Running Sequence 8 Dash 1
Chapter 2
“Whenever you find yourself in a cemetery,
never step on a person’s grave – its powerful bad luck,” according to Gilbert’s grandma admonition. “Worse than breaking a mirror, causing
misery longer than seven years.”
Gilbert’s
mom had never believed in such “nonsense”, waving off Grandma and her crazy
superstitions. Even his dad told him to ignore Grandma’s “babbling”. Now,
considering what had happened to his parents and surrounded by this forbidding
landscape, he lent a bit more weight to Grandma’s words. Treading cautiously
above and between the presumed dead husks of creatures (no telling if natural or artificial), superstition gripped his
spine.
After all, this is one of the Baron’s
Sectors, he thought. Anything is
possible, especially here. Everything is on the table, no matter how improbable
or bizarre.
Gilbert climbed a hill, swerving around and between
headstones, careful to not traipse over a plot. A stone archway ended his
descent, though a swath of a hundred feet or more shoved in every direction
multiplied headstones.
Now what?
Gilbert noted how the stone construction of the archway
seemed ancient and modern at the same time. Rubbing his hand over the serrated,
not sharp, deterioration seemed worn from centuries of weather, though fit
together seamlessly.
The
opening of the arch peaked about six feet above his head.
Through
the archway his eyes drew to glyphs etched into the interior faces of the
stones. Moving steadily, distracted by mysterious writing, he failed to notice
a shimmer in the air as he passed the midway point. Nor did he notice the
quality of light deteriorating as he progressed.
The
hairs on the back of his neck stood up.
His
flesh prickled.
A
swath of ominously roiling dark clouds hovered above.
“Uh-oh.” Another Sector!
Gloom
replaced sunlight. The atmosphere energized, different than any other Sector.
Weird.
Fifty
feet away, two ghosts appeared. Two dismantled robots sprawled to the side.
Sensing
Gilbert’s presence, the ghosts fluidly turned to face him.
Much
too far away to make out the details of their facial features, Gilbert strained
to do so, returning to an all too familiar sense of being in the wrong place,
wrong time, wrong plane of existence.
A
glance over his shoulder.
The
archway had been replaced by an immense rock cliff face.
Gilbert’s
adrenaline recharged, ready to flee.
Back
facing the apparitions a chilled breeze struck him in the face, delivering a
wavelength of:
“Who
is that? Why is a mortal roaming about the graveyard, Eero?”
“No
telling… Say, let’s steal this child’s body and keep it for our very own,
Polkins.”
“Can
you smell that? His blood is fresh and pure! His stamina is strong! A vessel of
life we shall both possess!”
“Brilliant
idea, Eero! Two possessions are always
better than one. Our masters, four demons inside their transparent spheres, the Metempsychosis
Quartet, a.k.a. the Reckoning will be
pleased with us! Let’s steal his husk of flesh!”
“Yes,
let’s!”
Grabbing
each other’s hands they became a nebulous blur, darkening, morphing into a
vortex, swelling hundreds of feet in height. Then the shapeless dark winds shaped
into hundreds of blood-leaking, severed heads of children donning dead masks of
flesh, split lips pulled back into grins. One head leading, turned its
collective attention to Gilbert as its brethren followed.
Gilbert
rocketed off.
Screeching
plagued the air in his wake.
He
needed to find some kind of refuge – anywhere – to elude these monsters.
The
huge flock of severed heads crested the hill, some bouncing off the ground,
speeding momentum of their pursuit. Giggles and guffaws invaded Gilbert’s ears
as he shot a glance over his shoulder. Malevolently glowing red eyes and eerie
voices ululating up and down etched into his memory.
Gilbert
disregarded his late Grandma’s warning and leaped over headstones, leaving
shoeprints on grave after grave. He had joined the ranks of those who find it
better to beg forgiveness than ask permission.
The
heads merged into one improbably huge head, stretched out a snake-slithering
forked tongue, flicked the tip at Gilbert’s head, knocking him headfirst into a
headstone boring the number 13.
Sinister
guffaws cut through the air, dropping like acid rain on Gilbert’s ears.
Pain
wrapped a clamp around his head from the crash into the stone and as he looked
up, witnessed the huge head explode into its previous state of smaller heads,
connecting into thin membrane-fleshed strands, all stemming from a larger
head’s empty eye sockets.
Gilbert
saw tiny faces, all screaming inside the transparent strands, some imploding, some
turning themselves inside out, splattering gore within the interior of the
membrane.
Scrambling
to his feet he ventured downhill again, lost his balance, tumbled, skidding to
a halt in front of a large tomb.
He
screamed.
A
gargoyle stared down at him. Wings of an angel, clawed feet gripped a stone
pedestal mounted above a doorway. Eyes blazed a bright red.
Gilbert
grabbed the handle of the wooden door and pulled frantically.
It
moved an inch.
The
heads shrieked, closed in.
Gilbert
gripped the handle with both hands and pulled again.
Screeching
ripped an echoed across the land.
Gilbert
wrenched the opening wider.
Small
mouths chewed into the soil, using their jaws to balance the huge head which
imploded, reformed, long white worms shaping a child. The child’s arms and legs
became membrane-fleshed strands, a mass of heads at the tips.
The
door opened wide enough for Gilbert to squeeze inside. He barely registered the
tingle on his skin and the hairs on the back of his neck rise as he pushed the
door closed, excluding the creature outside, sealing himself in the perfectly
silent darkness.
He
anticipated a thump or pounding from the excluded pursuers.
But
the sounds never came.
Silence
shrouded the interior of the tomb and a chill touched his skin.
Gilbert
concluded he had entered another Sector. He had
felt a tingle. He had felt the
hairs stand up on the back of his neck.
Sticking
his hands in the darkness he felt a cold stone wall, used it as a talisman to
move away from the door, pressing his back against it. Yet again Gilbert had no
idea which way to traipse. Standing still was not a viable option.
Scrape
of stone far away…
What was that?
Gilbert
tried to swallow, his throat parched. Gooseflesh scrambled across his body.
Keeping
close to the wall he moved, his fingers touching grooves and indentations. Stick
figures, animals and indeterminate geometric shapes in the etchings.
The
path took an abrupt ninety degree turn.
The
wall vanished.
And
the floor.
