Chapter 26
Welcome To Blackthrone Asylum
'Oh my God… Darby… Darby, help!'
'Darby, help me, please!'
'No! Oh God, Darby! Help me!'
During the whole time he had been running down this empty road, these disembodied, frightened pleas for rescue emitted by Cora had been the only source of sound that was loud enough to overlap the pounding of Darby's heart inside of his own head, along with his heavy breathing which caused his throat to feel like it was on fire. At first, these pleas formed one long, continuous, agonizing stream that made it absolutely clear that his companion was caught in a blinding panic as soon as she had been snatched away by the darkness, which didn't let up in the slightest when Darby began running as fast as he possibly could; no longer having his trusty van to get him where he needed to go, this was all he could do. A horrible, nauseating feeling pooled in the pits of his stomach when he noticed a brief silence after Cora begged for his help after calling out his name, almost causing him to slow down. But as soon as he heard her cry out once again, he managed to retain the pace, heading into the direction of the following lamppost that was just one of the scarce number of lampposts that had been installed on the side of this road. Not only that, but it seemed like her voice was coming from one single direction by now, having felt like it was coming from literally everywhere right after she had been taken; seeing how Cora's pleas for her companion to come save her just so happened to be coming from the same direction Darby was heading to, he instantly assumed that he was going the right way. Every now and then, silent pauses of variable lengths would fall in between her cries, but the fear and despair that could be heard in her voice would always remain.
Not once had the blonde ghost hunter's fists stopped glowing with a bright shade of purple, nor had the skin on the right side of his face regain the thickness it needed to hide his partially exposed skull, though this wasn't because he was too enraged to switch off his powers. No. He hadn't forgotten about the Infected that had been dwelling beyond the tree line earlier, he hadn't forgotten about the massive numbers that had been forced to fight off right after Cora had been dragged off through the woods like a ragdoll tied to a string. He had made it by the skin of his goddamn teeth, but he had managed to reduce them into nothingness, leaving the black mist they had left behind to be swallowed up by the shadows of the woods. But he had only fought off enough Infected to buy himself enough time to go after his companion, following the sound of a body being dragged through earth and her horrified shrieks; by no means did this mean that there were no longer any bloodthirsty, mutated ghosts to stalk him from the darkness that only grew thicker by the minute, waiting for the perfect opportunity to lunge at him from the thicket with a distorted bellow and pin him down to the asphalt, which would most likely be drenched with his blood as soon as it would unleash all of the bloodthirst that had been inflicted upon it from the moment it had been infected by Malakai. Not for one second had Darby stopped glancing from left to right, occasionally peeking over his shoulder as well every now and then to see if he could catch a glimpse of the Infected that he had left behind beyond the tree line, finding it highly unlikely that the dim light of a lamppost would be more than enough to scare them off, trying his hardest to detect a sound that could indicate the presence of a nearby Infected over the loud, non-stop thumping noise produced by his beating heart that rang through his entire head. It felt like his skin was being carefully pricked by hundreds of needless underneath the black fabric of his jacket due to the increased heat of his own body, but nonetheless, the sheer cold that only a ghost could produce would be enough to break through all of that. But as for now, it appeared that Darby Allin was all alone on this abandoned long strip of road, his rapid footsteps echoing and trailing off into the barely-lit night, not only spurred on by the fear and panic of Cora's disembodied voice, but also a desire that burned with the flames from the pits of Hell itself to make Malakai Black pay with his goddamn life if he dared to harm her in any way possible. Just the very thought of the half ghost putting his hands on the young woman who had managed to form a bond with him in a matter of days, the same woman who had made him lower his guard and trust her enough to talk about the darkest moments of his life that had formed him into the person he was now, the same woman who had made him feel things he hadn't felt for any woman throughout his life, things he hadn't thought would ever be possible to feel because of the part of him that had died many years ago along with his mother, made his blood boil to the point where black spots danced in front of his eyes, forcing Darby to quickly blink his eyes in an attempt to make them fade away; he partially succeeded in this, reducing the thickness of the spots but unfortunately not to the point of fully erasing them from his sight. In the end, Malakai wasn't going to be any different to him, he managed to realize despite the fury that clouded his mind like a massive, black thunder cloud that would form on the night of a particularly warm summer day. That bastard was not entirely human; a part of him was as dead as a doorknob. Half ghost or not, Darby had been able to take on countless of tormented, rampaging spirits of the past decade, so it wasn't like that was going to make any goddamn difference. Just all the other ghosts he had taken care off before, it would be the same for Malakai.
But for what he did to Cora… Darby swore on his mother's grave that he would make absolutely sure that his defeat would hurt a whole fucking lot.
