

A tale of horror and surrealism,

Catherine  
Forever with Love

Chapter One: Present - It Awakens

A drop of blood stumbles off the reservation. Down the neck it goes. Down and down. It meets the chest.

She tries to slap it away. She succeeds.

But a second drop soon follows. A third, a fourth, and a fifth. Then, a sixth! Always more. Always more, more, more, more, more!

It's the one constant fact.

Blood travels through the veins, arteries, and capillaries. This is whole blood. A mixture of about fifty-five percent plasma and forty-five percent blood cells. It is said there's two gallon's worth of blood in the body.

But he never stops to measure. He acts. But he never stops to measure and never keeps count.

She, the woman, her name, of little importance. They rarely pay too much thought to names or identities. The victims have no recognition, no prominence, or significance whatsoever; they're superficial sustenance, a means to their survival. Until the time they do. Matter, that is. Which is fine, they like the challenge of a prey willing to fight back.

There are rules. Or, not rules, but precedents. A means to make it fairer. A means to give a chance.

It screams muffled words, the lady; however, screaming isn't something they were looking for.

Not yet, at least. Screams only serve a purpose for the ritual's end. A mirthless melody contrived by the onyx orchestra.

"You'll have to excuse the restraints; while it makes formal conversation imbalanced, it is imperative for such occasions." The voice speaks with sporadic inflection, sounding neither angry nor cool, deep nor soft. The pitch varies from high to low with each word. An equilibrium not unlike splicing together unique, unconnected dialogue to form new sentences.

The rays of a streetlight rain down on the woman's face and illuminate her enough to be distinguished, but other-wise, all around her is darkness and fog.

The figure that spoke steps from the shadows, bringing itself into the light. The woman's words are muffled by the fog's hands, their smoky touch cupping over her mouth. Her eyes look up and down at The Haze, the main offspring of The Miasma. The puppet master, the conductor. The final stroke of the paint-brush.

The woman's screams, muffled, remain persistent. She is panicked; in absolute shock over what welcomed her into its clutches.

The Haze takes comfort in control. The foundations of its existence built on its simple and contrived principles. Fairness, but never allotting the chance for failure.

The woman gawks at The Haze's appearance; stoic and calm in disposition, but no foretelling of its emotions. It wears a peculiar ensemble, like an old suit of armor, one might term, but it looks like no armor she has ever lain eyes on before. Its helm brought to mind that of a wolf, and its armor looks desolate and wrecked. Worn and blackened, like it had been carried out through the depths of Hell.

Hands dirty with soot, the tips of the fingers sharpened at the bones. Skin ripped off. Its bones carved like claws.

There is an aura about The Haze, one that's smoky and green, a different color, but not unlike what engulfs her body and forces her to remain still. The smoke is thick and it cups the woman's mouth like a glove. She couldn't spread open her lips, could only grind her teeth with a humming scream. It drapes over her like a blanket, wrapped snug.

The Haze speaks on: "It would seem as if someone has made an enemy." The Haze's hand rests on the cheek of its new playmate. The woman can smell the death on the figure's finger-tips. The Haze can feel the beating of her heart with absolute definition. Beating faster and faster, like a drum. Another sound in the composition. "Do you know why you're here?"

The smoke leaves her lips and permits her to speak. But she doesn't; at least not with actual words, instead, she screams incoherently and cries nonsensically. The Haze places its hand on the woman's jaw and lifts up, through the wolf-helm, a glowing red aura is visible in the eye holes. "It's time for words now," The Man with the Wolf Head barks.

She can't stop sobbing, however. Unrelenting tears in a manic hysteria, unable to fathom her own intense amounts of phobia.

"Others have allowed the fear to kill them. The simple shock of what's before them. Always a pity." The Haze lets her jaw loose from his grasp and throws his hand out like a stage-performer, segueing into the darkness, presenting something. "We ALL want to see you suffer. I ask again, do you know why you're here?"

