Silent Hell
Chapter One
Claudia Wolf was not a lowly creature of the mud, and she knew it. Much unlike the nonbelievers, she knew every bit of God's grand glory and this made her walk tall. She was proud to be one of the chosen to serve God while her father was merely one of the common. While he sat on the pews during service, Claudia sat next to Father Edgar, the head preist. It was one more step-
Brandon rips the paper out the notebook and wads it up before throwing it in a general direction. The ball bounces off a growing pile and lands next to Snowy's cage. The rabbit sniffs before nudging it away with its nose. The writer lets out a frusterated sigh and falls back onto the floor. Nothing he's tried came out to his liking, but he needs to get at least an introductory chapter written to show to his editor and explain his plan. He half rolled over and faced his rabbit.
"Snowy, where did you hide my muse?" He whines pitifully. The rabbit perks its ears up then hops to its food bowl. Brandon sighs and returns to his back staring at the ceiling fan spin lazily. He needs a good opener to impress his editor, and the readers eventually, something that keeps them reading on. Something... important... Spinning, spinning, spinning... He feels his eyes close but still sees the fan spinning around.
-s-i-l-e-n-t--h-e-l-l-
Brandon shoots up, arms reaching out to grab hold of anything in sight, and he finds himself clutching the coffee table. Sweat forms around his neck and wrists and the sweatshirt he wears seems to be suffocating him. He rips it off and throws it on a chair, bits and pieces of his dream flashing through his mind. He dreampt his wife tied him up and started burning him alive. He watched Snowy being chased by a wolf before the rabbit was ripped to shreds before vanishing and leaving only scattered hairs in the air. Then a young girl's cry was cut short by a door slamming. Thunder rumbles in the distance and Snowy runs around its cage before hiding in its house. Brandon stands to retrieve himself a bottle of water before returning to the coffee table and picking his pen up again.
-s-i-l-e-n-t--h-e-l-l-
The slapping sound of skin upon skin echoed through the barren house followed by a small thud. A voice roared, drowning out the other voice, as if a angry lion and a scared mouse were biting at each other's speech. Leonard Wolf, a man of almost great importance in the cult known as the Order had just slapped his daughter and only child, Claudia, to the ground.
"The line goes 'a man offered a serpent to the sun and prayed for salvation.' It was not a snake!" The father bellowed. He reached down and grabbed the trembling girl's blonde hair, pulling up to his eye level. "Now," He gritted his teeth, "Say the next line."
Sobs shook Claudia's small frame. "F-forgive me, fa--"
"Say the next line!" He screamed in her face and tightened his grip on her hair.
"A-a woman offered a r-reed to the sun and asked," She sobbed. "For joy."
"Alright." Leonard let go of her hair and she collasped to the ground. "That's the lesson for tonight, goto your room." The four-year-old scrambled to pick herself up and walked quickly out the room and up the stairs. For if she ran, she would surely be punished more. Mr. Wolf's hands clasped together and his brows furrowed. "God, please forgive my daughter for she is a sinner. She cannot recite the Holy Scriptures as well as she should and for that I blame myself. Please give me more time and I promise You she will know every verse by heart. Amen."
Leonard Wolf and Rita Dastrup met while attending college in Silent Hill. Rita was studing to become a palientologist, while Leonard studied in urban geography. Rita, the social butterfly, was captain of the basketball team, and Leonard mostly kept to himself and concentrated on his studies. They had met by a blind date set up, as was the "thing" to do in those times, and became friends. As the years past, the people that knew Leonard started to see a change in him. He was frowning less and started to show compassion. As if she was the one who could guide him and be his guiding light.
After college, they married and had a baby girl, and it seemed that life could be no more perfect than it was for them. Then one day Rita came home from her job and greeted her husband and daughter as she usually did. As she held her daughter, Claudia started to wail horribly and nothing could calm her. The baby clung to her mother desperately and if someone was trying to pry her away. Rita, insisting that she was just tired, went to put her in her crib when she suddenly collasped to the ground. Leonard rushed her to Brookhaven Hospital where she died shortly after. Stricken with grief, the widower took refuge at the Balkan church where he met Dhalia Gillespie, a woman who's daughter was rumored to be the mother of God. Dhalia offered to help him in his time of need under one condition: He would give his body, mind, and soul to God, and become one of her followers.
