Chapter 8: The House of Knowledge
I've been a very bad author, I know it. I've had a lot of crap to do, with school and all, real school now, college, yuck. Anywhoo, I'll probably write more chapters, but its still gonna take me awhile. I never actually watched Twin Peaks until after I got Mr. Nguyen's review, and I can see the relationship between Cooper and Crocker. Crocker seems a bit more down to Earth than Cooper to me though. Farnwald is more there for comic relief than backup, unlike the Sherrif in Twin Peaks.
All roads out of the hellish town were closed. Avalanches had apparently made it completely impossible to leave, even by mountain trails. This pissed me off, but at the same time, I no longer was as shocked. Wierd things were natural in this place, almost as if a brand new set of physical laws had overcome the previous ones.
I carried by radio, gun, and camera on me at all times now. I couldn't understand why, but it seemed that whenever something threatening was nearby, the radio would emit static. The gun I had leftover from the police station, which proves that my experience there wasn't all in my head.
Farnwald and I were on our way to the library, as this is all I could think of in terms of "House of Knowledge". Farnwald was holding a long tube out the window, which connected to my physcic energy reader. The people we passed didn't seem to noticed, they just continued their dreary marches to who knows where.
We pulled up to the library, which lay on the Western half of Silent Hill, along Sagan Street. Compared to the rest of the town, this place seemed like it was at least relatively taken care of. It was very old fashioned, made completely out of stone and marble. Gargoyle's stared down at us, and the entrance was flanked by a pair of lion statues. In this place, I wouldn't be shocked if they suddenly came to life and attacked.
It was starting to get foggy, which was never a good sign. I hustled Tom inside, with all the equipment. The receptioness didn't look too happy to have us there, but one mention of Mr. S made her very compliant to my demands.
"How big is this place?", I asked.
"Three stories high sir, nonfiction on the first floor, fiction on the second, and refernce books on the third. Do you need a map?"
"A map, of a library? No thanks, could you just direct me to where Silent Hill history books are?
At my mentioning of this she started to get a little flustered.
"Those books are all down in the basement, you'll have to follow me."
She lead us through the ancient and grand library. It seemed even bigger than the New York Public Library to me. Stained glass windows depicted strange scenes of mostly female angels with strange captions like "Daughter of God". I'm agnostic, but even I know its the son of god.
"It's down this way", said the receptioness.
A door opened into a staircase leading to darkness.
"Aren't there any lights down there?", I asked.
"Our electricity doesn't run down there, its very old... here."
She handed me a flashlight. Not a normal type of flashlight, it actually clipped to the inside of my breast pocket. As we started down the stairs I wondered, "Why didn't she come with us?"
I had a queer feeling about the place. It was small, dust filled study that had apparently not been used for ages. There were a few desks and three rows of books. I immediately began looking at the titles, they were typical history books and I didn't really know where to start. As I walked through the stacks, I noticed a book, opened on a desk, that was stained with a bit of blood.
I thoroughly searched the room, but found no one. At this point of my "vacation", I didn't find anything the least bit shocking. I decided to read the page it was opened to:
There is no religion that has remained unchanged from the
moment it was founded.
This one is no exception. When the religion fell into the
hands of immigrants, it was deeply influenced by their own
original Christian beliefs. For example, the traditional
representations of these primal Gods may be given the names
and descriptions of christians angels. Thus shared characteristics
begin to appear.
(There is also one rare example of the chief deity, 'Creator of
Paradise' or 'Lord of Serpents and Reeds', being dubbed with a
demons name of course, this was not done by believers but by
their opponents.)
The book was titled Syncretic Religions. It was interesting enough for me, I figured I'd take it back to the hotel. After all, this place was creepy.
As I made my way back towards the stairs, I noticed that Farnwald had vanished. He wasn't in the room behind me, so he must have gone back upstairs. I climbed up to follow him, but then
I felt a pain in my head and stumbled down. I heard the sound of the air raid sirens going off in the distance.
I knew what this was. Opening the door in front of me, I found the library in a state of decay. Through the windows I saw that it had gotten extremely misty outside, again. I strode quickly towards the exit, but I was forced to halt in my tracks, as I saw a man kneeling in the center of the foyer.
