His flashlight turned itself off.

The unfathomable dark swallowed James in droning silence. He knew there was a window at the end of the hall but its panels had become black and opaque. There was an absence of sensation. He did and didn't know which way was up, which way was down, or where he was anymore.

Silent Hill had its eyes upon them again. James had known that this would happen if they stepped foot in here. It was sooner than he'd hoped, but not expected.

The silence pierced his head and scraped the inside of his skull.

Hey, James! I know you can hear me, you worthless, good-for-nothing coward! How does it feel now to get the short end of the stick? Are you scared? Huh? I bet you are. You didn't really know what it was like to be alone until you got here. You thought you had it all figured out. You spend all your time in Silent Hill and this doesn't even compare to what you've felt before. Ha! I bet you feel like a little worm. Well, good! That's due punishment, James! Not only for what you did to everyone you met, but for what you did to ME!

It was as loud as being in the thick of a parade. James closed his eyes and heard Eddie's laughter bounce like a tennis ball around in his head. Eddie's voice was greasy and boorish; high pitched, tonally unstable, and whose cockiness was unwarranted - like a hormonal teenager. He didn't miss it, and hearing its echoes now was a moment too soon. A coward, he called him. He'd called James a coward before and the sniveling, gluttonous crybaby neglected to see the hypocrisy.

You make me sick, James!

James knew he was spineless. This was no headlining news. You make me sick too, Eddie. I make myself sick. His lips twisted in self-contempt and opened his eyes to nothingness. The familiar dull, weighted net of shame rooted him in place. He wasn't going anywhere, even if he wanted to. The Lake View Hotel and its depraved master hammered another nail into the coffin and split its wall.

It's all your fault you're here, anyway. Weren't you the one to tell me I shouldn't go around killing people for no reason? Well how do those words taste in your mouth now? It's really no big deal - just like I said.

His arms slumped. The shotgun became a burden in his hands. It threatened to drop from his fingers and the backpack asked his spine to snap; it didn't care which way. From the far, far away end of the impossibly long hall came the reverberation of little feet running. They pounded the floor as though they were an elephant's charge. James felt the ground shake. Through the density of his torment, he recognized that the stride was impossible. Nothing could be both ten feet away and over a hundred. They acted as thunder and the noise strained his ears, but they were rapidly gaining, and taunted from afar. Eddie's braying laughter had faded.

A surge of strength brushed past his legs and he struggled to clutch the shotgun. He felt the air whip through the loose fit of his jeans as it raced 'round and 'round his dead body. A pair of forces ran in tandem and in the vastness before him, the tiny feet sprinted forever.

Why'd you do it? Why'd you do it? You're a liar! I was gonna have her! I was gonna be happy, and you took that away from me! We were gonna be a family! I never liked you, I never ever liked you but Mary said you were okay! She told me to trust you, and Mary lied too! You both lied! You both lied, you lied, you lied, you lied! I hope you drown, James! her horribly betrayed voice wailed as he felt her hands shove his hamstrings with all her might. He stumbled, his feet catching his balance under the heaviness of his body and the sack against his vertebrae. I hate you! she cried, her fists beating on his arm, his stomach, his thigh, his numb limbs. You're selfish! You're mean! You didn't want Mary and she didn't want you either!

I hate you, James!

james…

I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you you LIAR you KILLER you

james…

YOU COWARD you FART-FACE YOU'RE JUST LIKE ME JAMES you dumb mean AND A old CORPSE CAN'T LAUGH

The hall is so dark there is no right side up body is like a mountain of sand and rot she's beating her fists she's bruising his flesh he's chortling in his ear he's breathing his hot nauseating stink on his neck she's grabbing for his coat and yanking and yanking trying to pull him down trying to beat on his head he reeks of vomit and pizza and death and bloated and ready to burst cadavers she's kicking him and screaming and crying and

james…

Where is my knife?

The flashlight clicked back on.

Harry was out of breath when he made it up to the third floor again. He tried to catch it as he trudged towards James, who stood in the middle of the great stretch, and dangled two keys on their rings and plastic markers. "You won't believe it!" he huffed, and swallowed his dry throat. "302 and 319 were downstairs. What a stroke of luck, huh?"

He was grinning as he passed James, but the joy on his face diminished when he saw that the younger man had that worrisome sheen. Harry paused, studying his bleak face and glazed eyes. His knee-jerk reaction wanted to ask if he was okay. If he asked, he'd receive a lie or nothing at all, which served just as well as one. There was a key in his hand that would open one of these doors and his heart was still thudding from his haste and his excitement. They had a time limit and Harry had no choice but to ignore the problem.

"Okay, 302.. we're in.. great. It's back here." Harry eagerly pocketed the key for the other wing and slid the other into the lock. It opened on the turn and he beamed back at a man who stood unmoving. "C'mon."

The key went back to its sibling. The room was small, housing a double bed and a duffel bag sitting on the blankets, a dresser with a TV, a cafe table and two chairs against the corner, and two night stands complete with lamps and a phone. At his immediate left was the bathroom. For what was expected of Silent Hill, the room was abnormally pristine. It was eerie. He prodded the ajar bathroom door open with his pipe and found it empty.

