I don't remember how. But I woke up in the middle of the waiting room. The cops that were with me were missing. I get up. My head feels like a truck drove through it. I don't know why, but everything feels... off somehow. My gun is missing. Go figure. I look around to see if I can find anyone. They can't have all just left, right? The bodies are still here and... did that one just move?
"Hey! Are you alright?" I quickly approach the groaning body. He was male from the looks of it. A patient. I kneel down beside him and turn him over onto his back. Once I got a look at his face, I knew this wasn't an ordinary gig. He barely had a face. At least, not one that belongs on a living person. It was ripped open, but his eyes had this weird glow to them. He lunges at me, his his gnarled hands reaching out to claw at my face. I react fast, getting up from my knelt position and taking a couple of quick steps back. He snarls and gargles on what I have to assume is congealed blood in his throat. He quickly staggers to his feet, his head snapping to look me in the eyes. "You wanna bite? Come get it." I don't know if it understands, but it doesn't need to. It charges at me. Too fast to be a zombie. Not coherent enough for a ghoul. This was something new. I reel my stone arm back and swing it forward once he was in arms reach. His head splatters against my knuckles as his body is flung backwards. His brain and blood cover my fist. I shake some of it off with a grimace. I scan the room. None of these other corpses look very interested in getting back up. That was good enough for me. I turn to face the door as I begin making my way toward it. I'm nearly knocked off of my feet as the ground shakes violently. Earthquakes don't happen in this city. Something is going on, and I don't like it. A door to my right opens, the detective from before stumbles out. He looks tired. "Detective. Where have you been?"
"I don't know. A damn slaughterhouse in the basement. Some crazy bastard with a chainsaw tried to take my head off." He sounds hoarse. He's been running. And fast.
"Good to see you're alive. I'll deal with him later. Right now, we've gotta go." I begin moving to the doors as I throw them open. Outside is nothing short of bedlam. A God damned nightmare. The city was collapsing or going up in flames. It's the apocalypse. I hear the roar of an engine. Through the smoke, an ambulance appears. The driver shouts us in. He seemed to know Sebastian. I didn't get the chance to take much stock of the situation. The roads began to sink below the ambulance. We run for it. Sebastian hopped through the passenger window. I grabbed hold of the back, opening the door, and swinging myself inside. A scream reaches my ears as I close the door. The other passengers were the junior detective Kidman, a doctor, and a patient. The patient was the one who screamed. He was a young man. He looked to still be in his teens. He was staring at me with horror in his sunken, bloodshot eyes.
"Bad! Bad!" He yelled as he held himself tightly. The doctor tried to calm him down, calling him Leslie.
"I know I don't look the best. But we've got bigger things to -" The ambulance jostled violently, throwing me forward. I barely caught myself. "Jeez!" I look through the window into the drivers section. "Who taught you how to-!?" In front of us, the entire land started shifting. I mean that literally. It was like the entire city just split in half and was sliding half of a building into our path like a giant rubiks cube. "Hit the gas!" I yell. The driver did just that as we narrowly avoided being crushed by the shifting landscape. The ambulance kept going. There wasn't much else we could do. I sat by Kidman. She didn't look as scared as the rest of them. Especially from a 'rookie'. She just kept her eye on Leslie. Something didn't add up here. I wanted to question her, but now wasn't the time. We weren't very far into a tunnel when Leslie started muttering again. It was hard to pick up at first, but he was saying... fall?
"Fall. Fall!" He yells in fear. I hear a snarling from the drivers seat. The driver was changing into one of those things I splattered in the hospital. He lunges for Sebastian as I punch through the window and grab his head in my stone hand, forcing the back of his head into the wall of the ambulance as I hold him there. He scratches at my arm, but I don't feel it. I soon find out what Leslie was talking about when a growing light at the end of the tunnel finally reaches us as the ambulance quickly throws itself off of the edge and into the unknown below. I don't know how long I was out for, but I had eventually woken up in the upturned ambulance. The thing had caught fire. It charred up the sleave on my right arm. Being fireproof has its perks. No one else is in the back with me. No corpses and no blood. A good sign. I stumble out of the back doors and go to check the drivers seat. Sebastian was still in there. I wasn't sure if he was alive, but I wasn't taking chances. I crawl in partly and grab him by his shirt in my right hand. I quickly drag him out to avoid him getting burned and set him a safe distance from the ambulance. I prop him up against a rock and begin shaking him by the shoulders.
"Detective? Hey! Wake up!" It took a few minutes, but he finally came to. "You had me worried for a minute." I help him to his feet.
"Where are the others?" He asks, picking up a weird syringe and injecting the contents into his arm without much of a thought.