It was Jack Davis, the guy I had seem in the Strip Club when I first entered this strange, otherworldly place. His clothes were a bit more torn up then before and he had a huge, bleading gash across his forehead. Instead of a butcher knife, he carried a pistol with him. The knife had taken up a home in his belt.
I called out to him, and he spun around and unloaded his clip in my direction. Luckily, I was still somewhat in the door to the basement, and managed to duck inside before getting hit.
"Hold your fire! I'm not a monster!" I screamed.
"You better not be. Come out with your hands in the air!"
I did as he told and he lowered his pistol. He looked somewhat relieved, but still extremely tense.
"It's you... Dennis, right?"
"Uhh... yeah. Listen, have you been going through the same reality shifts as me?"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Don't things ever turn back to normal for you?"
"Huh? Its been like this forever, as soon as I escaped from that place"
"What place?"
He apparently didn't like my probing questions, cause he pointed his gun at me.
"Shut up! Its none of your goddamn business!"
It was then that my radio started emitting static. I reached into my pocket to pull it out, and discovered the gun that I had found in the tripped out police station was with. It wasn't after I returned that I found it missing, but now it had mysteriously returned.
Davis looked frightened. Without another word, he charged into a door in the back. A huge, black shape from the ceiling cast a dark shadow on the floor. Whatever it was, it had several sets of arms, and I didn't feel much like waiting around to see the rest. I ran through the door that Davis had gone, which took me into a hallway.
There was a puddle of blood and a dead body, with bloody footprints leading down the hall. I didn't feel like examining it, and
just followed what I assumed were Davis's footprints. I ran for what seemed like hours down the hall, through more than doorway. It didn't seem like there was any logical pattern to where I was going, I just followed the prints.
I found myself back at the front entrance to the library. I had come out of a door in the side of the stairs that lead to the second floor. My radio was still emitting static, so I didn't feel the least bit comfortable yet. It was too dark to see up the stairs, and this gave me an eery feeling.
Taped to the door was a small box and a note. The box was actually a flashlight. I tried switching it on, but the batteries were dead. I read the note which was written in blood:
WEAR IT
It was one of those flashlights that connect to the front shirt in your pocket. Whoever was playing this game with notes and messages probably wouldn't be satisfied until I put it on, so I did. Suddenly the writing changed.
NOW TURN AROUND
I followed the directions again. All of a sudden the flashlight switched on, and I saw something at the top flight that chilled my blood.
A little girl in school clothes, probably about eight or nine, was stuck to the back of the wall. By stuck, I mean a huge knife was stabbed through her chest into the back of the wall. Without hesistation, I charged up the stairs and ran to her side.
I checked her pulse, and found that she was dead, just like everyone I met in the town, either dead or crazy. I fell to my knees, and burst out in tears. I noticed that she had been carrying a book with her. I picked it up and read the front cover, "Book of Lost Memories", it read. There was a bookmark in it, and I read the page it was turned to.
Toluca Lake, the town's main tourist attraction. This clear, beautiful
lake has another side as well. It may seem like just a typical ghost
story that you might find in any number of old towns across the country.
But in this case, the legend is true. On a fog-bound Novmber day in 1918,the Little Baroness, a ship filled with tourists, failed to return to port. A newspaper article from back then simply says "It most likely
sunk for some reason". Despite an extensive police search, not a single
fragment of the ship nor any of the 14 bodies of passengers or crew has
ever been recovered to this day. In 1939, an even stranger incident
occurred.
Many corpses rest at the bottom of this lake. Their bony hands reach up
towards the boats that pass overhead. Perhaps they reach for their
comrades.
The island in the center of the lake was once used for dark rituals. No one is allowed to go there, by order of the town council.
Now, at least I had a new objective, to check out the island in the center of the lake. When I turned around to head outside, an old friend was waiting for me.
It was the damn monster I had decided to call pyramid head. He had his giant knife with him, but he didn't swing at me.
I shoved him aside and ran back down the stairs, to find that he wasn't following me. I turned back around and stared at him. I felt his eyes staring at me through his mask, if he had them, that is. We stood there for a few minutes, till the sirens started going off again.
I had another sudden flash, and I awoke to Tom giving me mouth to mouth resusitation. I pushed him off, got up, and found myself back in the "normal library", with a bunch of people staring at me.