The disembodied pleas for help emitted by Cora eventually came to an abrupt end when the light of the final lamppost he passed proved to be strong enough (or perhaps the sky had finally colored dark enough to merely make it appear like this) to reveal the shadowy frame of what appeared to be a massively tall, broad building that for now seemed to be shaped like a brick, partially obscured by surrounding trees. Just a bit more, Darby knew, just a little bit more before he could squeeze the goddamn life out of Malakai by squeezing his neck with his glowing hands hard enough to crush his throat into a bloody pile of gore and get Cora the hell out of there. Could he get a confession out of the half ghost about why the hell he felt like the blonde ghost hunter was worth all the time and effort to create a whole damn army of brainwashed, mutated ghosts in order to get his hands on him? Maybe so, although Darby didn't pay much mind to this due to the fact that he was he was this close to being completely blinded by his own rage, which in turn turned out to be the perfect fuel to run for a little below thirty minutes with no breaks whatsoever, in his case. The blonde ghost hunter didn't have to make any unnecessary guesses of where he should be heading next, knowing damn well what the towering building in the distance could possibly be. This is where he needed to be. This had been the plan all along. But now he had one more reason to get through those empty, dusty, dark, cold halls as quickly as he could.
Cora was somewhere in there… and there could very well be a cause of why he didn't hear her anymore.
'Hang in there, Cora.' Darby could hear himself say, his voice throaty and close to raw. 'I'm getting you out, I swear.'
From that moment on, the only source of light the blonde ghost hunter could rely on was the purple light the energy that flowed through the veins of his arms produced; of course, it wasn't a whole lot, but it was at least better than walking in the pitch-black darkness with no idea of what, or maybe more befitting, who he could bump into. The last lamppost that could be found on this road was soon left far behind as he made his way to the towering building that had been abandoned ever since late 1987, but would never be forgotten by those who lived in the area, no, by everyone who lived in the United States, forever remembering it as a fortress of unthinkable horrors. When Darby was five meters away from the last lamppost, he could feel something thin and dry crunching underneath his feet, littered all over the asphalt. Looking down, the blonde ghost hunter could see that nobody had bothered to keep on taking care of the small amount of area outside of the gates despite being officially part of the property, or this part of the road for that matter, allowing weeds to grow through the cracked, highly neglected surface, some of them sprouting to astonishing lengths, others forming a dried layer that covered most of the road, having completely dried from spending hundreds of hours in the relentless summer sun. On the right side of the road, just a few feet away from him, Darby could see a large, grimy sign that even though had been subjected to the elements of nature for many decades, vandalism from spray can-wielding youth and had a handful of missing letters due to either them falling off because of the neglect or had them ripped off as some sort of free souvenir, it had struck fear in the hearts of many unfortunate bastards who were send off to this place way before 1987 and would continue to do so for the few who were lucky enough to be deemed 'cured' and thus be released. Despite all of that, he could easily decipher what the remaining letters were supposed to fully spell out.
'We c m hr ne A y lum.'
Welcome to Blackthrone Asylum.
In other words; welcome to Hell.
More weeds emitted a dry crunch as he continued to walk towards the massive building, looking straight at it. It didn't take for him to figure the shapes of two large, iron gates adorned with a row of sharp spikes at the top of which the locks had been rendered completely useless, leaving them wide open and allowing anybody access to the abandoned property. How many of the poor saps trapped behind those walls back in the day were willing to take the risk of tearing their clothing or skin on those spikes whilst climbing those gates, being this desperate to escape from this hellhole? Would the staff have bothered to clean off the blood from those spikes after a failed attempt to flee from the torment they inflicted upon their patients? Darby found it highly unlikely. As he quickly walked down the path like many before him did, it almost felt like the abandoned building that had once housed dozens of folks who were unlucky enough to be committed here to have their mental illnesses 'treated' was a towering living being of its own, clad in darkness as it loomed over him, holding its cold breath as it quietly watched the blonde ghost hunter approach, countless lifeless eyes that took the appearance of filthy windows (some intact, some destroyed by a flying brick, rock or other heavy object) staring down at the infuriated, determined intruder. Staring at the building that had been dubbed as Blackthrone Asylum, Darby suddenly couldn't help but remember something. It was something he had heard many years ago, not long after he had set out on the road to live his new life, he had heard stories of the fate of many who had gained the gift of seeing ghosts in their physical form; to them however, it was nothing else but the worst curse imaginable. They had never asked to received it, they had only wished to try and continue living a normal life after theirs had come this dangerously close to ending too soon for their liking. But once the gift is bestowed on someone, there is no way to undo it. There