"No!" She screams, and as she does, more tears fall down her cheeks. She couldn't breathe; hyperventilating.

"Then, allow me to remind you."
Chapter Two: Past - Mr. Douglas, a Fetching Gentleman

Catherine danced; the affection of the crowd. By Eric Douglas' account, all of them looked ready to pounce on her at any moment. She moved; such agility, she was the envy of all her friends. From her luscious locks; a golden brown, to her marvelous eyes; an emerald green. A delectable delight beyond the grasp of description.

On the bleachers, all of the students, their tongues waggled and drooled. By Eric Douglas' account, even the females were in awe of her. They all knew themselves as being in the presence of a flawless specimen. Her legs kicked higher than the other cheerleaders, and her cheers could be heard from a mile away. They were so pretty. Loud, but serene.

That was, at least, by Eric Douglas' account.

With his assumptive role as the high school math teacher, there was nothing he liked more than being able to watch his Catherine perform. He had watched her from afar since she first stepped into his classroom her freshman year. But, alas, he shared no classrooms with his beloved this year.

It was a fact he found very disheartening. Having to only witness her from a distance. He fondly remembered the memories they'd made with one another over the years. The times spent talking. They'd talk for hours and hours. They didn't talk much anymore. It was like she was gone from his life.

"Ready!" The cheerleaders asked in unison. "Okay!"

Mr. Douglas was certainly ready. For what, he wasn't completely for certain. Eric missed Catherine, but found some refuge in attending basketball games, at least there, he could watch her from the bleachers.

She wasn't the captain of the team, for whatever reason, but being always in the front-row, Douglas could always get a good glimpse of her.

Oh, but soon, wait, such despair, a lady; Mrs. Fount stepped into view and blocked Eric's view of Catherine in the process. She stood, arms perched on both sides of her waist, such a sad and stricken visual in-comparison to what Eric once beheld. Mrs. Fount rudely stood right in-front of Eric, looking him dead in the eye, which told him she knew about the travesty she was committing.

But, no matter, Douglas wouldn't let her bullying and harassment get in the way of his enjoyment. And, so, he pivoted his body, poking his head over to the side of her, going back to the show!

The elderly woman on Eric's right didn't really seem to like him leaning on her like the arm-rest of a particularly uncomfy couch, but it was not as if he liked it more than she did.

"Eric, what are you doing here?"

Eric stopped bending and contorting himself for a second and sat straight. He looked up at Mrs. Fount. Her voice sounded serious and her face didn't look too good either!

He gifted her with a smile and answered, "Why, I am here to enjoy myself, and until now, I have been."

Eric fidgeted uncomfortably with the tie that hung over his white collar shirt, he sounded more polite on the surface than how he actually felt. And, even then, he found it hard to contain himself. He was downright miffed! This was HIS and Catherine's time, not some no-good History teacher's!

Mrs. Fount looked at him with skepticism, until rolling her eyes, putting her palm to her head before she walked up to the bleachers to find her seat.

What could she have wanted? Eric asked himself, before he felt assured it was probably because he'd been sick. He hadn't been to work because of it; a nagging cough and a sneeze he just couldn't nip. It hadn't all gone away, but he forced himself out of bed for a chance at seeing Catherine. If one or two twerps had runny noses the next day, it'd be no skin off his bones.

Eric stretched his legs out and relaxed, hands on his head, sprawled out on the person behind him.

Catherine, she swirled and twirled; a beauty beyond words. He didn't even try to find words for an attempt.

It wasn't long until the first rendition was over, and the pesky basketball game began. A collective sigh from the crowd befell the gymnasium, or at least, that is what Mr. Douglas imagined. In a larger school, cheerleaders stood at the sidelines as the game occurred, but North Rites wasn't a larger school. North Rites' gymnasium, with the bleachers sprawled out, was barely large enough to encumber wiggle room for the players, let alone let the cheerleaders face the crowd and root for their team.

