Chapter II: Dark Time - Early Monday Morning

AN:

Hey there, Fan-fic-folks!

Given that the nights are getting longer now in the Northern Hemisphere, I figured it'd be a good time to get back to the Darkness. Took a while to make my decision, but I've decided I'm going to try this one from a neutral third person narrator perspective (ie. not one of the characters telling the story of another as in Decay-dia Bay). It was kinda tough to make the balance between flowery verbiage and blunt and to the point statements work, but I think I got it. Let me know if this style works for you.

If you wanna find the original comic, search 'the darkness 1996 read comic online to' in google and click on the website with the last four words in its name. Should be the first result, but just in case. The second game is on steam. Not sure about the first one, though. Haven't been able to find that. Do let me know if you're aware of any place to get it.

There should be around 10 chapters in act 1 of Simple Smile and Bewitching Lies, according to the new story plan thing I've got going. Probably going to end up being less, though. Either way, the current plan remains to try and spend the rest of this year (today was my last day of university until January) getting every uploaded story I have to the end of the first act (basically, after all the main players and story points are introduced and when the lead in to the main drama in the second act is done) before I go back and actually work at finishing them over the next few months. I've been trying to trim down some of my plans so you aren't all waiting a year for the end of stories I started two years ago, but thus far that is slow going. So, yes. Expect all the less populated stories to start updating this year, and then the others to continue in the new year. I'll do my best to keep y'all apprised as that inevitably changes when some godsdamned twist of fate conspires to make that plan impossible.

Thanks for reading and, as always, please review

There's a reason only those with no other option sleep in a car, and that reason is that they are bloody uncomfortable. When Chloe awoke in her truck that cold morning in October, a crick in her neck and a curse on her lips, for a moment or two, she had no idea where she was or how she'd gotten there. And she really wished she could say that this was the first Monday she'd woken up in such a way, but sad to say it was all too common an occurrence, ever since her dad had been killed in a fucking car accident. As you may have assumed, she hadn't dealt with it well.

Her truck had conked out during her nap, leaving in her so cold she could see her breath. She revved the truck a little, turning the heater up as she tried to get warm again. While she waited, she took a look at the area around her. The lay-by she'd parked in for a quick preparatory bake 'sesh' certainly wasn't notable. It had trees and was by a road. That really was all. There weren't even any of the various farm animals that occupied the fields this far out of the town. Luckily, she hadn't slept for long, dozing for maybe half an hour in total. That meant she could still make her meeting.

She shook her head, clearing most of the morning fogginess, and put the vehicle into gear. Her mind raced faster than the truck, plotting and planning and paranoiacally muttering fearful warnings about how this was really a terrible idea and she should abandon it immediately. Nathan Prescott was not someone you fucked with lightly, but Chloe was going all in. She planned to blackmail him, of all things, with proof of his... 'indiscretions'. His family, ruthless and hated as they might've been, were still concerned with perception, reputation. If they found out what he'd done, they wouldn't care. If anyone else found out what he'd done, well... that was an entirely different kettle of roofied fish.

And that was exactly what he'd done, and tried to do to her. She'd managed to grab what remained of the drug before she fled his room that night and since then, with a little research and investigation and a few copies of skilfully pilfered security camera footage, she'd collated evidence together until she had a nicely damning file all ready to ruin the rich prick's life.

She pulled into the Blackwell lot, easing her truck into not one, but two handicapped spots. The old her would've felt some guilt about using them, but the new her rationalised it with the fact that Blackwell's administration would never actually enrol a disabled kid. They wouldn't even be able to get in the building, for one; Blackwell had no ramps, no elevators, no nothing. Even her elementary school had a ramp for wheelchairs by the front entrance. It was a fair point, but solely a rationalisation.

Chloe didn't really care. Couldn't, if she was being really honest with herself. Though that was a rare occasion indeed.

She hopped out of her truck, grabbing her jacket from behind the seat and starting off for the school. To Chloe, Blackwell reeked of privilege. She could almost taste it on the air. Like foie gras sprinkled with platinum and a side of supercars, rolexes on the side. She hated it. She always had, even when she went here. Oh yes, Chloe Price had once graced the halls of this proud institution, bathing in all that class and money, and bringing it down with her mere breathing presence: a fact the other kids attending the school had been sure to never let her forget. Not all of them said anything, very few had the balls to try, but she could see it well enough. Saw it in their eyes, the little crinkles of condescension and the snorts of snootiness. Scholarship kid made good, huh? The Vortex Club were the worst of it. Privileged rich kids turned a once proud group of rebels into their own little playground of superiority. They were the ones she hated the most. She could-

She shook her head, clearing all those pesky distractions and insecurities. She couldn't afford them, not where she was going. She may have had the advantage of Prescott, but it was tenuous. If he smelled weakness, he'd bite. And then there'd be blood in the water. All the Vortexer sharks would be all a'frenzied to get their pearly whites on her socially-leprous corpse.