Leonard followed the cult's religion without questions, and raised his daughter strictly beneath it. Dhalia practically raised Claudia until she was three, and informed Leonard that Claudia was old enough to be blessed with the word of God and that what better person to do it than her father. But whenever Leonard would look at his daughter, hatred filled him. He blamed her for the death of his beloved wife; he believed that his daughter must have done something to kill her. And when his hand slammed against her cheek the first time, he felt no remorse. She was the demon that took his Rita away. And if their neighbors heard the screaming, crying, or even the yelling, they mentioned no word of it.
Upstairs, Claudia was curled up on her bed, hands over her sore scalp, and still sobbing. They were quiet, mostly hidden into a pillow, because if Father could hear her from his study he would grow angry. She wanted Alessa. Alessa could make her feel better and protect her from her sins. But little Claudia had no idea where her friend lived, so her only option left was to memorize the Sun prayer to make Father happy. Her head still hurt but she got up and walked over to the book on her desk and opened it to the certain page Father had marked for her. She strugled with the letters and words, quietly whispering them to herself, every line, over and over again. Eventually she nodded off, using her arms as makeshift pillows.
The next day, after her studies at the church, she was greeted by Alessa. Because Dhalia had taken care of Claudia ever since she could remember, Alessa and her had become the best of friends. She ran across the church yard where the orphens played and hugged her friend. "How was school?" Claudia asked excitedly. Alessa was two years older than Claudia and attended public school. Claudia, of course, was too young to even attend the lowest grade, so she studied with the orphens about God and their religion. Alessa giggled at her friend's enthusiasm.
"Colly," She smiled at her friend's nickname brought about when she was being taught to talk, "You ask me everyday and its always the same! We do math and english in the morning, and social studies and science after lunch!"
"You say that, but I still can't wait until I start going! We'll be able to see each other more often during the day!" The blonde girl beamed.
A wave of uneasiness washed over Alessa, but she just smiled back. "Oh!" She started, "I gotta show you this!" She grabbed the girl's hand and they ran across the yard again and into the church. Alessa kept running down the hall until she was tugged back slightly.
"Alessa," Claudia whispered looking around nervously, "We can run in here, Father says its a sin to run in formal places." The other girl rolled her eyes but her voice held no sarcasm.
"Okay, we'll just walk fast." They hurried to one of the offices and Alessa shut and locked the door behind them. "Ready?" She whispered breathless and Claudia nodded in responce. Alessa stared at a spot on the floor between the two of them really hard. The younger girl wondered what the elder one was doing until a squeak came from thin air. Slowly a black transparent figure, as tall as a baby appeared with no face and arms and legs that ended in little points. Claudia squealed and knelt down to get a better look at it. The tiny creature ran towards her, flailing its arm, and tripped causing it to emit another squeak.
"It's adorable, Alessa! How did you do that?" Claudia reached out her hand to help it up and its little arms grasped her hand and it started running around again.
"I'm not sure, Colly. I was thinking of how cute you were as a baby and this thing appeared..." She trailed off at the wide-eyed look Claudia was giving her. "What is it?"
"This just proves it further!" Claudia jumped up and ran back over to Alessa. "The Mother of God is supposed to have special powers."
"You're right! But I always thought that I would have, you know, powers to bring forth the salvation of mankind or something."
"Why would you want to do that?" Claudia questioned. "Not all of them believe in God, so why should we save the nonbelievers."
"Because when God tried creating Paradise, She was making it for everyone." Upon seeing the look of confused protest on her friend's face, the Holy Mother sighed. "Colly, its--"
Her explanation was cut short when the doorknob turned furiously. Both girls snapped their heads towards the door and the creature faded away. On the other side, someone fiddled with keys in the lock. Claudia crept behind Alessa and clutched her dress, trying to hide herself behind the older girl. The door unlocked and in walked a woman who looked far older than she actually was. Alessa relaxed and ran forward to hug the woman. "Mommy!"
Dhalia Gillespie placed a hand on her daughter's head. "Alessa, what are you doing back here with Little Claudia?" The woman's voice seemed a little hoarse. Claudia tensed up, but Alessa answered quickly.
"We were just playing! It was too loud anywhere else." Claudia could not tell if Dhalia was convinced or not, but the woman walked over to the table and picked up a slim book from its surface and then turned to the girls.
"Let us be off. For the night approaches with no care of where we are." Ms. Gillespie walked infront, leading them out of the church.