"Gone. I don't know where. They could've only gone one way, though." I point to the dirt path ahead of us. "Let's get moving." I lead on, making sure I'd be the one facing whatever showed up first. Sebastian didn't have a weapon. I hoped he had a good arm.
"What the hell is happening?" I hear him ask from behind as we approach a cliff. A lone lantern sits near the edge. Thunder cracks as we approach. It'll rain soon.
"I don't know. But for now, we need to keep moving. Find a safe place to regroup. We can work out the details later." I explain as he picks up the lantern. Below us, we can see a large tent. The driver from the ambulance walks inside, oblivious to the calls of Sebastian, who was sliding down the steep cliff. I jump off, landing beside him with a grunt. From the tent, I can hear a noise I know all too well. Wet sloshing and crunching. I place my stone hand on Sebastian's shoulder to get his attention. With my flesh hand, I raise a finger to my lips to signal that we need to be quiet. He nods as we slowly make our way to the entrance to the tent. The light from within casts a shadow. The figure is unched over, his arms and torso moving erratically. He was eating... this didn't look good. Sebastian must've thought so, too. He slowly leaned down just outside of the tent and picked up a revolver.
Lucky.
I stood by him and readied myself to take a swing if this guy was the same as the last freak. "Conolly?" Sebastian asks. The man in question drops whatever he was chewing on. A severed head. Half of it is missing. I'd bet I'd find it in Conally's stomach. He turns slowly, once his eyes land on us, he charges, arms outstretched. I was ready to lay the smackdown on him when Sebastian's gun discharged, blowing the guy's head to pieces. He has good good aim. "My god, Conally." Sebastian mutters to himself as I stand over his corpse. Weird pustules covered his body. Is this some kind of curse? It's starting to look like it.
"Look around. Find any spare ammo that you can. I get the feeling you're gonna need it." I warn him. As he begins scouring, I look ahead. It's a cave. And only one lantern. Fantastic. "Sebastian. Take point here. You're gonna need to light our way, Rudolph." Sebastian chuckles dryly as he makes his way into the cave.
"You're a paranormal investigator, right?"
"Most of my life."
"So, have you seen anything like this before?"
"Nothing that was 1-to-1. Curses and plagues can make monsters like Conally. But that doesn't add up with the shifting world."
"So, we've got nothing?"
"Nothing concrete."
Our chat is cut short when we take a turn. Muttering catches our ears. It sounds like the kid from the ambulance. As we approach, he becomes panicked.
"Hurts. Hurts." He repeats quickly. We stop just before setting off a tripwire. I don't even wanna know what it does.
"Hey there." I try to ease him. "It's gonna be okay. We want to help you. Alright? Just stay -"
"Help you." He copies me. He's not completely crazy. But something in his brain isn't firing.
"We need to get this kid to a hospital." Sebastian tells me. I didn't think that was much of an option right now.
"Hospital. Hospital. Hospital. HOSPITAL. HOSPITAL!!" He panics and runs away.
"Hey!" I shout after him. I duck under the wire and begin pursuing. Sebastian follows my lead. Coming out on the other side, the kid was gone. Well, there was only one way he could've gone. I started following the trail, Sebastian stopped for a moment to retrieve a box of matches from the ground. Well, I guess they might come in handy. Pressing on, we spotted a small shed with a weird blood splatters on the front. Kinda like a lighthouse. We figured the kid might be inside so we go in. Nothing. Sebastian starts slowly making his way toward the mirror.
"Hey, what's wrong?" I ask him, and he holds his hand up as if he's being blinded. I blink. And he's gone. "Sebastian? Sebastian!?" I run to the mirror. I examine all of it but... nothing. He was just... gone. "Damn!" I growl. He didn't die. He couldn't have. Either way, I can't do anything about it now. I leave the shed and continue. If he's alive, I'm sure we'll catch up. As I press on, I see the kid at the bottom of a hill. He runs into another shed and slams the door behind him. A good thing, too. Another one of those freaks got up and slammed into the door. I slowly approach it from behind. Doing my best to tread lightly. I was an arms length away when I reeled my stone fist back. "Knock knock." I mumble. It turns to face me, too late as my fist smashed into its face. Splattering it across my hand as I follow through, punching the door and shattering it. Its corpse falls. Thick red ooze pouring out of its stump. This freak was even more deformed. Pieces of his torso were missing. How its guts stayed in, I don't want to know. Entering the shed, the only way through was a window. I look through it. Leslie is running down the path. "Dammit, kid! Wait!"
"Did you find him?"
I turn quickly. It was Sebastian. "What the hell happened? Where'd you go?"
"I don't know. I looked into the mirror, and it took me to a hospital. Didn't you hear the music?"