I've been a very bad author, I know it. I've had a lot of crap to do, with school and all, real school now, college, yuck. Anywhoo, I'll probably write more chapters, but its still gonna take me awhile. I never actually watched Twin Peaks until after I got Mr. Nguyen's review, and I can see the relationship between Cooper and Crocker. Crocker seems a bit more down to Earth than Cooper to me though. Farnwald is more there for comic relief than backup, unlike the Sherrif in Twin Peaks.
All roads out of the hellish town were closed. Avalanches had apparently made it completely impossible to leave, even by mountain trails. This pissed me off, but at the same time, I no longer was as shocked. Wierd things were natural in this place, almost as if a brand new set of physical laws had overcome the previous ones.
I carried by radio, gun, and camera on me at all times now. I couldn't understand why, but it seemed that whenever something threatening was nearby, the radio would emit static. The gun I had leftover from the police station, which proves that my experience there wasn't all in my head.
Farnwald and I were on our way to the library, as this is all I could think of in terms of "House of Knowledge". Farnwald was holding a long tube out the window, which connected to my physcic energy reader. The people we passed didn't seem to noticed, they just continued their dreary marches to who knows where.
We pulled up to the library, which lay on the Western half of Silent Hill, along Sagan Street. Compared to the rest of the town, this place seemed like it was at least relatively taken care of. It was very old fashioned, made completely out of stone and marble. Gargoyle's stared down at us, and the entrance was flanked by a pair of lion statues. In this place, I wouldn't be shocked if they suddenly came to life and attacked.
It was starting to get foggy, which was never a good sign. I hustled Tom inside, with all the equipment. The receptioness didn't look too happy to have us there, but one mention of Mr. S made her very compliant to my demands.
"How big is this place?", I asked.
"Three stories high sir, nonfiction on the first floor, fiction on the second, and refernce books on the third. Do you need a map?"
"A map, of a library? No thanks, could you just direct me to where Silent Hill history books are?
At my mentioning of this she started to get a little flustered.
"Those books are all down in the basement, you'll have to follow me."
She lead us through the ancient and grand library. It seemed even bigger than the New York Public Library to me. Stained glass windows depicted strange scenes of mostly female angels with strange captions like "Daughter of God". I'm agnostic, but even I know its the son of god.
"It's down this way", said the receptioness.
A door opened into a staircase leading to darkness.
"Aren't there any lights down there?", I asked.
"Our electricity doesn't run down there, its very old... here."
She handed me a flashlight. Not a normal type of flashlight, it actually clipped to the inside of my breast pocket. As we started down the stairs I wondered, "Why didn't she come with us?"
I had a queer feeling about the place. It was small, dust filled study that had apparently not been used for ages. There were a few desks and three rows of books. I immediately began looking at the titles, they were typical history books and I didn't really know where to start. As I walked through the stacks, I noticed a book, opened on a desk, that was stained with a bit of blood.
I thoroughly searched the room, but found no one. At this point of my "vacation", I didn't find anything the least bit shocking. I decided to read the page it was opened to:
There is no religion that has remained unchanged from the
moment it was founded.
This one is no exception. When the religion fell into the
hands of immigrants, it was deeply influenced by their own
original Christian beliefs. For example, the traditional
representations of these primal Gods may be given the names
and descriptions of christians angels. Thus shared characteristics
begin to appear.
(There is also one rare example of the chief deity, 'Creator of
Paradise' or 'Lord of Serpents and Reeds', being dubbed with a
demons name of course, this was not done by believers but by
their opponents.)
The book was titled Syncretic Religions. It was interesting enough for me, I figured I'd take it back to the hotel. After all, this place was creepy.
As I made my way back towards the stairs, I noticed that Farnwald had vanished. He wasn't in the room behind me, so he must have gone back upstairs. I climbed up to follow him, but then
I felt a pain in my head and stumbled down. I heard the sound of the air raid sirens going off in the distance.
I knew what this was. Opening the door in front of me, I found the library in a state of decay. Through the windows I saw that it had gotten extremely misty outside, again. I strode quickly towards the exit, but I was forced to halt in my tracks, as I saw a man kneeling in the center of the foyer.