Eric could see no entertainment value in watching a couple guys throw a ball through a hoop. Instead, his eyes drifted down and admired the maple wood planks. The squeaky sound of shifting sneakers and a ball being dribbled could be heard, but all he did was look down at the floor.

This went on for about ten or so minutes. A few times, he got excited by a cheer from the crowd, thinking the cheerleaders were coming back, but was always disappointed to learn someone only made a basket or some gruelingly tedious play.

Mr. Douglas found himself compelled to leave after about an hour of waiting, but, at last, it was half-time and the cheerleaders were welcomed once more.

The cheerleaders piled back into view; such beautiful attire, dark-blue with white tops, a cute, little logo of the team's mascot, a white fox, as the focal. Mr. Douglas skimmed through the faces of each one, with thoughts ranging from disgust to disgust.

Something was wrong.

He searched through them again.

A second time. Nothing!

Three wasn't the charm either. There was no use.

Catherine was nowhere to be seen!

Where was she? Douglas searched, leaning forward in his seat, squinting his eyes in hopes that it would help. This was an outrage! Douglas could feel his hands shaking, trembling like a teenage boy's on prom night. He was furious; angry, like the TNT in his chest was about to detonate.

He arose to his feet, ignoring the cheerleader's in-front of him. They paled in-comparison to Catherine's beauty and he wanted nothing from them. He stomped his way out of the gymnasium, making for certain they'd hear him as he left.

Eric shoved the metal push-door open and walked through the hallways. He stared down at the white titled floor, then, up at the trophy case. While walking, his body shook and contorted furiously with each step, and so, he gave his hands a purpose, messing with his hair, making sure it was proper. He was making a b-line toward the main office. They had explaining to do and he wasn't exactly in the listening mood.

His hysteria nearly reached a breaking point as he felt a hand touch his shoulder. It was Mrs. Fount with a worried expression on her face. Equipped with a haggard look that told the story of somebody near their inevitable demise. And, her end, like so many, would be anticlimactic.

Unlike Catherine, who hadn't a blemish to scathe her face, and a body that told him her story was far from finished.

Mr. Douglas tried his best to regain his composure, once again straightening his tie and readjusting his hair; a bad comb-over he didn't care very much to discuss.

"I don't know what you're thinking of doing, but, whatever it is, please don't. We can't be having another mishap like this," Mrs. Fount pleaded. While speaking, she did these awkward hand-gestures. They reminded Eric about all the other cheerleaders trying to keep up with Catherine.

Catherine.

The very thought of her and what they had done made Mr. Douglas want to jump out of his own skin and stuff it down Mrs. Fount's throat until she choked to death.

"This is an outrage!"

Eric turned his back to Fount and started back toward the main-office. There was no reason at all for her not being there.

"What's an outrage?" Her eyes showed concern, but under all of that, there was something that annoyed him more than anything else.

"I think that maybe I can help if you just tell me what's wrong." Mrs. Fount walked in-front of Mr. Douglas and put her hand on his shoulder. Her finger tips laid on his skin like the talons of a pterodactyl or those one chips you can wear on your fingers that reminded Douglas of witch hands. In other-words, Mrs. Fount's hands were like witch hands.

"Catherine should be out there, she is the best cheerleader this school has to offer." He said, trying to keep his anger in-check, he politely karate-chopped Fount's hand off of his shoulder and bolted toward the main-office.

"Is, ... is, what," Douglas could hear her footsteps as she tailed after him.

She was always getting in his business. This time though, he was steaming. This school was going to get theirs. And theirs was a swift kick in the ass.

Fount grabbed him by the hand and yanked him around. More aggressively than he would have expected from her. Her hand felt chilly in his.

There was a stern look on her face this time, a look that didn't seem very reasoning, but more like that of an authority figure.

