Pre-AN: A few details before I let you loose in Silent Hill: this SH story contains a little more fantasy than usual in terms of magic, but it's no more magical than you would expect from Dahlia or Alessa, even Samael. I admit, the first draft of this first chapter was a bit cheesy (I haven't written fantasy in sooooo long T_T), but it should be better now and from here on out. Other notes: monster creation and Silent Hill physics go off of game/plot analyses found on the internet, most prominantly from the person by the alias President Evil. Meaning: there aren't only patient monsters and dog monsters running around, and everything has a reason. I think that's it for now; I hope you enjoy this latest installment of Silent Hill.
"You can still hear me, can't you? Even though it's all over, my voice still reaches you in the depths of the darkness like this. What does that mean?"
Logan's eyes fluttered open softly, slowly, as if he was waking up in his own bed after a long, dreamless sleep. He was disappointed to realize he wasn't in his own bed, nor even in a place he remembered. The mattress was cold with holes in it, the springs poking out in various places. How had he gotten here?
He rose to a seating position slowly, his auburn hair falling slightly before his hazel eyes. The strange room was dark and silent, eliciting a bit of worry from him. He tried to recall how he had ended up here, but he couldn't even remember much of anything that recently happened. His head hurt from the attempt.
As he stepped onto the hard wood floor and walked over to the closed window, Logan realized he was still fully dressed in his large, brown coat and black boots. Why was that? He finally reached the window and glanced outside. Unfortunately, he couldn't see much of anything. A thick fog obscured everything from view, and a light snow made his desire to leave slightly less. Where was he? Had he been in Silent Hill the last time he was awake? But when did he go to sleep, or did he? This couldn't be his home.
He backed away from the window. It was about time he got some answers. Glancing around first to make sure he wasn't forgetting anything, Logan moved to the door, and opened it slowly, its creak enough to send frightened shivers through him; damn thing. He stepped out and realized instantly from the series of doors and placement of tables and such that this was an apartment building or hotel, something of the like. Someone else had to be here, and they would know what he was doing here.
Logan glanced down either end of the hallway, then started walking down the darkened path. There weren't any lights on, and the gray dimness outside only shed so much light inside. Almost fumbling for his way, Logan eventually found the noisy stairs and went down, straight to the lobby of this creepy place. The thought plaguing his mind was: why the hell was he the only one making any sounds in this whole place? Why was it so quiet?
The lobby was strangely empty. There were equipment and chairs and so on, sure, but there wasn't anybody down here. There was more light, though, but it was only because the main doors were wide open, leaving the hotel exposed to the elements of the outside world. Distraught, Logan struck the bell upon the front counter. He waited for a moment for some kind of sign that there was life in this place, any sort of sign, but the eerie echo of the bell throughout the building gave him a strange chill. This couldn't be right. He hit the bell once more just out of spite, but it was not only the useless sound that traveled to his ears, but also something else, something behind him… What was it? The exact sound was faint and not bringing to memory any images telling its origin.
Fear crept up inside of Logan, but strength kept him standing in place, his hands moving to the sides as if in prepared attack. He did not let his mind dwell on the issue, merely letting his body do what it liked out of reflex, since his memory was certainly not something to help him right now. The sound rose in volume, becoming louder a lot quicker than he expected. Whatever it was must be charging at him. Crying out to scare it away or something, he turned around quickly… to face nothing but the cold fog outside. What the hell…?
A cold wind swept inside and tore at his face, but it only drove him on, bringing him outside. He only found what he feared: he was the last person alive in Silent Hill… or was this Silent Hill? Perhaps that was the more frightening question, though he could not realize why…
Logan held his head as the strange voice came and passed, a peculiar question from a peculiar source. What was that? His hand covered his eyes for but a moment, then fell to reveal something new before him. In the gray, empty landscape of the town so like all others surrounding it, one lone figure appeared before him, moving through the streets. It was a woman dressed in an outlandish outfit making him think it of religious purpose, and she moved slowly, silently, down the street directly past him. Her face was blank, clear of expression. What was she doing?
Before he could call out to her, a wave of darkness spread over everything, and then was just as quickly replaced by fire, fire burning everything and everyone, flesh and town alike. The changes came so quickly along with the sweltering heat now assaulting him, that he barely had the time to react. His senses returning, he rushed out into the middle of the intersection before him, hoping maybe to save that woman, he didn't know anymore. The sound of shattering glass to his left; his eyes darted quickly to the sound, only to find some sort of wretched, decaying being with sword blades for hands. What the hell was it!? It had no face, its entire body seeming to be lumps of flesh tossed onto a half-visible human skeleton without any God's grace upon it. The blades replaced whatever hands something like this could possess, for the obvious sole purpose of killing him without thought or mercy. With inhuman speed, the hideous creature darted towards him, intending to end his life.
Impulse taking over, Logan raised his left arm and braced it with his right hand, his left palm completely exposed as he screamed, "Stay back!"
Power flowed through him and escaped his hand in the form of a black sphere, thick and pulsing with dark energy, impacting with the creature and shocking it like electricity. After a moment of deafening static-like noise and the demon's convulsions, it fell "dead" upon the ground. Seconds passing through the fire, Logan wasn't sure what surprised him more: the creature's demise, or the fact that such a power resided within him. Before he could dwell on the thought for long, a powerful blow struck him in the back of the head, knocking him out instantly.
"It's coming, and we don't know how to stop it."
"Everyone's gonna die! Don't you understand that!?"
"We have to get out of here!"
"When am I going to wake up?"
"Cybil, I know you're afraid, but we can't stay here. The darkness is growing."
