pulled the trigger.

The bullet sailed off into the blackness...and ricocheted off of something on the far wall, whizzing uselessly past his left ear lobe. A little farther to the right, and the shot would have killed him.

Where is it? he moaned in his head. He knew it was in here somewhere--it had taken that kid right off of his/her chains as if he/she had been no more than a toy on a rack at a convenient store. Now he feared both for Heather's life and for his own.

"Come on," he urged silently, not wanting to provoke it any further for fear that it might be intelligent enough to take him up on it. "Where are you?" He waited, waited...pivoted, spotting his flashlight straight ahead.

There! Movement, just out of range of his flashlight. He turned towards the source just in time to catch a glimpse of something long, narrow and pink-colored, sailing out of the path of the beam and back into the welcoming darkness.

Welcoming for him, at least, Douglas pondered. He felt his heart speeding up; he wanted badly to face his attacker...but he wasn't so sure he wanted to see it. Not while it was alive. It might just get to him in the wrong way.

"Stand still," Douglas pleaded, displeased with the desperation he heard in his own voice. "Quit moving around so much!"

Screeching metal, not too far off to the left. He turned.

There it was again. He caught sight of two wide trunks--presumably feet, maybe something else--rising up into the blackness.

It was above him now.

He took no chances; he turned his gun upward and fired three times, each shot traveling off in a different direction. He felt a surge of unparalleled joy--coupled with the most extreme anxiety he had ever felt in his life--when he heard that distorted bass noise again, accompanied by a meaty splattering sound. Seconds later, there was a crash just to the right of where he now stood. He gave his flashlight one final turn, and for the first time gazed upon his new enemy.

It was too large to fit in the beam of the flashlight, but what he saw of its flailing form was enough; two narrow feet, each the sickly color of interwoven scar-tissue, that ended in two razor-thin claws; thin legs, marked with wrinkled patterns that were either birthmarks or severe burns, that rose up past the beam of the flashlight. A long, pasty tongue dangled from the creature's mouth, which was beyond the reach of the flashlight--something Douglas felt thankful for; ugly as the tongue was, with thorn-like protrusions distributed in a freakish, uneven fashion all along either side, more likely the production of a nuclear mutation akin to that seen in a '60's horror flick than of natural development, Douglas had a feeling that the rest of the creature would be far worse.

But that was before he noticed the tattered remains of a pair of blue dress pants, dangling just below the top of the flashlight's beam, just below what was presumably the thing's waist. Seeing that all-too-familiar guise made him suddenly and extremely curious.

"Go on, take a look," a voice--both shrill and low at the same time, as if it were speaking with two overlaid tones instead of one--invited. "I won't bite."

Douglas felt all the fight run out of him; he knew that voice all too well. He didn't want to look. Even so, he found himself unable to resist the invitation of the thing which now stood before him, so he made a compromise: he raised his head upward, allowing his eyes to adjust just enough to make out the edges of the thing's total shape...but left the flashlight where it was.

He saw that it was much taller than he was. He saw no visible arms of any sort. He saw the shadowy outline of a head that looked like a child had made it in the sand, intending for it to resemble a castle of some sort, with malformed turrets and things that might have been dangling banners but were probably not. He saw two familiar human eyes staring out of that horrid shape, seeming to feast on his own visage like a rat does cheese. He saw the faint glimmer of the familiar South Ashfield Police Department badge, and the familiar turquoise tie, now just a tattered ribbon.

He saw enough.

"You're not real," he said. "You never were. You died back there. I knew it!"

"Nobody dies here, chum," the familiar voice said. "You just take a little vacation. And you wish you'd just died and gone to hell instead."

"What did you do?!" Douglas bellowed. "John, what the hell did you do?!"

"I'm not John," the thing said. "They don't call me that."

"No," Douglas said, wishing badly that he had a free hand to place over his gaping mouth.

"Are you ready to join the party, Doug?" John's imposing voice teased. "Everything's about to go down--the Conjurer's on his way to the Mother, and the other Mother is on her way, too. It's gonna be the second big bang, I tell ya!"

"Respect the dead," Douglas said, trembling and close to tears of outrage, and shot the beast in what he believed to be its chest. Once, twice, thrice. Each shot echoed throughout the hellish halls...but there was no subsequent ricochet. Every one had struck home.