"Look, Mr. Douglas, we've talked about this before. The school lets everybody come to the events, whether it be the parents, the faculty, or some random person that wandered here off the streets. It's fine, and you can do that, but if you make it a scene then we'll have to involve the police." Mrs. Fount stopped and then added, "Again."

Mr. Douglas was offended. Scarred even. Who was she to talk to him like he was nothing more than a small child? He hadn't completed eight years' worth of college at the top of his class to be talked down to.

His conscience tugged at his ear, the cute angel on his shoulder whispered sweet nothings. He kept his cool and spoke. "I just want to know why Catherine isn't here. She should be out there. She's the best cheerleader."

He voiced his concerns plainly, trying his best to sound sensible and professional.

"There isn't a student named Catherine on the cheerleading team. Douglas, please go home. You're talking nonsense!"

Mr. Douglas toyed with his tie some more. Made it crooked. Straightened it. Rinse and repeat. He was frustrated. He could feel his face turning red. He hated the feeling. The warm feeling that made his stomach feel like it was on fire. The beads of sweat shot down him like bullets. He had to let it out or else he'd blow a gasket.

"Don't try to fuck with me, Fount!" Douglas freed himself from Fount's grasp before kicking at a nearby trash bin, knocking it over along with a few pieces of garbage. It was one of those hard rubber trash-cans and didn't make the metallic clang he so desperately craved. "Let me tell you what you are going to do. You are going to start giving me some answers and stop bullshitting me."

"Okay." Mrs. Fount sounded really worried now. No more of those authoritative stares from her now; she understood who was in-control of things.

"Where is Catherine?" He asked again.

"I think she went home sick." She announced. "Yeah, she wasn't feeling well. In-fact, I do seem to remember her complaining about an upset stomach. And, you know Catherine; she would never miss out on cheerleading unless she had to, she has too much passion for it. I guess she turned out a little too sick though and had to go home after all. It's a shame, a real shame," Mrs. Fount had a bit of a somber voice at the end.

"Oh my," and like that, all of Douglas' anger and frustration evaporated into the air and vanished without a trace. It was replaced with a concern for his beloved.

There was so many things he didn't know about her, his Catherine, but the visions flew inside him like he was the passenger to a car carrying only the driver. Love was like that sometimes, it didn't always make sense.

A sweetness to her eyes, and the bliss to behold the innocence from her smile. Oh, but the smell, the smell was the cherry on top her scrumptious sundae. It was the lovely smell of strawberries, freshly picked, that would keep Douglas awake for days.

She wasn't feeling well, such a sad thing to see, his sweet and precious Catherine.

Douglas loosened up his posture and took in a breath of air, letting it pass slowly from his lungs. Mrs. Fount had a relieved smile, then, she spoke: "I think she's going to be fine after a couple days of bed rest, that's all."

Mrs. Fount stared at Douglas without saying anything, waiting for him to give the assurance he wouldn't cause a conflict. He nodded, and, at last, Fount turned her back to Douglas and walked toward the doors leading to the gymnasium.

Douglas watched her off. Listened in on the distinctive gallop of her high-heels on the ground. Her legs were mostly hidden by a long, gray skirt that traveled down, almost over her ankles.

She was a prune if Douglas ever knew one.

Not like Catherine.

His Catherine was special.
Chapter Three: Past - Holly, an Anomaly

Holly was an anomaly; a quiet and unobtrusive girl well-liked and popular amongst her classmates. In later years, she became more outspoken, her confidence building as her appearance followed. Two years ago, she couldn't have run a brush through her tangled and crinkly hair without ripping out a patch or two. Now, as if the stars aligned in her favor, her dirty-blonde hair rested straightly down her head to her shoulders without a kink in-sight. In time, Holly had blossomed into a beautiful young woman.

"Wake up!" shouted the mother of one, Olivia, at her recently turned sixteen year old daughter.

