DISCLAIMER: I don't own Silent Hill 2, but it might just own me. (This goes for any related merchandise in the franchise.)

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is mainly an experimental piece. Of all the Silent Hill games, SH2 has always seemed to a lot of people to demonstrate the most thematic complexity and depth in terms of narrative storytelling. I happen to be one of those people. This introspective little piece stands up as a one-shot, but if things go well it may progress into a larger novel-sized project.

There are of course other attempts to produce a decent novelization of SH2 and the other games in the franchise, and some of them are very close to succeeding (for those not in the know, I point to Ryan M. Usher's "Letter from Silent Heaven" as the best example known to me thus far). Excellent though those attempts may be, those of you who are writers will empathize with me when I admit that I will not be satisfied until I take my own half-baked crack at a literary pool quickly filling with like-minded amateurs (not that I include myself in such a debased collective, har har).

Think of this piece as a starter meal that, upon being tasted, will allow readers to give suggestions on how the main course should look. Feedback is extremely important to me, and I've always thought fans in general are the best way of measuring the direction of matters such as this. So read the story, read my rationale at the bottom, and tell me whatcha'all think.

Enjoy.


Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence...
-Simon & Garfunkel

THE SOUND OF SILENCE

You have blue eyes.

You have blue eyes and dirty blonde hair. You have lips that rarely smile.

You have pale blue eyes, dirty blonde hair that hasn't touched water in almost a week, and a disarming habit of talking to yourself in the mirror when there's nobody else around. Behind your reflection looms an alarmingly dirty bathroom. The shadows on your face suggest the obvious.

Reminder: You are exhausted.

There appears to be a crack in your reflection. You trace it with a finger, but there's nothing familiar there... Nothing but disgust as the filth rubs off on your flesh, adding to the layers of dust and fatigue built up by countless hours on the highway. You've stopped into this little restroom to take a piss and a break, but you're torn between biology and something else; something that's been driving you. You're not sure what it is.

Reminder: You know exactly what is it.

Logically, you shouldn't even be here. You read somewhere that the average human being needs at least eight hours of sleep per night, or they go insane. Your leptin levels go down. Your cortisol levels go up. Your blood sugar and insulin go haywire. You have not slept in three days, and it feels like more. People need to dream to stay sane. You wonder if constant waking nightmares count.

Reminder: You are a twenty-nine year old everyman.

Your job is waiting for you. Back there, in case you forgot. Data entry clerk, small mailing company. Remember? It was a good life, before the drinking started. But don't start on that. One nice thing about not sleeping is you start forgetting things. It almost works better than the bottle. Unfortunately the big, important details tend to hang around...

Like that letter in your pocket.

Dear James...

You look down at the pocket. There's a tiny American flag sewn to the green leather over your left breast. Under the stiff bomber jacket is a grey cotton-polyester blend and a black undershirt. The jeans feel slightly stiff in the humidity, but these silver-buckled boots were made for walking... You've obviously been listening to the car radio non-stop until you got here, the Sound of Silence trapped in your head amidst the pain and alcohol withdrawal. There doesn't seem to be any way off the observation deck if not by foot.

In my restless dreams, I see that town.

Your purse your lips and sigh, just to hear a voice other than the one in your head. Your fingers softly brush your cheek, and you wish the hand belonged to someone else. The young man in the filmy glass seems to plead with you to release it from its reflective prison, but you can do no more for it than turn away. Inaction is an action.

You promised you'd take me there again someday...

Doing nothing is as much a decision as doing something.

But you never did.

Exposing yourself is the last thing you want to do in a place like this, but your body is urgently reminding you that there are more things in life than hunting down the dead. The way you keep glancing at that pocket suggests otherwise. Reminder: The name on the envelope said "Mary". That in itself ought to make it clear that this is all the product of a seriously deranged mind... Or one that just needs a good long REM cycle.

Well, I'm alone there now... In our "special place".

The smell and sound of your urine hitting the rust-caked porcelain makes you flush. In the physiological sense. There's no way in hell you're touching that handle; and besides, it's impossible to make this place any filthier than it already is. As you zip up, you feel self-conscious, as if the face in the mirror is somehow watching you. She always said you were a bit prudish when it came to these things... Whatever that meant.

Waiting for you.

Outside, it's big and bright and beautiful until you look across the parking lot to the wall of fog where there used to be buildings. The south side of the town shows through dimly, as if behind a veil, fading in and out of focus as the wind blows. It looks like some reconstruction has been going on, but it's hard to tell. One thing you know for certain is that the lake is still there... There's no way all that water could disappear during the time you were away.

That town...

Silent Hill.

As you recall, there was a large road sign somewhere around here with that name on it. It's gone now, presumably along with the town's bustling tourism trade. You haven't seen another car for miles. You catch yourself wishing there was a prominent road sign pointing you towards Mary, but they don't build signs for spouses who died of a terminal illness three years ago... Not unless they're made of stone with a date written across them.

But you don't remember any such stone. So maybe the letter in your treacherous pocket is right, and she's still alive and wandering these misty hills somewhere. Because, after all, a dead person can't write a letter. A lake can't disappear. Neither can people.

Yeah, and people can't just leave their jobs and drive a million miles into nowhere on a wild ghost chase. The blue eyes in the rearview mirror speak flatly to you: Ridiculous. Totally absurd. Mary died of that damn disease three years ago.

So then why am I looking for her? you respond.

Good question, say the eyes... and then they snap down to the driver's seat. There's a map sitting there, inviting you to pick it up and leave the tarnished remains of your former life behind. So tempting.