"No." I narrow my eyes at him. I'm sceptical, but I can't disprove him. "Leslie went this way. Come on." Hopping through the window, I walk in the direction he went in. After following the trail, we came upon a decrepit house. A man shambles out, muttering something. He stands in the open and stares into the distance. Toward a light. Once it passes over him, he starts convulsing. Barbed wire surrounds and stabs through him. It's not a fun way to go. What got me thinking, however, was when this process was done, he became like the others. A shambling, rabid... thing. Once it was done, a second stood up. His face was mostly skinned open with a buncha nails stuck in his head. "Damn." I mutter. "I'll get face-lift, over there. You get the other one." I whisper to Sebastian. He nods in response, crouching his way toward the building that his target disappeared into. I walked towards mine once its back was turned. I grab it by the back of its neck with my stone hand. It writhes and gargles. I squeeze until its neck looks like an empty tube of toothpaste. Meat and bone slosh and crunch. Thick, mud-like blood, oozes from its slack maw as its body goes limp. I toss it backwards onto the fire behind me. Sebastian emerges from the house, blood covering his hand and knife. I guess he took them by surprise. "Up ahead. More of 'em." I point out three up ahead. "You still got ammo?"
"Yeah. Six chambered, 3 on backup."
"It'll have to do. You take the one on the road. I'll get the two near the house."
"Got it. Be careful."
"You too."
With that, we set off. Sebastian chose the quiet approach. Sneaking close to the freak near the fires. I took a left toward the house. The first one of mine was holding a torch. "Hey, hot head." I call out as I walk into his field of vision. "Come light my fire." I taunt him. I still don't know if they understand me. But it's a habit. Either way, he charges at me, taking a swing with his torch. I grab his hand in my stone fist and crush it. Blood seeps from between by fingers. I yank back hard, tearing what was left of it from his wrist along with the torch itself. I hit him across the head with the flaming end. He ignited immediately, thrashing and screaming. The torch almost disintegrated in my grip as soon as he went up in flames.
Weird. Either way, there was one left. I could see him inside, he glares at me and snarls. He charges forward, but something catches my eye. A glint in the shadows, illuminated by the fires outside. Another wire? My question is answered as he runs into the wire at full speed, soon exploding into chucks of meat. "... Gross."
Walking back to the path, Sebastian handles his without much of a fuss. We continue up the road until we reach a gate. Said gate required a wheel to be turned. Before I said anything, Sebastian had already begun turning it. A proactive guy, if nothing else. Shuffling and groaning catches my attention. Two of the bodies I thought were dead start to rise. I raise my stone fist and slam it hard onto the closest one's head, crushing it easily. From there, I swung my fist upward as an uppercut into the seconds chin, almost tearing the head from it's body. Only being held on by a few threads of meat as it is flung back like a ragdoll. It's waist catching on the corner of a building and tearing it in half. All the years I've done this job, and not once has this kinda stuff stopped being gross. Once the gate was open, we continued. Slowly. Over a wall came an orange glow. A fire. A big one. We ducked behind a wall to observe. I couldn't tell how many of those freaks were in the field, munching on their neighbours. I wasn't about to find out. We kept moving. Crouched behind a smaller wall, barely big enough for me to use as cover. We thought we had made it when we got to the bridge, but one of the freaks managed to grow a brain long enough to notice us.
"Damn!" I slam my fist onto it's head as it lunges, crushing it. "Move! Now!" I yell as the horde stands from their feast and begins the chase. There are dozens of them. Me and Sebastian run like hell to get across that bridge. The large gate at the other end doesn't budge. I reel back and punch it. I shutters, and some of the wood splinters, but getting it open would take too long. Sebastian already looks for another way. Turning back, he runs toward a pile of rubble, almost like a ramp. I follow him. The crazy bastard actually manages to drop kick one of them and land on the rubble itself. I see a fat one of the creatures about to lunge at him.
"No!" I yell as I tackle tons of fun off of the edge. As we fall, I get a good grip of his collar bone in my flesh hand and reel back with my right. "Damn monsters!" I yell in frustration as I swing it forward. His head splatters like the others as we hit the water. It takes me a minute, but I get my bearings long enough to stand. The water isn't too deep, thankfully. About waist high. I look up to the bridge, the creatures are gone. I can see the lights they were carrying heading back over the bridge. I guess they lost interest. A breach in the water draws me from my thoughts, I ready for an attack. It's Sebastian. I guess he jumped, too. Once we get our footing, we make our way out of the water. Looks like we're near the jetty. Under the bridge, there's a path beneath one of the arches. As we continue upward through the remains of a cobblestone building, the snarls of the creatures keep me focused. "Keep that gun ready."
"I've got your back."