"You're good," the thing that was not John Phillip Herring said, and fell over on its back. Douglas looked away as it passed into the beam of his light--he didn't want to see what sick joke this place had made of the guise of his former friend. "How did you know?"
Douglas did not--could not--respond. He wanted no more to do with the thing that now lay dying before him. He wanted only to leave this place and find Heather.

"She's already Become," the thing that was not Herring said. "You're too late. You were too late, anyway--you were stupid to try."

Douglas bit back a hateful retort and turned away from the dying thing. His flashlight reflected off of the implements of torture that covered the room's four walls, and for one moment he could see the twisted parody of his former friend's face in each and every surface, beckoning to him.

He closed his eyes, afraid that he would see it on the back of his eyelids, too...but there was only peaceful darkness. Yes...peaceful darkness.

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For the second time in less than ten minutes, Walter felt like he'd won the lottery.

There was no third bullet. It had passed right through him, exited out of his back just to the left of the junction between his hip and spinal cord. That explained why he was starting to feel better already; sure, he was still bleeding to death, but his head was beginning to feel a little clearer, and he found that the pain was beginning to subside.

I'm gonna be alright, he thought, wondering where the voice in his head had run off to this time. I'm gonna fuckin' live! How sweet is that?

"Oh, so sweet," he answered out loud. He was glad, too--he wouldn't have to bear the unspeakable pain of DIY surgery again. He felt more uplifted than he ever had in his life; things were going to work out after all!

Now, he needed only to wait. Wait, and let the magic work.

Let God work, he corrected himself. God wouldn't like you to steal credit, would you?

He chuckled out loud. It was a wonderful sound; he was going to live. He was going to be lifted up above this sorry cesspool of a universe, brought up to the heavens to watch it all come crashing down, down, down the drain at the bottom of everything where it belonged.

And he would enjoy every minute of it: the revenge, the justice...the relief. He was safe at last.

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It didn't take long for Douglas to pinpoint the corridor on the opposite side of the room from which he'd entered. It was directly across from that first door, and it, too, lead up onto a staircase. He didn't look back.

As he took the first step, his flashlight began to flicker.

"Don't," he mumbled. "Please, don't. Not here, not when I'm so close."

The flashlight steadied.

Douglas sighed, relieved. He took the next two steps with one single motion.

The flashlight blinked out...and then flickered on. Off...on.

"Damn it," Douglas spat. "I don't have time for this...this crap. Alright?"

The flashlight gave no dissent.

"Alright," Douglas acknowledged, and climbed the staircase. The flashlight behaved well all the way up to the top, but once Douglas had cleared the last step, This time, its comforting, earthly glow did not return.

"Shit," Douglas hissed. He felt his heart speed up again, panicked to be enveloped in total darkness...but then he realized that he wasn't in total darkness afterall; the long, wide corridor into which he had stepped was not lit well, but it was lit. Far up on the walls to either side--probably thirty feet, at least--a series of torches extended from fancy golden pyres embedded into the brick wall. Each pyre bore the disturbing, smiling face of a human male, engraved in what appeared to be some expensive, shiny metal. The torches extended far up ahead, marking every twenty feet or so in pairs of two.

Wherever this was, it was close. Very close. He could feel it as deep as his heart.

Heather...I'm almost there. Just keep fighting, alright? Keep fighting. Don't let him win.

He'd seen that demon take her in--make her Become, that creature had said--and he'd sensed the finality of the act--but some insistent, ignorant part of him still clung to a shining thing called hope...surely, the only thing keeping him from believing that Heather was in a place far worse than Hell. He had to believe she was still alive, still rescuable...for to accept the alternative would be to accept the most horrible thing of all: That there was a God, and he (or she) was truly insane. That God would not allow even a young woman, devastated by the loss of her only parent, the single mistake of trying to hold onto what was undeniably gone. That God would punish that woman with a fate worse than the worst imaginable.

If such a God existed, then--his crazy, romantic heart dreamed--he would strike that God down, and return the world to a state of sanity and order. He would separate Heather from the mass of that horrible creature, and he would return home with her, and they would live out the rest of their days in a state of restless happiness. Restless, yes; disturbed, yes; but happy, nonetheless. And sometimes, that happiness was all one could expect, even under the weight of all that despair, no matter how unfair it all seemed.

For there was no other choice.

END OF CHAPTER 35