never was. From that moment on, they would see ghosts in all of their horrifying glory, be it in their Wanderer phase, to all the way up to the Mindless phase, whether they liked or not. Naturally, fear would strike into their hearts, not knowing what they could do to stop this, or how to fight back. Some who had obtained the curse, as they obviously would see it, would crack soon enough under the constant stress of the horror they were subjected to almost every day, eventually making pushing them over the edge and turning them screaming mad, which lead them to commit themselves to psychiatric clinics with the hopes of proper medication being all they needed to make these sights stop; if only they knew how ineffective it would be. Many people suffered a fate like this, but to Darby, there was one story in particular that had always stuck with him and making him grateful that he had been bestowed with this power from literally the moment he was born and thus granting him the ability to live with it. There had been this one guy (Darby had long forgotten about his name, though) who upon being institutionalized, came to the sobering realization that no medication in the world was going to free him from the sight of ghosts, and so he decided to take drastic measures. Measures he thought would end it once and for all. How the unfortunate nurse who had entered his room to give him his daily dose of medication must have screamed at the top of her lungs to see him having ripped his own eyes from their sockets with his bare fingers…
All of this could have happened to him too, the blonde ghost hunter thought to himself as he stared at the empty husk of an asylum. All of this could have happened if he had been able to see ghosts in a later point in life, especially during the time he had been forced to live with that piece of shit who just so happened to be his maternal grandfather. But he had been lucky enough to grow accustomed to it, believing that this was a part of him. And he had the power to fight back against the ghosts who had gone out of control, having known how to correctly wield it during these years.
And he was going to use those same powers to make Malakai pay for all the shit that he had done.
Now that he had approached the abandoned asylum and was right in front of it, just a few feet away from the front doors, all that Darby had to do was to walk up the short flight of stairs to get there, some steps partially chipped due to being exposed to the elements for the past few decades or the same individuals whose definition of a fun night was to spray intelligible scribbles all over the sign nearby the gates, which apparently also included leaving some on the stairs as well or using whatever heavy object they could get their hands on to smash pieces out of the stairs. As with the path behind him, these stairs too were littered with weeds, but also with dried pine needles that must have been carried along with the wind. This had to be it, Darby knew, and the black thundercloud that was his rage spread throughout his mind, menacingly rumbling. Cora had to be in there somewhere, it just had to be. Malakai was keeping her there and God knows what he was planning on doing with her, or what he was doing with her right now. And he hadn't heard her voice that desperately pleaded for him to come save her for too long; way too long. He had to get the fuck in there, right now.
And so, refusing to waste any time, the blonde ghost hunter ran up the stairs and reached the main entrance. For many years, before Malakai Black decided to come along, a thick chain had kept the doors bound together, sealed with a padlock that could only be opened by a key that had most likely collecting dust in the basement of Oakheart's local town hall for decades by now. There was beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was the half ghost's doing that entry to the derelict Blackthrone Asylum was now going to be a whole lot easier for Darby, seeing how a smidge of black ooze could be spotted on the broken links, and obviously not only that; the thick, iron chain that had kept the main entrance of the asylum closed for many years had been turned into a useless string of scrap metal, now lying in a puddle of the same black liquid that had been used to turn hapless ghosts into rampaging monsters. He was here, with the young woman who had made an impact on his life that he could have never foreseen.
'Cora! I'm here!' the blonde ghost hunter called out as loud as he could, pushing open the doors with his brightly glowing hands with so much strength that the doorknobs surely would leave a visible dent in the walls upon impact, stepping inside without second thought.
What?
What was this?
How in the hell could this be possible?
It had happened in the blink of an eye, but it had been enough to briefly stun Darby, causing him to quickly shield his eyes with his forearm. But when he lifted up his head, blinked away the remaining spots that had formed in front of his eyes caused by the sudden flash of white light that had greeted him when he lifted his foot over the threshold and was able to get a view of what was ahead of him, he could feel his heart immediately dropping to his feet, as if it had turned into a large clump of lead. His mouth slightly fell open as he stared at his surroundings in a mix of confusion and shock, knowing damn well what he was looking at. It was all still so recognizable, which only made sense since he had passed through here many times throughout his childhood. It was all part of a place he had never wished to visit again, dearly hoping that it had burned down to the ground whenever he was reminded of it thanks to his nightmares, but yet here he was again, as if he had never left. Nothing nearby indicated that it had been left neglected every since he had left.