I nod to him. A pile of corpses blocks our way. I was about to walk over them when Sebastian lit a match and threw it onto the pile. They went up in flames instantly and burned to ash in just a few seconds. I've seen weird stuff, but this is just wrong. Nothing here is adding up. It's like, the rules of reality don't matter. Well, it's a start. As we walk through the ruined building, the door opens on its own. "At least we're expected." I say, trying to make light of the situation.
"I'm not sure that's a good thing.
"Neither am I. But we can't go back."
We continue onward into a village. Bodies hang from an overpass, and the buildings are as run down as everywhere else. But it was quiet. Too damn quiet. Making our way through one of the buildings, slowly, there was still nothing. No creatures or monsters. Sebastian was luck enough to find some more ammo. Even if it was just two bullets. As we continued upstairs, shouting caught our attention. It was human. He was shouting for someone. Sebastian took point, opening the door and aiming.
"Who's there?" He demanded.
"No, don't shoot!" The doctor from the ambulance begged.
"Easy on the trigger, Detective. This one ain't snarling." I walk forward as Sebastian lowers his weapon. "You're the doc from the ambulance, right?"
"I am, yes. My name is Marcelo Jimenez. We are lucky to be alive."
"Lucky is an understatement. Have you seen anyone else from the crash? Or anyone normal at all?" I ask.
"Yes. My patient, Leslie. I saw him running up ahead, but..."
"But?" Sebastian asks.
"Come this way. Quietly, mind you." Marcelo whispers.
We follow him out onto a balcony.
"Those things. Chased me all the way into the village." The doc tells us.
"Us too." Sebastian replied.
"Leslie went through that gate." The doc told us in hushed panic.
"Damn. Alright, listen. I'm gonna go down there and bust some heads. Doc, stay hidden. Detective, get to the gate and find a way to open it. Got it?" I jump over the railing and land below the balcony. I don't even try to be sneaky as I march up the road. "Hey! Yeah, you smelly bastards! You wanna piece?! Come on then!" It didn't take long for them to come crawling out of the woodwork. The first was a villager, the barbed wire was piercing through his eye and out the back of his head, it snaked down around him and through him. He doesn't seem bothered.
He charges me with a pickaxe and swings down with it. I grab it by the handle in my right hand and rip it out of his grip. As he staggers, I swing it into his head. The blood and puss contained within spewed outward like a faucet as the pick ripped all the way through his head. I leave the pickaxe in his head, it's easier than trying to wrench it out. I turn quickly, swinging my fist in a backhand toward one of them that tried to be sneaky. His head turns to mush as blood splatters against the wall of the nearby barn. Speaking of the barn. I can hear struggling inside. Chains and a feral snarling. It'd have to wait. I run toward a nearby cart and turn it over to empty the hay in it. Grabbing it by the handles, I swing it towards one of the creatures, crushing its body as its limp corpse is thrown to the side.
I see two more coming down the road, I throw the cart at them. It crushed the first and rolled over the second. I run up to finish the job, kicking it in the face as it tried to get up, tearing the head from its body. An explosion catches me off-guard. It came from the barn. I run inside, slamming the door shut behind me. Upstairs, I see Sebastian standing there with some kind of crossbow. Looking down beyond a wooden wall in front of me.
"I told you to get the gate!" I shout up to him. He looks panicked.
"It won't open! We need to cut the chain!"
"Any idea how!?"
"Yeah! Ask HIM!"
As he finishes, a chainsaw being revved up beyond the wall gains my un-devided attention. Once it starts to roar, it's user does the same as the feral growls accompany it. Not a moment sooner does a large figure smash through the wall. He's wearing a muzzle and a spiked collar that's digging into his throat. How this freak is alive is beyond me. I guess this is the jackass who chased Sebastian.
"Hey there, ugly. I've heard a lot about you."
He snarls and charges at me. He raises his saw and brings it down. My stone forearm meets it. The teeth of the saw don't even scratch it as I push it back, staggering him. I lunge forward and give him a left hook to the side of his head. He is knocked back a few steps. He's definitely stronger than most people, but not nearly as strong as me. He shakes his head with a snarl. His pale eyes lock onto me as he raises his saw and charges me again. I don't bother blocking this time. As the saw comes down, I dodge to the left and slam my stone fist into his face. "Boom!"
He is thrown off of his feet and launched back violently as he rolls several times across the floor before the top half of his body smashes through the back of the barn. I can't see him moving through the dust. But his legs aren't even twitching. That's good enough for me. Walking over to him, I pick up the chainsaw that he dropped. This thing has definitely seen better days. I turn to Sebastian, he'd apparently watched the whole thing.
"Meet me at the gate." I hold up the chainsaw. "I've got a way through."
