Prologue: Isolation

By Myhrr, proof read by Raven (badly)

Disclaimer: Bleah. Who gives a rat's bum about those things anyway? ^_~ enjoy!

Supposedly if you were a good driver, you could get yourself out of any sorts of dreadful or even bizarre or freaky car related incidents. If that was true then I could confidently exclude myself from the ¡°good¡± side of the drivers as I always had. My car and I were officially floating into midair and officially we were not coming off.

Guess I was too used to being in control. I hated feeling powerless like this. Yes, yes I was a self-titled paranormal researcher, but hey there was a reason I called myself that. I had been overly dependent on my 6th sense, or whatever people called it, for over 10 years now and it never really failed me.

I believe that was because I was brilliant in that area. My brother believed that was because I sucked at everything else.

Good thing that having been a part-time unemployed person I didn't need much of anything else. So lack of peoples skills wouldn't cause that much problem. Not to mention my other part-time job didn't really pay my bills, until now. If I settled the whole Silent Hill mystery, I would at least become official in the Paranormal Partner Trust, and at least I could earn a bit dosh. Yes, there was a way to get money in everything career. If you call it a career, that is.

I'd love to be full time on that. I mean, not like I actually enjoyed dealing with people that much anyway. If I nailed that job at least I would have an excuse to not talk to humans too damn much. Not living ones, anyway.

And most spirits I had met tend to be nicer. They really didn't care what qualifications you have, or more specifically what you DON't have. If they wanted to haunt or kill you, they would just go for it, whether you were a PhD in genetics, a pipe cleaner or a housewife. To them, you were just another human. With fairness like that, no wonder the suicide rate is increasing.

And me? Too much communications with all sorts of random creatures actually taught me quite a bit about their lives, no puns intended. And it was safe to say that with all the nice things they have, I'd rather stay alive. Thank you very much.

Which was why I had to jump out of the car. After all, getting out by yourself tend to be less humiliating than getting thrown out. Good thing that I remembered to keep my gear ready by my side.

I grabbed my red pack and pushed open the door of my rusty grandma car. I aimed for the tree that looked nice and soft and took a leap.

The good news was that I landed on that soft-cushionish looking tree I aimed for. The bad news was, looks can be pretty deceiving.

Damn. My 6th sense should be more respected than my sight. Lesson of the day. If I had remembered that, that trip of Silent Hill would have been safe.

I had hoped anyway. Because later on, I had a bad feeling that ghosts and spirits ¨C my specialty, really didn't play a big part of Silent Hill mystery. Gosh, the success rate really dropped. And yes I still wanted that job.

I cursed myself for having chosen to land on a young, beautiful and healthy holly tree. It should be a miracle that there were people who were surprised about me having failed my 6 grade biology twice in a row. At least I learnt my holly tree today. Never again, Katt-Rose. Never again. They sure stung a bloody big time.

After adjusting myself from those sore scratches, I figured out why the town was called Silent Hill. Silent, stood for the ridiculous lifelessness. And Hill, well, first I thought was a bit flat but now was clear ¨C the road I took to get here disappeared just in that short period of time, vanishing into nothing but a bottomless broken cliff. Guess I was too caught up on the fall, but sure whoever did it did a pretty good job. The hard concrete melted into nothingness so quietly, that I could've stepped right into it with my eyes closed. Whatever the escapes from this Silent Hill I had, was well gone. Not that I wanted to, mind you. Weird, me like.

I checked my pack. Yay, I actually managed to not damage anything. Torch, checked. Amethyst wand, checked. First Aid kit, couldn't live without it. Swiss army knife, shiny and sharp as ever. Camera and notepad, perfect. Last but not least I took out my betrusted cell phone, and remembered that I should text my bro to tell him I made it safely. Of course, he didn't have to know minor details like my car flying or road gone missing. He thinks I was insane already. Couldn't give him too much proof on that could I?

My text got bounced back almost as soon as I pressed ¡°send¡± button. And sure was not just any other bad receptions. As was normal to have trouble sending out text in most abandoned empty towns, that was actually the first time for me to get a message telling me ¡°ERROR: dear Katt-Rose, you can not send your message, now you are doomed, as hell invites you to your doomsday¡±. Hah, they used the word ¡°doom¡± twice. Whoever tried might be trying hard to be scary, but that was what I'd call bad vocabulary. In fact, that personalised error message might've freaked out a few people.

What normally freaks out people, amused me.

I stuffed the phone back into my pocket, still laughed at the very rude yet funny message. Who ever that was making the mystery at least seemed to be a straight forward person. Or ghoul. Or being. Oh, whatever.

Silent Hill sure was foggy. Droplets of moist stained my eye lashes and blocked out sight bad. I blinked as hard as I could. Finally I managed to form the town's images properly. Abandoned houses and cars were everywhere, but the lawns and trees all looked well kept. Then from the corner of my eye, I saw a human like figure afar, swinging on a tree. I decided to go and have a look, if whoever there was alive I could ask him for an interview. Even if he was dead I probably still could ask the same thing, given that he wasn't dead for too long and the spirit hasn't left him completely yet.