The duffel bag was the point of interest. Harry lay his weapon on the bed and found the bag open, and as James finally decided to join him, he picked up its only contents: two cassette tapes.

Harry frowned and sighed heavily, turning them over to look for a description. There was none. "You've got to be kidding me. I hate this damn town. You know, I never missed anything about this place," he griped, "but one thing I really didn't miss were the puzzles. Why puzzles?"

James shrugged. "To keep your brain healthy while you're rotting away here." Their eyes met, and an appreciative smile for the humor crossed Harry's face. "To be fair," the resident continued, "this is our.. first riddle? In the scheme of things so far, we're not doing too bad."

The tourist groaned again and waved the cassettes at him reproachfully. "Don't say that! Jesus Christ, James! You know these walls have ears!"

Harry tucked the tapes into his inner jacket pocket and dug around in the bag in case he'd missed something. His search turned up null and so he dipped into his pocket for the key to 319. "Alright. Guess we're going to the other wing. It better be open."

James stood aside for Harry to pass. "Or what?"

"Or what, what?"

"Or, what. You sounded like you were going to make a threat."

The grey-streaked head turned and brown eyes glimpsed back at James. It appeared that whatever had shaken him was no longer an issue. "You want me to make a threat?"

"No, I said you sounded like you were going to."

"I'll consider it when and if we get into another annoying problem," Harry replied, leading the way to the adjacent wing. He didn't notice it before, but the air smelled mustier. And perhaps it was because he'd cooled down from his race through the hotel, but it also seemed much colder. His hands were chilly, like forgetting one's gloves on a fall day. It was easy to write it all off on Silent Hill playing its games, and so Harry did, in favor of putting any more thought into it.

Maybe he should have been putting more thought into the question of why the first puzzle was curiously easy. The hall doors were open and 319 was waiting for them. Moreover, a cassette player was on the bed just as the bag had been, like someone had kindly laid it all out for them. It was way too easy, and neither one of them were going to dwell on it.

The first nondescript cassette was chosen and the machine rewound side A.

There was nothing to hear on side A. Harry skipped through the tape and found it blank all the way through. It was ejected, turned over, and clicked on.

Side B had much more to offer.

Harry and James gathered close around the player, the father sluggishly taking a seat on the edge of the bed. They stared at the old device as a man's gruff, weathered voice spoke through distortion and static, overshadowing the unintelligible echoes of a young girl.

[ .. the case years ago.. I went— after searching—out success, I decided.. try to find.. I had missed —couldn't.. anything— no use in.. didn't tell.. —r— know— working.. — something disturbing and strange—approached— looking for a girl — I need to go to Silent Hill— .. tracked.. —d— that w —all these roads.. —possible.. disappeared and.. —with it? — hate to take.. job.. wants her poten—.. can't.. anyone.. money is too tight.. —er Mason, god help.. soul. ]

The tape ended. Harry's breath was shallow; his heart repeatedly leapt to his throat. There was no denying that whoever that man was, he knew Heather.

Harry fumbled to eject the tape and shove the next one in. Side A was chilling. A woman's voice whispered into the dense air. Though he turned the volume knob as far right as it could go, whatever she was saying was muted and indiscernible. It didn't help that she, too, was being overlapped by another woman, making their secrets too cluttered to understand.

The last hope was side B. They cut in to a conversation that continued from the first side: two muffled women whose contradicting speech made it impossible to hear their dialogue. A third of the way through they were joined by a child; a little girl, her sound two hairs louder than the others, albeit too quiet to identify.

That was the end of their findings. They stared at the machine, disquieted. An intense silence hung in the wake of the recordings that made Harry's head feel tight. He popped open the player and numbly took the cassette out. He held them both, rattled, in his hands.

These tapes posed more questions and held no solutions. All that it gave them was that there was a man that was looking for Heather, if he interpreted it right. This stranger could have very well stolen her and signed a contract for her head. If so, then Heather was in worse danger than he imagined. Harry was not only sickened by the idea; he was furious. Whoever this monster was, he was more detestable than any of the abominations that wandered the town.

Morals in exchange for money was dishonorable. Since the deal was made, the stranger was undoubtedly corrupt beyond help. From what they could make out of his rambling garble, Harry now suspected the Order had a lot to do with Heather's capture. The longer he thought of it, the more the pieces jammed together. If understood correctly, someone hired the man to look for and take Heather Mason to Silent Hill. He even had the audacity to pray for her soul. The only logical conclusion then was that it was, in huge part, his fault.

But what desperate son of a bitch would take blood money? Didn't he know what the Order was capable of? That was his innocent little girl. Harry put his everything into giving Heather a normal life. For seventeen years he kept her far, far away from Silent Hill and as safe from its reach as he could. Of course, there was no real way to figure if he was doing a good job at it. If it never came for them at all for seventeen goddamn years, didn't Harry have a right to assume he was successfully avoiding it? Perhaps he'd gotten a little too comfortable and brazen. No, he never truly rested well knowing that Silent Hill would always lurk in their shadows: and that was his first unspoken reason why Heather going to college scared him shitless.