"On it. I'll- Behind you!" He warns me too late. A sharp pain flares up in my right side. I throw my right elbow back on instinct. It connects to the face of the masked jackass who staggers, leaving his cleaver in my side. I growl in pain as I pull it out.
"You lousy sonova-!" I turned to face him. He was already on me. He grabbed me by the throat and lifted me up, choking the life out of me. With a rabid growl, he throws me toward the barn doors with enough force that I smash right through them and roll into the middle of the street.
He comes out, running toward me. I stand stand up, dropping the chainsaw at my side as I run back to meet his charge. I go for a left hook. His head rattles at the blow. It hurts him, but I'm gonna need the big guns. I reel back my right arm, but he recovers fast. He puts a left and right hook into my jaw. He's stronger than he looks, and I stagger back.
I don't have many clear thoughts after that. All I've got is anger. He tackles me, squeezing me around the gut, trying to make me pop. I keep my hooves planted into the mud as he pushes me along the dirt road and against the wall of one of the buildings. I can't make him let go.
I raise my right fist up and slam it onto his back, following through as he smashes against the floor. I step to his side as he groans. I grab him by the neck in my right hand and grab his belt with my left. I heave him off of the ground, and in one quick spin, I smash him head-first through the wall, throwing him inside. I don't wait a moment as I march inside, batting away one of the regular freaks and splattering it against a wall. I look to the centre of the room, he stood there, glaring and snarling. With a growl, he charges at me again. On instinct, I grab a chair to my left in my flesh hand and throw it at him. He raises his arms to block, the chair shatters on his arms as he continues to charge. What he can't block, is my right hand smashing into his gut while he was distracted. "Wham!"
Throwing him back to the floor as he skids along it and propping himself up in a sitting position, his head hanging limply. I slowly walk over. He wasn't moving, or even breathing. But I fell for that before. I kneel next to him, poking his forehead with my stone finger. "You done, Tubbo?" I ask. Satisfied, I begin to stand again. His hands shoot forward, grabbing the collar of my coat and bringing me closer as he slams his forehead into my nose. I stagger backward, Mt left hand clutching my nose. Nothing broken, but that hurt like hell.
"Screw this!" I yell. Grabbing his head in my right hand and throwing him back towards the street. I run after him. I make it to him just as he reaches his feet. With a left hook, I rattle his jaw. With a right hook, I tear it off along with his mask and knock him to the ground. Whatever he is, he can at least feel pain if the roar of agony was anything to go by. He stands quickly and faces me.
He goes for a right hook. I grab his fist in my stone hand and squeeze hard. The bones snap easily, and blood leaks out from between my fingers. He snarls in pain. I hold tight and begin to spin him around, smashing him through a support beam for one of the houses before slamming him into the middle of the street. He's dazed. I slam my knee into his chest to hold him down and begin wailing on him with all I've got. A left. A right. A left. A right. I keep going until his head was like a deflated balloon. Raising my right hand one more time, I punch straight down, finally crushing his head. With one final twitch, his body goes limp. As I stand up, my temper starts to get the best of me as I examine his body. "Damn ugly motherfu-" I stop myself. On his belt is an object I'm all too familiar with. Reaching down, I pull my revolver from his belt. Checking the chambers, she's fully loaded with four rounds. Each one being 400 grains of dumb lead force.
The Good Smaritan.
"It's good to see you again." I mutter to myself. I holster my gun and turn to face Sebastian. He's holding the chainsaw and looking at me like I just shot his grandma.
"Remind me not to piss you off."
"You won't need a reminder." I retort. "Come on. Let's get that gate open."
Once the chain was cut, the doc showed up behind us. I have no idea where he was hiding, but he must've been good at it. Once we were over the threshold, the gate slammed shut behind us. Can't say I was surprised. After the crap I've seen today, I'm willing to expect anything.
"Ah, the hospice. Yes... Leslie was being treated here years ago." Marcelo tells us. "He'd come here thinking that it was familiar and safe."
"You know where we are?" Sebastian asks as we follow him.
"Just ahead is the hospice my brother runs. He'll take us in." The doc explains.
"That doesn't answer his question, doc." I say sceptically. This guy knows more than he's letting on. And, what kind of doctor cares THIS much about a patient? Either that is some damn commitment to the job. Or, something else is going on. I'm gonna keep my eye on this jackass
Before we head inside. I notice that Sebastian goes inside another shed with the same blood splatters as before. He dissapears again, only to come back a few moments later. I guess it was the same as last time. Either way, he was ready to head in. As soon as we step foot inside, I knew something was up. The place was a mess and there was muttering from further inside.
"Hush. Hush... don't you fret."
Yeah, no. I draw my revolver and slowly make my way inside. Marcelo didn't seem nearly as cautious as he began walking ahead of us.