The days passed, and Claudia noticed her friend was acting less and less like herself. When she confronted her about it, she replied that one of her apparations appeared at recess one day and the children started calling her names. "That's herecy!" Claudia had exclaimed, "Don't they know you're the Holy Mother?" Alessa had just shaken her head and tried explaining to her friend that one day people will understand, but before that they must be cleansend, no, the whole world must be cleansed with fire. After that, everyone will see how glorious God really is.
Tiny blue eyes fluttered open. Outside, the snow covered everything in a soft, thin layer. Today was a very special day for Claudia. It had been two years since the children found out that Alessa could create illusions, and at the end of this week the Holy Mother would turn eight. But today they had planned to do something special today just the two of them. Claudia slipped on her black dress and shoes before making up her bed and going down stairs. She found her Father in his study, reading from the Holy Book and waited until he gave her permision before telling him she was going to the church to pray. He started a lecture on how she should go to the church to pray every morning and every night so that God knows how much she loves Her. He nodded at her to leave and she walked briskly, almost to the point of a slow run, to the church.
Alessa was waiting on the steps when Claudia arrived. The blonde questioned the plans for the day and the older one informed her it was a surprise. "Oh first!" Alessa grabbed Claudia's hand and changed directions. "Let's go this way."
"But this is the way back to my house." The girl protested.
"It's alright, we're just gonna go around to the back." When they arrived just below Claudia's window, the Holy Mother scooped the snow up in her hands and blew on it. The snow swirled around and formed into a butterfly slowly flapping its wings. Claudia watched in awe as the butterfly flew in lazy spirals, somehow making its way upward to her window where it settled as frost still in its shape.
"That was neat!" Claudia whispered. Alessa only nodded and grabbed her hand before taking off again. They followed the sidewalks, the black haired girl obviously knowing exactly where to go, along the main streets. A horrible feeling started to fill Claudia and she clutched to Alessa's arm. "Alessa," She whined, "I've never been this far. I'm scared."
"Its okay, Claudia. We're gonna be somewhere nice soon." As reassuring as Her words were, the bad feeling still did not go away. She pulled Alessa back, saying they should go back to the church and have the surprise there, but Alessa insisted on going along the strange streets. Footsteps came running fast behind and the girls turned around to find Dhalia Gillespie. The woman grabbed her daughter's hand, pulled her from Claudia, and started walking away.
"Uhm.." Claudia trotted to catch up with them and grabbed ahold of the woman's shaw. "Mother Dhalia... Alessa promised me that..."
"Now, now Claudia, we'll be back soon. Just wait here." Dhalia seemed less than interested in dealing with the blonde right now and wretched herself from the child's grip. The yong blonde girl stood there and watched them dissapear then sat on a bench that accompanied the sidewalk. Time ticked away and there was no sign of either Gillespie. A hot shiver ran through Claudia as a burly man approached her.
"Hey little girl, did you lose your parents?" He asked, kneeling down to her level.
"Uhm.." Her voice was barely audible. "I need to get back to my house."
"That's alright! I talked to your parents and they told me to bring you back to him!" He laughed once, his breathe rancid and humid.
"Really? Father's looking for me?" Claudia winced.
"Yeah, he's been looking everywhere fer ya! Worried sick he is!" The man laughed again and stood, extending his hand. "Come with me and I'll show you to him. He'll be so happy to see you."
The bad feeling hadn't gone away, but that was probally because she knew what awaited her at home if her father knew she wasn't at the church. The blonde started to slide off the bench when a black car pulled up to the sidewalk and honked at them. Out stepped a man in his fourties in a suit and tie.
"Hey, what do you think you're doing?" The new man asked the burly man. Claudia ran over to the car and the burly man started to back away. "You know how much time you can do for a crime like that?"
"I-I'm sorry man, I didn't mean anything! I wasn't gonna do nothing to her, I swear!"
"Then leave now." The fat man scrambled away and the new man turned to little Claudia."Are you alright?" the girl nodded meekly. Good, let's get you out of this weather before you catch pnemonia. "My name is Dr. Kaufmann." He told her after they got into the car. "Claudia Wolf." She replied.
The doctor drove her home and talked to her father for a little bit then left. The door closed and fear flooded the girl's body. Over the years, Claudia found that the first and final blow were always the worst. The first and last always held more anger than the rest. The name calling would lose its effect after the became a teenager, but until then then words like "filty sinner," and "demon" flooded her thoughts.