Reminder: You don't have to go through with this. Your dad's a superintendent in Ashfield, not far from here. Just drive there and explain that what you did was crazy, but it's all part of the grieving process and you just had to get out by yourself for a little bit. Frank Sunderland thinks his son's a pretty stable guy: plays things a little close to the chest, and not much ambition, but still basically sane. He won't be surprised if you pull the 'ol solitude card on him, and it's possible you wouldn't even be lying.

There would still be the letter, of course. And the map is within arm's reach.

Even as you stare at it through the windshield, the town seems to shiver with anticipation under the blanketing mist. Silent Hill... This whole town was her special place.

It's all laid out for you in here, James, the map seems to say. What in hell are you waiting for? Don't you know what your "special place" is?

You shake your head. Did she mean the park on Toluca? You and Mary spent the whole day there. Just the two of you, staring at the water. If you squint hard enough, maybe you'll see yourself with her down there, hand in hand at the railing overlooking the lake. A newlywed couple, grinning foolishly with possibility. Still unaware of the meaning of her occasional coughing fit, her once-a-week check-ups. The empty prescription bottles. A couple still believing the future would be as kind to them as they were to each other.

Scattershot thoughts scramble through your head as you stand on the observation deck, map in hand, gazing over the silent town through a shimmering filter that seems more than just mist. Could Mary really be there?

The map crinkles softly in your hand. Details skim overhead, unobserved, like the clouds scuttling distantly across the faded sky.

You are twenty nine years old. You are the son of an Ashfield superintendent named Frank Sunderland. You have an American Flag sewn over your left breast, and there's a Mars Bar wrapper on the floor of your generic blue Ford.

The air smells like organic things rotting.

Is she really alive... Waiting for me?

And now you're running, running startled, like you can't believe you're actually doing it... and then you slow down to a steady jog, breathing heavier than you should be for a man your age, feeling things pop and tremble in your limbs as you pound down the stairs and into the foggy depths of the nature trail leading to the streets below. And maybe you're crying, maybe you're not... Probably not, because you seem so calm to yourself now that you've decided which course to take, and it feels so much better to be down here. Like a decision you made a long time ago. And you feel like you've finally decided to take control of your own life, because not even Frank, or your boss, or even your poor wife is really around to tell you what to do...

You breathe in, and imagine you taste freedom on those lips that never smile.

INCREDIBLY LONG REDUNDANT JUSTIFICATION FOR HOW THINGS TURNED OUT SO FAR:

There are several reasons for the style of this piece.

The first is the POV. I chose the rather unpopular 2nd person voice, because there is a certain element of SH2 as a video game that I wanted to preserve: the fact that James retains his own identity and personality, while also being completely controlled by the player, is extremely interesting to me. Not only is James controlled through a fourth dimension by the player, he is also controlled within the narrative of the game; by Maria, by his own past, and of course by the evil forces in Silent Hill itself. The POV therefore lends a sense of alienation and loss of control that seems fitting for a story about a video game character.

Second, you may see I have already begun to take liberties with the text of the game. I saw this problem while novelizing Donnie Darko as well; the translation of cinematic material to literature is nigh impossible without a few artistic crutches. Adding content, combining or removing scenes, and refurbishing dialogue is all part of a necessary sacrifice. And admit it. Some of the spoken parts of SH2 are kinda brief and cheesy, if only for a novel.

(Again, since he's doing it first and I would in no way want to steal his thunder, Ryan Usher's novelization does a wonderful job with this. It puts me in mind of those ubiquitous paperback horror novels that I crave so dearly. Excellent work.)

The slow build-up of expository information, and the speed at which James must process and put the mystery together, is one of the more appealing things about the game to me. To this end, this piece is very stylized, with bits and pieces of the story appearing from the fog like Silent Hill itself. I wanted everything to reflect that, and you might notice this fragmented style of storytelling works with James himself as he reflects in the mirror and on his surroundings. Even James is a puzzle to be put together, a little bit at a time.

(The details, such as James' age and job, are more than fan speculation and less than cold hard fact. I'm not sure of the source but I will include the context of said knowledge eventually.)

By nature, I'm a lyrical writer at best. Check out my story "Any Time of Year" at Fictionpress for a good approximation of how I approach horror. Several people have told me it really creeped them out, and they will never hear the song "Hotel California" quite the same ever again; so if that's a selling point for good horror, than I think I have a good chance at replicating SH2's atmosphere. I place a heavy emphasis on psychological detail, but action scenes are still terribly entertaining. I also greatly enjoy writing dialogue and AtoY has plenty of that, too. Describing the bizarre and impossible is familiar territory for me.

SO NOW WHAT:

Unfortunately for me, SH has a lot more backstory than Donnie Darko ever did. I'm in no hurry to pound out another novelization (as far as anyone's concerned, Ryan Usher has no competition in this field), but if you're impressed so far or would like to see a few changes, please feel free to add your opinion. Anyway, while I have no idea about where I'd take the plot, you should be getting a good idea of the basics of my writing style.

I guess, like James, I'm going to toss my questions to the wind: So now what?

You tell me.

PS: Simon & Garfunkel's "The Sound of Silence" is in many ways perfect for my idea of SH2, from its depiction of loneliness and disconnection to the vague religious references in the last stanza (well, except for the basic message... but let's ignore that for now). Substitute the line "ten thousand people, maybe more" for "a bunch of humans, maybe four" and you'd be set.

And, uh, toss in a couple lines about Eddie killing things. Just because.