"Doc, wait." I warn him. He ignores me. They always ignore me.
"Valerio, it's me!" The doc calls out to his brother. I pick up the pace to catch up to him. "This is my brother, Valerio. Leslie's original... doctor." He pauses as he finally notices the behaviour of his brother. Hunched over a table and cutting into the poor bastard on the table. He slowly turns, his scalp was peeling off, revealing the muscle underneath. He raises his curved blade. I raise my gun. Pulling the trigger, his head is blown to bits with a thunderous bang.
"That's all from you, Val." I holster my gun again. As soon as his body hit the floor, the entire house started shaking, and some damn ringing fills my ears. Through the blaring noise, I see Valerio again. It looks like, the past. He scratches the meat off of his own damn head. Once the illusion ends, I turn to Sebastian. Looks like he had it just as bad. "You alright?"
"Yeah. What was that?"
"I don't know. A vision is most likely. But, I'm pretty sure none of us are psychic." I try to explain. It wasn't long before the doctor showed back up. I guess he went to hide. Smart.
"How could he have done this to Valerio? Impossible... It couldn't be Ruvik." I hear him muttering to himself as he examines his brother's work space.
"Ruvik?" I ask. The doc doesn't answer as a scream comes from outside.
"That sounds like Leslie." Sebastian says.
"Let's go." I order, jogging toward the exit and onto the main road. Another one of the creatures was stalking the road. I don't slow down as I swing an uppercut into his chest, launching him thirty feet into the air, his body collapsing in on itself as it lands.
"Help! Help!" Leslie screams as he runs into a small house.
"Leslie! Wait!" I call out, running after him. The detective and doctor follow after. Once inside, I begin searching. No sign of him on this floor. The only way he could've gone is- "The basement." I grumble. Drawing my gun and heading down. "Detective. Watch my back. Doc, get between us." I order. The doctor couldn't defend himself, it'd be better if he was covered. Making our way into the basement, a red room used for Polaroids makes itself obvious. We enter, heading to the back and finding Leslie. He struggles against Marcelo as he tries to settle him.
"Hellboy. I think something's coming." Sebastian says. True to his word, the door was flung open by... nothing? There was nothing there as the door slowly closes again. I aim my revolver as I scour the room, from my standing position. I thought I was losing my mind... then a bottle was knocked over.
"It's invisible!" I take a chance and fire blindly ahead. My bullet doesn't hit as the steps pick up speed until something grabs at me. I take a guess at where it's body is and body-check it with my right hand. I feel a ribcage collapse against my knuckles as the creature revealed itself. It looked like the other creatures, but instead of a face, it possessed a writhing mass of tentacles. I push it against a wall as Sebastian takes a shot, blowing its head apart.
"This place is a deathtrap. Is anywhere safe?" Sebastian asks.
"That is unlikely." The doc replies, leading the way with Leslie.
"Can't get out. Can't get out." Leslie panics.
"Great. Then where the hell are we going?" I ask, keeping my revolver in hand as we exit the room.
"Anywhere. It's bound to be better than here." The doc replies. As I catch up to them, Marcelo is examining a wall that definitely wasn't there before.
"The stairs are gone." He says, disbelief in his voice.
"Move. I'll make some." I tell him as I begin punching the wall. Each time getting I little further in.
"We must all be collectively losing our minds." Sebastian points out as he catches up.
"Losing our minds. Losing our minds. LOSING OUR MINDS!" Leslie shrieks, turning me from my work.
"Hey, kid. Don't worry, I'm gonna get us out of..." I pause. There's another figure down the hall back towards the red room.
"Oh God... no." Marcelo whispers.
"Hey! Who are you!?" I aim The Good Samaritan. I may not be a good shot, but he doesn't know that. The man smirks at me. Wait... that's the Frankenstein sonova bitch who took me by surprise!
"Ruvik... it IS you." Marcelo whispers in horror. Ruvik(?) Turns and begins to slowly walk away.
"Hey! Get back here!" I yell, giving chase. The detective follows with me, despite Marcelo's warning. We barely took three steps when the hall changed instantly. It was still a hall. Almost the same. But the doctor and Leslie were missing. "Damn. Only one way to go." I look to Sebastian. He nods in return.
"Let's get going." He says. In front of us is a door. Behind us is an endless hallway. Well, it's better the devil you know. We make our way toward the door. I was expecting any kind of deformed creature to smash through that door. What I'm not prepared for, is the tidal wave of blood that enveloped us. I can't see and I can't breathe. The rushing blood finally slowed. We found ourselves, waist-deep in blood and I don't even wanna know what else.
"This is disgusting." I grumble as I begin wading through the crimson sludge toward a door.