It was Jack Davis, the guy I had seem in the Strip Club when I first entered this strange, otherworldly place. His clothes were a bit more torn up then before and he had a huge, bleading gash across his forehead. Instead of a butcher knife, he carried a pistol with him. The knife had taken up a home in his belt.
I called out to him, and he spun around and unloaded his clip in my direction. Luckily, I was still somewhat in the door to the basement, and managed to duck inside before getting hit.
"Hold your fire! I'm not a monster!" I screamed.
"You better not be. Come out with your hands in the air!"
I did as he told and he lowered his pistol. He looked somewhat relieved, but still extremely tense.
"It's you... Dennis, right?"
"Uhh... yeah. Listen, have you been going through the same reality shifts as me?"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Don't things ever turn back to normal for you?"
"Huh? Its been like this forever, as soon as I escaped from that place"
"What place?"
He apparently didn't like my probing questions, cause he pointed his gun at me.
"Shut up! Its none of your goddamn business!"
It was then that my radio started emitting static. I reached into my pocket to pull it out, and discovered the gun that I had found in the tripped out police station was with. It wasn't after I returned that I found it missing, but now it had mysteriously returned.
Davis looked frightened. Without another word, he charged into a door in the back. A huge, black shape from the ceiling cast a dark shadow on the floor. Whatever it was, it had several sets of arms, and I didn't feel much like waiting around to see the rest. I ran through the door that Davis had gone, which took me into a hallway.
There was a puddle of blood and a dead body, with bloody footprints leading down the hall. I didn't feel like examining it, and
just followed what I assumed were Davis's footprints. I ran for what seemed like hours down the hall, through more than doorway. It didn't seem like there was any logical pattern to where I was going, I just followed the prints.
I found myself back at the front entrance to the library. I had come out of a door in the side of the stairs that lead to the second floor. My radio was still emitting static, so I didn't feel the least bit comfortable yet. It was too dark to see up the stairs, and this gave me an eery feeling.
Taped to the door was a small box and a note. The box was actually a flashlight. I tried switching it on, but the batteries were dead. I read the note which was written in blood:
WEAR IT
It was one of those flashlights that connect to the front shirt in your pocket. Whoever was playing this game with notes and messages probably wouldn't be satisfied until I put it on, so I did. Suddenly the writing changed.
NOW TURN AROUND
I followed the directions again. All of a sudden the flashlight switched on, and I saw something at the top flight that chilled my blood.
A little girl in school clothes, probably about eight or nine, was stuck to the back of the wall. By stuck, I mean a huge knife was stabbed through her chest into the back of the wall. Without hesistation, I charged up the stairs and ran to her side.
I checked her pulse, and found that she was dead, just like everyone I met in the town, either dead or crazy. I fell to my knees, and burst out in tears. I noticed that she had been carrying a book with her. I picked it up and read the front cover, "Book of Lost Memories", it read. There was a bookmark in it, and I read the page it was turned to.
Toluca Lake, the town's main tourist attraction. This clear, beautiful
lake has another side as well. It may seem like just a typical ghost
story that you might find in any number of old towns across the country.
But in this case, the legend is true. On a fog-bound Novmber day in 1918,the Little Baroness, a ship filled with tourists, failed to return to port. A newspaper article from back then simply says "It most likely
sunk for some reason". Despite an extensive police search, not a single
fragment of the ship nor any of the 14 bodies of passengers or crew has
ever been recovered to this day. In 1939, an even stranger incident
occurred.
Many corpses rest at the bottom of this lake. Their bony hands reach up
towards the boats that pass overhead. Perhaps they reach for their
comrades.
The island in the center of the lake was once used for dark rituals. No one is allowed to go there, by order of the town council.
Now, at least I had a new objective, to check out the island in the center of the lake. When I turned around to head outside, an old friend was waiting for me.
It was the damn monster I had decided to call pyramid head. He had his giant knife with him, but he didn't swing at me.
I shoved him aside and ran back down the stairs, to find that he wasn't following me. I turned back around and stared at him. I felt his eyes staring at me through his mask, if he had them, that is. We stood there for a few minutes, till the sirens started going off again.
I had another sudden flash, and I awoke to Tom giving me mouth to mouth resusitation. I pushed him off, got up, and found myself back in the "normal library", with a bunch of people staring at me.