Her last moments of preparation done, she strode into the bathroom - seriously, why on earth he'd picked to meet here, she'd never know - to find her target standing by the sinks and staring forlornly into the mirror.

"I hope you checked the perimeter, as my step-ass would say?" Chloe stepped past him, pushing open each stall door in turn. The school was full of sneaks, so someone could be hiding in there, waiting to find out just what Nathan Prescott was doing in the girl's bathroom. Or possibly just hiding from him in general, he was a terrifyingly unhinged individual. Either way, she found the room was clear, and got to business. Or, as Chloe's... 'unique' vernacular put it "Now, let's talk bidness."

It kind of was like bidding, in her mind. And what she was selling was far more valuable to this kid than any client an auctioneer could ever dream of. Her client, though, seemed reticent. He didn't even look up from the mirror he was staring into. Chloe felt a burst of confidence: he was scared of her! "I got nothing for you."

The first words he'd spoken were harsh, bitter, almost forced out. Chloe grinned impudently and with so much satisfaction. She'd so got this. "Wrong. You got hella cash."

"That's my family," Nathan retorted. "Not me."

She felt a flash of irritation at the conniving little weasel trying to bluff his way out of their deal. And he still wasn't looking at her! "Oh boo hoo, poor little rich kid. I know you've been pumping drugs n' shit to kids around here." Everyone knew drug dealing was a big earner. Kid was probably rolling in it, she thought bitterly. She took the anger and used it, letting her lips curl with a spiteful little smile. Maybe reminding him of the situation would stop him deluding himself. "I bet your respectable family would help me out if I went to them. Man, I can see the headlines now..."

"Leave them out of this, bitch."

CHLOE.

She could see the kid getting angrier and angrier, but she pushed on. Probably a bad decision, in hindsight, but Chloe never was one for social awareness. Or tact. Or good manners. "I can tell everybody Nathan Prescott is a punk-ass bitch who begs like a little girl and talks to himself-"

Her near-rant was cut off as Nathan spun, a handgun in his... hand, and charged her. He shoved her up against the wall by the door and jammed the barrel of the gun into her gut. Chloe was in shock. She'd gotten drunk on the feeling of power and dominance - a feeling rarer than self-analysis in Chloe's hard knock life - and now it was coming back to bite her in the ass. "You don't know who I am, or who you're messing around with!"

All that confidence had vanished faster than Nathan's apparent sanity, and now Chloe was desperately trying to do some damage control and calm the crazy person down. "Where'd you get that? What're you doing? Come on, put that thing down!"

Not a good tactic.

IT'S YOUR TIME, CHLOE. USE MY POWER OR YOU WILL DIE.

What? What was happening? Who was that voice? She was, rather appropriately, sure as hell it wasn't Nathan. His voice wasn't that deep, or... disturbing. Disturbed, sure. But nothing like this.

"Don't EVER tell me what to do. I'm so sick of people trying to control me!"

Nathan was furious now, and Chloe could see her life flashing before her eyes. The self-awareness lightning had struck twice today, and she wasn't happy with what she saw. She couldn't believe he'd really shoot her. He was angry, but that was just insane. There were students outside, and Wells was down the hall. Useless and corrupt as he was, even he couldn't cover up his prize student shooting someone in the middle of half the campus population.

JUST LET IT HAPPEN, CHLOE. IT'S YOUR BIRTHRIGHT.

Chloe shook her head to clear the voice, sure it was some side-effect of the panic she was feeling. She tried again, yelling as loudly as she could "You are going to get in hella more trouble for this than drugs!" Nobody wanted to get in that much trouble, right? Surely, she thought, shooting her of all people wasn't worth going through that amount of shit.

Nathan's next line, calm and considering, broke that belief. Her body began to shake, synapses firing rapidly with adrenaline that sent agonising surges through her body. Her heart beat faster as the maniac leaned in. "Nobody would even miss your punk ass, would they?"

Chloe tried one last ditch move: maybe she could get out and find someone, or maybe someone would overhear and burst in? She shoved him back, yelling "Get that gun away from me!"

YOUR TIME'S COME AROUND, CHLOE.

Nathan raised the gun and Darkness took him.

DARK TIME.

"Chloe!"

Chloe's shoulders pulsed and writhed and her skin felt like it was being stung by a thousand hornets everywhere at once. Her stomach burned and her throat convulsed and her veins felt like they were trying to rip themselves from her body, desperate to flee whatever was happening there. She gasped as the voice that'd been speaking in her head suddenly arrived to her ears instead in a horrific symphony of snarls and fury.

"Free! Free! Free! At last, I feeeeeeed!"

The door slammed shut behind Nathan as he ran screaming. The blood dripping down his face made for a nice image, sending a shiver of satisfaction down her spine. But... that wasn't Nathan's voice that shouted. Who..? Chloe turned around, and stared into her worst nightmare.