"What the hell is going on?" Sebastian asks from behind me.
"No idea. But, this Ruvik guy seems to be responsible." I answer. I heave myself up onto a small ledge, giving Sebastian a hand in doing so.
"With our luck, the door's locked." Sebastian said as we approach it. I hold up my fist in response.
"Don't worry. I've got a spare key." I turn to face the door, and lo and behold. Ruvik. That same damn smirk on his face while this red crap peels away from him and makes its way into the guts. I take a swing at him, he dissapears in distortion and static. A wall of flesh blocks the door.
"We've got company." I hear Sebastian from the railing overlooking the blood pit.
"Don't let them corner you. I'll see if I can thin their numbers." I leap over the railing and into the red slush. I stand at my full height and swing a right hook into the nearest one of the creatures.
"Boom!" It's head splatters like the rest. From there, I raise my fist and bring it down on top of the head of another.
"Bam!" Crushing its skull like a watermelon as its corpse sinks into the goo. I reach out with my left hand, grabbing the hand that held a shoddily crafted axe that was swung at me. I grab tighter as I punch it in the chest with my right hand. The force tears it's harm off and throws it back, toward a large container full of the mulched remains. Its spine snapped as it hit the corner.
A gunshot from behind me gets my attention, as well as a falling body from behind me. Sebastian had just taken out one of the fuckers who tried to sneak up on me. I give him a nod and continue the fight with him covering me. Another right hook splatters a head. I bring my arm into a backhand toward the torso of another creature, crushing its ribcage as it is throw into a wall, being flattened against it. Another from my left lunges at me. I grab it by the top of its head and force it into a bowing position. From there, I swing my right hand into an uppercut, shattering it's skull and launching it upward into a meathook. Where the last of its light left it with a choking gargle. Sebastian managed to pick off the stragglers. Three in total. I still don't know where he got that Crossbow or where he's been keeping a shotgun. I guess it didn't matter, so long as it helped.
Grabbing the railing, I pull myself out of the fleshy sludge. As I get to my hooves, the flesh covering the door retreats. Sebastian is the first to try the handle. Thankfully, the door opens without much more of a fuss. Ahead of us is a long hallway, leading to what looks like a dead-end room with a blinking light dangling over a corpse. "Well... this can only be good." I mutter, stepping in front of Sebastain as we walked to make sure I'd take the first hit if things went sour. As soon as we get within five feet of the body, a gyser of blood shoots out. With it are the screams of a woman. They're pained and hateful. A large, gangly, pale skinned, blood soaked woman with raven black hair and an extra pair of arms on her shoulders crawled out of the corpse. Needless to say...
"Screw this!" I yelled, turning to follow Sebastian who had already started running back the way we came. He was trying his damndest to get a door open since the one from before was gone. Go figure. As I reach him, I look back and see her quickly crawling towards us and screaming the whole time. I look back to the door and start swinging. The damn thing doesn't even budge. Not a dent or a shake. It's like I'm not hitting it at all.
"Shit! What now!?" Sebastian yelled, putting his back to the wall, facing the new monster and taking a couple of shots at her. If she felt it, she didn't show it. Well... this is a dumb idea. As she gets five feet away from the door, I lunge toward her and take a swing with my right hand. She's quicker on the dodge than tons of fun was and I miss. She lunges up, grabbing my head tightly in two hands before slamming me head-first into the ground. She opened her other set of hands and started slamming them onto my head, trying to crush it as the stone beneath my head starts to crack. Lucky I'm so thick-headed. A couple of gunshots ring out and the creature pulls back, holding her face. Sebastian had taken a shot, and the door was opened by one of those 'normal' creatures.
"Go! I'll catch up!" I yell at him as I stand back to my hooves and grab her by the throat, swinging her into a wall. Sebastian takes off running, but I'd have to deal with her first. I let go, quickly bringing my right hand into a gut punch, curling her over as her shoulder arms swiped at me. Some of her nails clipped my left cheek. I follow up with a left-handed hook to her face, disorienting her before I bring my right hand back for a haymaker right between her eyes. The wall behind her head cracks as I follow through. To my disappointment, her head doesn't smash as easily as the rest. She screams at me, it's like nails in my brain. I can't think straight. I only come back once she digs her claws into my shoulders and into my sides. I groan in pain as she lifts me up, screaming all the while before slamming me to the floor and dragging me along the way Sebastian went. The concrete floor beneath me is dug up as she pushes me through it. It goes on for a while before I notice what looks like a security shutter. I don't think it'll stop her, but it'll slow her down. I kick at her knee, she loses her balance and has to take her claws out of my sides to stop her herself from falling. I grab her wrists in my shoulder in each hand and rip them out of my shoulders. I slam my forehead into her nose. She staggers back, screeching all the while. I quickly get up and throw a haymaker into her head as she thrashed around. She's flung back into the wall at the other end of the hall. I run inside and slam the button. The shutter closes as she crawls toward me like a goddamn spider. She slams into the shutter, trying to open it. After a few hard hits, it quiets down. Sebastian is nowhere to be seen. I guess he kept going... somewhere. "Where the hell did he-?"