"James, watch out!"
"I'll kill you!"
"Alessa!"
Logan screamed as he burst awake, his hands flailing about as he struggled to stay awake and alive and to understand what was happening and--
"Hey!"
The voice caught him by surprise, drawing his eyes to the speaker. His frightened state instantly diminished at the site of her.
She was a young girl, not much younger than his twenty-three years or so, he was certain. Her hair was blond and falling slightly before her sapphire eyes in an attractive sort of way. In truth, she was very beautiful, but there was some sort of mysterious aura surrounding her, it seemed, something that perverted the innocence that her physical features showed, especially in her eyes. As she sat in the chair beside the bed he woke up on, she was clearly afraid, as Logan thought she should be: this was no longer the real world.
The room appeared to be another apartment, the window to his right displaying yet more gray fog. Behind the girl, on a little table was a small, portable radio, and a song was playing on it amidst the smallest tinges of static:
A letter to my future self,
Am I still happy? I began.
The girl finally asked, "Are you okay?"
Logan rubbed the back of his head, the pain still strong. His eyes traveled over to the lead pipe lying on the floor, the obvious means of striking him.
Have I grown more pretty?
Is daddy still a good man?
Before he could say anything, the girl explained with guilt, her eyes trailing to the side, "I'm sorry about hitting you. In the darkness, I thought you were another monster, or at least that man, Nykis."
Am I still friends with Colleen?
I'm sure that I'm still laughing.
Forcing a smile, she said, "I'm Alice. And you are?"
The pain fading, he told her gently, "My name's Logan." His thoughts drifted to her words, how she said it was dark, not ablaze like he had seen it, and he asked her, "What do you mean it was dark? What monsters have you seen, and who is Nykis?
Aren't I?
Taking the question without deliberation, Alice explained, "I've been seeing monsters looking like demented, skinless gorillas all over the place. Them and killer dogs, and shadows with knives." She laughed softly, bitterly. "Not too crazy, huh?"
Aren't I?
She continued, "Of course, it's not as bad as what Nykis said he saw."
Logan thought about her words: gorillas, killer dogs, shadows with knives… He had only seen the sword demon. Were there really more creatures out there? Was the evil he sensed more powerful than he thought?
He didn't tell her more about his own situation, but repeated his question: "Who is Nykis?"
Hey there to my future self,
If you forget how to smile,
Although she didn't seem to be purposely avoiding the question, Alice rose from the chair and began pacing around as if she hadn't even noticed his words. She furthered this thought by asking, "Did this town call you, too? There's an evil here that feeds upon us."
I have this to tell you,
Remember it once an awhile:
Logan closed his eyes and let his mind wander towards that itching at his soul, the draw of the dark lord, the power of Silent Hill and Jenisaera… The evil was there, and it was growing, stretching out to cleanse the world of humanity.
Ten years ago your past self
Prayed for your happiness.
He looked at her again, and she was watching him with a changed perspective. Maybe she wasn't even staring directly at him, but focusing on her inner thoughts and memories. Blood-red tears began to cascade down her cheeks, and sorrow slowly increased in her expression.
Please don't lose hope.
She turned, and just vanished as if she never existed. Logan felt as if he had blinked, and she was gone. The room contained only him now. Where had Alice gone? Had she even been there? Was she just another demon or lost soul within the evil power of Silent Hill?
The song playing on the radio dissolved into painfully loud white noise, as if the station had suddenly been wiped off the face of the Earth. What the hell…?
Before he could even rise, the window shattered with the force of some huge object, the glass shooting towards him and cutting slightly across his cheek. In the roll of his movement, Logan had barely the time to see the terrible flying creature before he had fallen behind the bed and the creature had flown away, its hideous screaming still ringing in his ears. His heart pumped hard as he tried to comprehend what was happening: Alice was gone, some pterodactyl-thing was trying to kill him, and he was trapped inside the evil of Silent Hill, the very power he was a product and assumed killer of… What?
Another crash; the monster had flown back and was trying its best to devour him through the window, the melting flesh of the unearthly creature shredding and bleeding on the shards of glass as it worked fervently at the task. Logan, in a height of adrenaline, decided that the monster was capable of hurting Alice if it got away, and if she even existed, and if she wasn't exactly a part of the evil herself. Throwing all factors aside, he raised his arm again, wind circling his body, and fired another black sphere at the creature. To his dismay, the pterodactyl pulled away just before the magic blast could strike it. The monster flew out, hovered in the frozen air, and charged back at him, this time shattering the solid wall of the building and coming directly into the room. Bricks and wood and frivolous furniture struck Logan's body as he fell back under the weight of the thing, its body twitching incessantly as it tried to bite his head.
Logan struck the creature with his fist, ending its movement long enough to roll away, grab the lead pipe that Alice had left behind, and splatter the insides of the creature's head. His breathing threatened to break his lungs in the first moment of movementless silence, but slowly lessened to a healthy rate. What the hell…? This couldn't be one of his inner demons…
His eyes trailed over to the radio, realizing the static had warned him about the creature. He cursed aloud when he noticed it completely destroyed from the monster's attack. In the loud noise of the growing wind sweeping through the room of the apartment, Logan wondered what the hell he was supposed to do now.
Post-AN: The song was "Letter ~ From The Lost Days," from Silent Hill 3. Speaking of that game, I won't take much of it into account in this story, since I don't know much beyond what I can find on various websites. I will, however, delve into story parts from the other two games, as you may have noticed. Anyway, thanks for reading, and stay tuned for the next chapters! ^_^