I drawn out my wand and clipped it into my hidden sleeve pocket, with the sharp amethyst side out. Just in case if the being there wasn't entirely friendly, I could easily take out a normal lost soul with a charm, or dig out an eye with the sharp bit if was a violent human being. As much I hated it, I had done that many times in the past to defend myself.

In my semi-relieved and semi-disappointed state, the body just did not feel right. No matter how hard I tried he simply just hung there, dead. As if he never lived. Unless of course, he was recovering from the sudden shock ¨C as most of us would if our head got twisted into awkward direction and the spinal cord snapped. The only thing that kept that badly de-faced head from falling was a final strip of ripped neck muscle still supporting the whole weight. Someone dug out his eyes way before I did. Where eyes used to be, had nothing but two hollow holes left. John Doe's left arm was torn off from the shoulder, and the joint where the initial violent rip had taken place looked very¡ well, cooked, with drips of solidified saturated fat. His waist was tied on to the tree with his own belt, leaving his once-were-designer pants hanging down his ankles. Layers of foggy mist crystalised onto his leg hairs, making his bulky and bruised limbs look unrealistically glittery. Talk about a degrading death. There were splats of thick dark liquids all around him, and from the smell, I figured was his own blood.

Note that, I am selectively colour-blind. Some days I would have full coloured vision. Today was one of those ¡°other¡± days. I figured that was part of my price for having some special abilities, eh? To be honest that didn't affect me much other than having a bit problem with playing video games once in a while - namely I happened to be colour-blind on a chocobo-breeding day. Other than that, I really didn't mind. According to Hollywood the only good thing about seeing colours was when you were about to be blown to smithereens with 10 seconds or so left, so you could cut either the red or the blue wire in time to save you, and many other innocent people's lives. That certainly didn't affect me. For one, I doubt anyone would go over the troubles to actually kill me. Two if they did they would probably rather run me over when I mow the lawn. Cheaper that way. Three, even if they somehow had too much to smoke and during some random hallucination they decided to kill me with an expensive bomb that had to be set in the right place and the right time, they would be smart enough to make all wires red- not just the vital one so I could chant ¡°blue, red, blue, red¡± to myself.

If the cell phone didn't went off, my thoughts would probably kept on flying away. Wonder if the psycho sent me another insulting message. It was strange to hear the radio-alike static though, because I was pretty sure I had the Hi-5 theme as my ring tone, just for the sake of annoying those people who thought it was cool to put Eminem in their cell all the time. No time for that though, something told me instantly that something dangerous was approaching.

I think I just found one of the reasons why this town was so empty. Because right in front of me, there was a giant thing that can only be described as ¡°once were a dog.¡± An oversized, rabies-inflamed violent canine. Where there used to be a head, had nothing but a painful split right through the middle, fangs spelling out their craving for blood. Having calmed myself, I slowly pulled out my weapon. Oh dear, was when I realised that the wand was perfect for self-defense against almost anything, but not a creature that had no eyes for me to dig out. I slowly backed off as the split-headed dog slowly wiggled and twitched toward me. Every step it took left a dark sticky paw print on the hard ground. My heart started to pump like crazy, and I felt the sweat on my palm.

Closer and closer, I could feel the hot breath and brutal hunger of that thing. The strong sulfur smell was so sharp, my eyes started to water. I tried to slow my breath, in the same manner as a pregnant women ready to give birth. Tell me about breathing being an easy task. And the ever so loud cell phone static really wasn't helping.

I clutched my fists so tight that the wands silver wire cut right into my flesh. The dog took a giant swift jump at me. I had to take out my knife in time.

But that time I didn't have. The momentum when the dog landed crashed me against the brick wall, for a moment the blotch-stained teeth expanded into everything I could see. Things were cracking, was it my ribs? I didn't know. I was too numb to feel any pain anymore.

After what felt like eternity, the disturbing scene faded into fuzzy wooly inky darkness. I never felt my body this weightless since last weekend when I gulped down a whole bottle of coke syrup.

And sure I wouldn't do that again. Not if I have a choice.

Next Chapter: Katt-Rose found out that she's not alone, but who's behind all the things going on? And what is her own innerself that she never knew about? The special abilities, bless or curse? Or maybe she's just too high on coke syrup. We all do that one day or another, right? _;;;;;;

Author's note (Myhrr): I cannot write. I admits that. Hell, I think I broke my highschool's record on lowest English mark ever, so yeah. Flame on. Just remember English isn't my first language eh?(excuses excuses excuses)

Rumer: if you think my story is too similar to yours, tell me to take it down and I'll be happy to do so. I tried to send it to you first but you don't have a valid email address. But then again, we all got something from Anita Blake, right? ^_^

And reviews pleeeeease. I'm begging here.

Author's Note (Raven): English isn't my first language either. But who cares.