He recognized the row of shoes on his left, all of them made of brown leather and strung with black shoelaces, with the exception being a pair of red and black checkered slippers. He recognized the wallpaper of the narrow hallway he had just found himself in; olive green with thin, vertical stripes of gold. He recognized the beige coat with long sleeves with a cream lining and round, brown patches sewn onto in the middle of the sleeves. The mere sight of the deep red umbrella that had been put in the tall, golden bucket near the shoes was more than enough to make a heavy shiver run up Darby's back, along with a spark of anger, knowing exactly how much they can fucking hurt when they are struck against your back with full force. Breathing in, he could smell the stale odor of cigarette smoke that had soaked into every single item in the house throughout the years, unable to be driven away no matter how much perfume would be sprayed around or how deeply everything would be cleaned. At the very end of this hallway, Darby could look into the living room, or at least a part of it.
The aged, brown leather of the couch that faced the TV on the wall had absorbed so many of his tears throughout his childhood, either when they were shed after he had received yet another relentless beating, the fear of having yet to receive one or the strong wish of his mother coming back to life to take him out of this place, back to the trailer park and never stop hugging him. The only time when the tall lamp with the green, dusty lampshade near the couch would be flipped on was when his tormenter wasn't interested by whatever was on TV during the night and felt like reading something instead, mostly history books regarding the Vietnam war. It was impossible to see it from here, but Darby could still remember the painting you could still see on your right upon exiting this house's hallway, this goddamn house of horrors; to this day, Darby could still remember the silent fright painted upon the snout of the fox as it was chased by a pack of ferocious English Foxhounds through the woods, egged on by hunters chasing the poor animal on their horses.
Not only had this short-lived flash of light changed all of Darby Allin's surroundings, but strangely enough, it seemed that it had shrunk him down to the size of… of a…
Oh fuck.
Looking down and raising his hands, Darby saw that they were now completely void of ink and looked much smaller, which only increased the shock. If this really was the hallway of the house where he had spent a good chunk of his miserable childhood, if all of this was for real, then… The blonde ghost hunter forced himself to look to his right, remembering damn well what had been hanging on that wall over there during those years. A young boy who couldn't be older than eight years old stared right back at him in the reflection of the large, rectangle-shaped mirror on his right, blue eyes widened with horror and clad in a grey t-shirt, a pair of denim jeans that had been torn near the knees and a pair of black sneakers stained with earth. Just like Darby, he too had short, platinum blonde hair.
'What the hell…?!' he wondered out loud to his reflection, but the voice he spoke with did not belong to a grown, young man at all; it belonged to his eight-year-old self, still able to remember how his voice sounded like around that time.
Oh God.
He was a kid again.
'There you are, you little piece of shit!'
Before young Darby had any chance to react, a large hand that felt like it was made of thick iron grabbed him at his throat as it had done many times before, but this time, he could sense an immensely strong sense of vengeance in it. All the little boy could do was let out a choked scream as he was lifted up on in the air for about two seconds before being plunged down to the floor with a heavy, painful thud. Everything was uncontrollably shaking around him when he opened his eyes, but he could clearly see, or rather who, had just manifested himself out of thin air just now. The smell of cigarettes had increased by tenfold at this moment.
Norman Allin's eyes were blue, just like his grandson's, but due to the murderous rage that had overtaken him, the whites had taken on a shade of red, giving his bulging eyes something even more monstrous. A thin layer of grey hair was visible on his balding, wrinkled skull. His chest heavily heaved up and down with an unholy rage underneath his blue-and-navy striped blouse. Though aged, his massive hands were still contained massive strength and were clenched into tight fists, one of them clenching the dreaded tool of Darby's childhood with so much strength that his knuckles had been completely drained of blood.
In the faint light of the hallway, the silver buckle of the black, leather belt dimly shone with an ominous, almost sadistic feel to it.
'Everything is your fucking fault!' Norman bellowed at his grandson, sending droplets of spit flying into the boy's face, like it happened many times before. 'If only your mother had aborted your ass while she had the chance, she would have still been alive! If she had never pushed you out of her body, she would have never had to take up that shitty job and have to drive home on that night! It's all because of you, Darby! You fucking killed your own mother, you little shit! And then you expect me to take care of you after everything you have done?! You should have died instead of her! Do you hear me, Darby?!'
It was on that moment, that one horrible moment, that it all came flooding back to him. He hadn't felt it for years, never wanted to feel it again, wanting to leave it behind in his fucked up childhood, bury it deep into the ground and never look back on it, never wanting to remember it again. But God, oh dear fucking God, it came back to him, paralyzing him to his very bones for a few agonizing seconds. Darby recognized it all too well. Fear. The same fear that had reduced him to a pathetic, helpless, frightened mess of a boy who would tearfully plead with his grandfather to not hit him with the belt, anything but that belt, to not hit him at all for that matter, frantically apologizing for whatever pissed him off this time and if none of these worked (which was in the case most of the time), hysterically scream at the top of his lungs for his mother. Although Darby didn't do any of that, he was still unable to move a muscle as he laid down there on the ground, staring at his tormenter with large eyes, watching as he raised the hand that was holding the belt that had caused him so much physical pain. That goddamn belt.