Harry had failed her once. A sick, greedy predator had hauled her back to where it all began. Of course. Right back home, where it all began, and this time Harry Mason was going to dismantle the Order for good.

Whenever he finds this crooked man, on his vow, he will skin him alive and leave him to the dogs.

James watched Harry get to his feet and finger the cassettes. The older man was frowning as he looked between them and the player. He was clearly debating whether or not he should take it all, and he was forced to accept that he had to leave the player behind. James waited while the tapes were stored safely in the backpack and once zipped, he eyed the distraught father.

He had seen that grim, haunted look before in the mirror many times before. Harry appeared very far away and lost in a traumatic time long ago. The author's eyes were unfocused and blank. James pitied him. This was no state to be in knowing what was at stake, but he knew that Harry needed to process. For his sake, James would allow him a few minutes. Any more than that and they could be facing consequences.

James stood in silence as he watched his ward fall away to his memories.

Harry was revisiting Old Silent Hill. The hunt for his sweet little Cheryl raced before his eyes: the mazes of intestines strung on chain-link like perverse Christmas tinsel, dangerous streets where skinned dogs and flying monsters chased him, a town suddenly turned industrial and rusted red. He'd become accustomed to the flashbacks and lately, they reduced their frequency to twice every few months. Since he arrived, they'd returned in full blast. Perhaps he'd have found irony in experiencing it again while also standing in Silent Hill long before, if Harry hadn't been actively trying to ignore them.

It was different this time. In the mad dash to save his daughter he was so focused on her that he temporarily forgot a very important piece of the town. He was disgusted that it took over a perceived week to remember the Order at all. Why hadn't he thought about this before? The Order played an integral part in the machinations of Silent Hill. Hell, it even laid out a glaring clue to it on his first day! Harry only now recalled the enormous sigil burned into the street that tightened his head and strained his eyes. That should have been immediate proof that the cult was playing maestro to Heather's abduction and whatever atrocities they had planned.

Harry was absolutely livid. He'd wasted an enormous amount of time running around thinking there were no leads. How many times did he pass by the sigil and ignorantly wondered about it? His shortcomings were piling on by the second and he cursed himself for every single one.

Taking all that into account, in his head Harry rewound not only the found recording but the phone call that turned his life around on a dime.

Clarity came through. Heather's broken words had strongly hinted that she was being stolen away to Silent Hill. Not even hinted - confirmed. Absolute panic had forfeited his critical thinking and kept it caged until this moment, when the Machiavellian plot unravelled like a dropped ball of string. Harry was outraged at himself for not once returning to the very crucial moment where it all began, but now..

Now it was all plain to see. The Order was alive and not well. Of course they were at the bottom of this. Nobody else would be.

And so the first puzzle was solved. Harry felt no joy in it, for it should've fallen into place long ago. The whispering women had to be the Order. It was no question that the man was connected to them. He was sent to find Heather and bring her back, and by James's word, he already did. Silent Hill was a nefarious place that wanted the blood of its reborn daughter and it was on the verge of success.

Harry was delusional to think it would be anything else, and he swore to kill all of them with his bare goddamn hands.

But what of the little girl on the tape? His reasoning in mind, it took him back to a vital part of the order that centered around a special child who was to bring paradise by her death. It was she that gave him the daughter he raised as Heather, of whom he adored and also feared.

She was Alessa. Harry's blood ran cold. Connecting the Order to his purpose then and now naturally cycled back to the sacrificial daughter of Silent Hill. Should all this be true, he had to assume that Heather was going to be used to complete the ritual at last.

Yeah, no: Harry Mason was going to make sure that didn't have a snowball's chance in hell.

The author stewed in his racing thoughts. He'd outright forgotten where he was and who he was with. The clock ticked on as he battled the past. James had to break him out of it.

"Harry," he said. He waited. It appeared he went unheard, so he raised his voice. "Harry," he sternly repeated. The father lifted his head and fixed preoccupied eyes to his guide. James lowered his voice to normal, but didn't remove the tone. "What are we going to do?"

Harry glanced to the side. "We should go," he answered distractedly. "I think we've found everything we could."

The affirmation kicked him back into gear. The Mason patriarch led the missing Sunderland through the hall (and past 312, where only James heard her knocking forlornly on the other side of the door) and down to the lobby.

They were met with the cruel notion that they'd botched their chances. Where there had been some foggy illumination in the lobby, it now was replaced by full darkness. The change dropped James's lead heart to the pit of his stomach. The very thing they were trying to avoid lay beyond the doors and he knew, he knew they never would have made it out in time. When Harry thrust open the door, what they predictably found heralded enmity unlike ever before.

Beyond the steps, the lawn disappeared in the shroud of black. Their flashlights shone as far as they could and still could not hope to penetrate it. Night had fallen, and Harry's promise was broken. The two men stood in the threshold and felt mutual contempt for his lie as the darkness held them in derision. They were trapped, and that was that.

Harry took a deep breath and closed the door.