I'm cut off as more of her screams start up behind me as she emerged from another corpse. I guess it wasn't a one off. Before she can get her leg out, I swing a right uppercut into her chin. She's flung back and hits the wall. I can't let her get up. I charge quickly, grabbing a fistful of her hair in my stone hand and begin swinging her around the room. Into boxes and walls. Whatever is around me as she claws at my forearm. Once I slam her into a wall and try to let go, she sticks to it like some kind of spider, grabbing my arm at one of the ridges and pulling me toward her. She grabs my face and slams the back of my head into the wall. She gets in front of me, her blood-soaked hand gripping my face like a vice. She screams, slamming my head over and over again. I swing a left hook into her face. Blood flies from her mouth, but she doesn't let go. I take right swing into her temple, she's flung to the side, her nails scratching both sides of my face. I brace for a landing but find no floor beneath my feet as I fall, hitting my head on the rungs of a ladder as I fall into the gap. As I land, I fall onto my side with a groan. This wasn't ideal. I rise to my feet, her screams still above me. I decide caution is the better part of valour as I begin running down this new hallway. Narrowly ducking under a trip wire. I hear a thud. Turning around, she had dropped down and was slowly crawling toward me. "Jeez. You don't know when to quit."
"Hellboy!"
Turning back to the hall, it's Sebastian in an elevator. Well, that's a no brainer. Picking up the pace, I make it inside. Sje was still about half way down the hall. Weird. Was she tired? No.
"I'm glad you held up back there. You're tougher than you look." Sebastian said as we listened to the ruckus of this old elevator taking us down.
"Hey, Detective?" I ask, my eyes narrowing at the corpse neat our feet.
"Yeah? What's wrong."
"What does it mean when something chases you very slowly?"
"... there's probably a reason it doesn't have to run." He says grimly, following my eyes down. As the elevator stops, the door's squeak open as the creature starts to rise from the corpse.
"Move it!" I yell, following after him in a sprint. He kicks open a door into a suspicious hallway. We've no time to examine it as the shutter at the end of the hall starts slowly closing. "Run!" We take off into a sprint. I steady my lace slightly, ensuring he'd be the first to get through. He slides under, as do I. Rolling my tail up to avoid it being crushed. "This is getting ridiculous." I groan as I stand up.
"Tell me about it. What's even happening?"
"I don't know. But... I don't think any of this is real." I say, looking around the large silo we seem to be in. A set of spiral stairs lead down into an abyss.
"What do you mean?" Sebastian asks, leading the way as we slowly descend.
"Nothing makes sense here. The monsters. The shifting world. It's like... we're in a dream."
"More like a nightmare."
Ahead of us, Ruvik appears. He doesn't speak. He just glares at us as he marches toward us. "Back up the stairs." I order Sebastian as I take a shot. He seemed to... faze around it. Well... crap. I follow Sebastian as I turn and run. We make it a couple sets up before the guy just stops. Staring at us before dissapearing. "I hate magicians." I mutter. Below us, a groaning of rending metal reaches us, the stairs were crumpling like under some massive weight. As the stairs we were on finay gave way, we began falling through this endlessly dark tube. I don't know when it happened, but Sebastian was swallowed by the darkness as I kept falling. Further down, I see a light, a dull glow, like dusk. The light increases, I squint, the light burns my eyes, I can hardly see. The next thing I know, I'm being smashed through wooden objects until I finally come to a stop by smashing into a concrete wall. As I fall the the floor, the splinters on boxes surround me. I lie on my back as in breathe deeply.
"This... is gonna be a long friggin' day."
END OF CHAPTER!
Alright, I both love and hate my brain. I know I should be finishing these other stories but as I take a break doing other stuff, my brain decides to say "Hey, you know what would be cool?" And then take me on an undesired ride through many ideas until I finally get fed up and start writing them down. This was one of those times. Either way, I hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to comment, and criticise where I could do better. I love hearing back from my readers. Either way I'll see you when I next see you.
Have a great day/night.
P.S. as I was writing this chapter, it became abundantly clear to me how short The Evil Within would be if Hellboy was the main character. Seriously, I think most of my time is spent crouching around as Sebastian trying to get stealth kills to conserve ammo. But if it were Hellboy? It'd be a bar fight for every level and that's something I want to see.