This…
This…
This couldn't be real.
None of this could be real.
Just as the belt was about to come down with an ungodly fury, Darby Allin snapped out of it and raised both of his hands; as soon as the bright, purple flash of light that lit up the whole hallway had faded away, Norman's upper body was nowhere to be seen, causing the other half to drop to the floor, spewing out a fountain of crimson on the laminate flooring.
'You have been dead for ten years, you old bastard.' Darby growled.
Just as sudden as it had appeared minutes ago, it appeared just as sudden now; the same bright flash of light that forced him to shield his view by clenching his eyes shut. But when the blonde ghost hunter opened them once again, he saw that his body had been fully restored back to normal, tattoos and all. Not only that, but it immediately became apparent that he had never set foot in his grandfather's house to begin with. A layer of dust and black dirt stuck onto his jacket when he got up as quick as possible, his body have left a visible, clear print on a tiled floor that hadn't been cleaned from the moment this whole place shut down. He was only able to catch a glimpse of his true surroundings thanks to the purple glow of the energy coursing through the veins of his lower arms.
A hallucination… it had all been a hallucination.
'Okay, Malakai… If you wanted to piss me off even more, I'd say you did a pretty good job on that.' Hearing his own voice, Darby realized that it had thankfully caught up with his present age.
The ground floor of Blackthrone Asylum showed its neglect in full glory in the light of the blonde ghost hunter's energy, only a part of a massive kingdom of dust, vandalism, neglect and sheer cold with the ghosts of those who passed away on these grounds as its unwilling population, some of them forced to relive the memory of wandering through these halls while some may have entirely forgotten of why they were here at all, their minds having rotted away or snatched away from them with a lobotomy session like how you would rip a lollipop out of a small child's chubby hand. Cobwebs that had formed on the wide staircase a few feet ahead of him seemed to be glistening now that they were entirely frozen, and the same could be said for the massive cobwebs on the ceiling as well. The dust that had been lying here for decades had grown in a thick mass before they were covered with an even thicker layer of ice; now that a coldness that could be compared to that of the ninth circle of Hell in Dante Alighieri's infamous poem crashed onto Darby like an avalanche, seeing the warm, shivering breath that escaped past his lips turn into small clouds before disappearing. If one or two more ghosts would be added to the numbers that were dwelling here, snow could have very well fallen from the ceilings. And out of every corner, every single direction, he heard the wailing. The crying. The screaming. The desperate pleas for no more pain to be inflicted upon them. All of them emitted by the ghosts that could be found in the nearby hallways, in the cells on the upper floors or in some other part of the asylum. In some of these voices, a hint of unimaginable sadness could be heard, others were screaming with burning fury; but all of them were emitted in fear. But thankfully, none of them contained that unsettlingly distorted pitch that indicated that Malakai had gotten his hands on them… yet.
And who was to say how much time there was left before Cora could be turned into one of them?
'Cora! Where are you?!' the blonde ghost hunter called out as he began his search, starting at the ground floor. He moved as fast as he possibly could, unable to melt the ice that had completely covered the floor in every room he went. He couldn't spot her at the long tables in the dining area where these poor bastards were forced by the relentless staff to consume inedible slop in their past lives, nor at the recreation room where several ghosts in the Wanderer phase could be seem slowly walking across the icy floors, some them pacing around like captains on their deck, others curled up in the far corners, the rest sobbing uncontrollably before breaking down into gibberish that nobody could possibly understand. None of these ghosts resembled Cora in the slightest, much to Darby's relief. Now back at the massive staircase, he made his way up to the first floor, his hand aching with cold as he held onto the frozen handrail. Not once had he stopped calling out his companion's name.
It was on this floor that some of the many cells could be found, most of them still keeping their occupants imprisoned. Despite being muffled down due to the thickness of the doors, their endless wailing and sobbing could still even be heard before Darby could turn to the left to head towards them. Once again, he called out Cora's name as loud as he could, hoping to receive an answer from the pitch-black darkness of the hallway these cells were hiding in, spoken with a voice he could recognize like none other.
No reply other than bitter mumbling, crying and unintelligible gibberish were given in return.
After exploring this floor as well, Darby made his way to the next floor; if his heart would be beating any faster right now, it would come exploding out of his damn chest.