Max Caulfield stepped fully out of the shadows (and didn't this bathroom seem darker now somehow?), then smiled awkwardly, with no small trace of horror, up at her once and future bestie. "Hi, Chloe. You look like hell." Chloe had no idea why the girl was looking at her like that. Sure, this wasn't the best reunion, but surely she... wasn't... that...

Oh, God.

"God cannot help you now, Chloe."

Chloe stumbled forward, legs unsteady and near to collapse, catching herself on the middle sink and staring up into the same mirror she'd seen Nathan glaring at when she'd entered. What she saw was truly a nightmare.

Two long, black tendrils extended from her shoulderblades out to her sides, each tipped with a eel-like head with spines ridging its back and a set of razor sharp teeth dripping with foul ichor. The rest of the tendrils shimmered with it too, and the shadowy veins criss-crossing over it pulsed with an antediluvian power. She could almost feel them hunger, images flashing through her head of blood and viscera and juicy tender meat. Four more tendrils, though these were without the heads, extended out from her lower back, curling around her legs like tails. Her body was changed too, with shadows stretching over her form like armour. The faint outlines of mouths and eyes and teeth eased in and out of existence inside the shadow. Long, curved blades stretched out from her back like skeletal wings. Her eyes even had a faint, yellowish hue, contrasting vividly with the seeping, bleeding black cloud of ichor leaking from them like running mascara.

She looked like Death.

"Yeeeesss." The voice crooned, discordant and shivering. "The Darkness will like you, Chloe. Lucky, lucky you."

Chloe blinked, stood stock still in shock. She couldn't speak, couldn't even think to speak. She just stared at her new reflection. After a while, she found her mind freeing up. Desperate to calm the mental screaming, she resorted to her usual coping mechanism. Awful, awful jokes. "Well, I guess it could be worse..."

Max stared for a few long moments then, of all things, started to chuckle. "Still Chloe Price, I see." She still seemed immensely freaked out by her once best-friend looking like a demon from hell, but somehow amusement was streaking through as well. "Is this real? Or were you trying to punk that asshole?"

"Hella real, Maxie. Hella fucking real." Chloe muttered, running a hand over her face. "Did you hear that voice?"

"Uh, No. No voice, Chloe. What do you mean this is real? It can't be real?" Max's eyes bulged disbelievingly, but Chloe knew the other girl could read her as well as she could read Max. The truth of her words shined through the shadow and Max just gulped.

One of the eel-like heads chortled, swivelling to face Chloe. "Oh this is all too real..."

Chloe met the eye of the eel looking at her, tilted her head questioningly. "What... are you?"

"We," The eel responded, "are the Darkness."

Out the corner of her eye, she noticed Max staring at her like she'd, well, grown an extra head. And then started holding a one-sided conversation with it. Since that was exactly what was happening, Chloe wasn't offended. "And the Darkness is..?"

Both heads turned to look at her, and the mouths opened to reveal forked tongues and even more rows of wicked sharp teeth. The voice crept into her head again, "The Darkness is-" Suddenly, the voice screeched in agony that wracked Chloe's body. She looked up in time to see Max by the light switches, staring at her in horror.

"Chloe!" The girl called, desperate and concerned. "What's wrong, are you-"

And then, the pain stopped. Chloe came to again, shaking her head. With an exertion of will, she pulled herself up onto the sinks again. The image in the mirror was her own again, no shadow, no teeth, no Darkness. "What was-"

Max's form hit her like a bullet and her arms wrapped around Chloe's body and squeezed. "Oh dog, oh dog, Chloe! I turned the lights on and all the monster stuff just like... pulled itself back into you! It was so scary, Chloe."

Chloe shook her head again. "Yeah, yeah. Listen, Max, we gotta get out of here. If Nathan tries blaming us for some shit, we don't want them to find us here, 'kay?"

She felt Max nodding against her body and heard a vaguely muffled "Yeah..." that made her chuckle. Max may have seen similarities to the old Chloe, but Max hadn't changed at all. For a moment, Chloe indulged her instincts and pulled Max close in a tight hug.

After a moment, Max let go and stepped back, still staring down. Chloe watched as she took a deep breath, and the panic in her stance vanished. She met Chloe's eye. "Let's get out of here."

Chloe grinned. "I thought you'd never ask."

They ran out of the bathroom and down to the front doors, just in time to avoid David Madsen, school security guard extraordinaire, charging in. They managed to avoid everyone else, student and teacher alike, and made their way down to the parking lot. When Chloe pointed out her truck and introduced it as 'her baby', Max's expression was sceptical, but when the truck raced out of the lot like a bat out of hell, Max's scepticism turned to terror.

Chloe's driving just might've been the scariest thing she'd seen all day.