Holly could hear the sound of the light-switch being flicked, she slowly opened her eyes. The light burned for a second, her hands shielded herself on reflex. Once she adjusted, she began rubbing the crinkles out from her lids and looked up at her mother with a tired glare.

Olivia wore nothing more than a long white t-shirt that acted as a dress and the underwear that was hidden under it. Her hair was disheveled and messy and her eyes looked puffy and swollen. Holly knew she would be returning to bed in a matter of seconds.

It was a habit of her mother's to wake Holly up for school each morning. It had been this way since as long as Holly could remember, like there was some little mechanism in Olivia's brain that always woke her up at seven on the dot.

One of the few interests Olivia took in Holly's life ever since her father died.

Holly mustered the strength to sit-up off the couch and yawned. The window by the front-door brought in some light. A certain bleak gleam to the shine, it had rained deep into the night. In the midst of doing her routine stretches, she turned her head and could see down the hallway to the mother's bedroom. As expected, Olivia had already flopped herself back onto her bed and was ready to sleep well into the evening.

They both had their routine, and they followed it to a tee.

The night was pleasant enough, she had slept like a rock, which was no easy task with the worn, uncomfortable couch. A couch with a loose spring that would always find a way to gouge into Holly's side no matter how many times she tossed and turned.

Holly brought herself up to her feet, ushering in the creaky sound of bent metal, knocking over a full can of Pepsi and spilling it down over the floor.

"Shit," Holly mumbled to herself. The brown-liquid flowed down on the already stained rugs, Holly walked over to the closet door, right beside the bathroom and grabbed a hastily folded towel to throw over the puddle before drying it with her foot.

She swapped her pajamas and tank-top with jeans, a black shirt with a hooded figure on it she bought from some rock concert, and a green and white striped jacket.

The bathroom was filled with dirty laundry, but after climbing over the proverbial Mount Everest of clothes, Holly was able to get a look in the mirror.

She looked well enough. It's not like she was trying to impress anybody after all.

The house was a little bit of a fixer upper. That much, she had to admit. Stains and trash all over the place, but it wasn't like she stayed at it much. It's not like she cared. She opted for greener pastures and figured her mother could enjoy the hellhole.

There was one last glance to her mother lying down in her bed in the other room before she closed the front screen door behind her and started way toward the school. It was likely the last time she would see her until tomorrow.

Olivia was always out.

Holly assumed from the smell of alcohol on her clothes she was out getting shitfaced, but never cared too much to ask. They were roommates above all else, hardly mother nor daughter by now. And Holly couldn't have felt less about it. She was fine with it. In-fact, she welcomed it; the less of the crazy bitch, the better.

Her house was only a small ways from the school, so walking wasn't too much of a problem. She had been pinching pennies to save up for a car, but wasn't there yet. Friends would've offered her a ride, if she asked, but she never did. She didn't like having friends over, after all, she didn't exactly like being 'over' at her home either. Often coming home in the wee hours of the morning because she was out with friends. It wasn't about getting wasted or tongue wrestling with strangers, although both of them helped. It was about having an escape.

She walked down the road from her house. Her feet dragged, only further decaying her worn sneakers. Rocks ran fourth down the ditch beside her driveway with each kick she made. They made a splashing sound once they plunged into the murky water. She liked the sound. So much, in-fact, she went ahead and kicked another set of rocks down for good measure. The sensation died away the second time and she went on her way.

Taking the little ear-buds from her pocket, she shoved them in her ears and, once situating her mp3 player, her mind fell to evanescence.

The time went by quick. It almost always did when she had music to listen to. Music was a wonderful creation. And, it was of immense value to her. Everything else ceased to matter; all of the bullshit in the world seemed insignificant and small. The only thing that existed was her, and even that felt so indistinct amidst the melodies that took her captive.

She felt calm and relaxed. Her eyes occasionally lent themselves up to the sky. It was a mildly dark and cloudy shade of blue. Some might have deemed it bleak and unwelcoming, but she found something very still and peaceful about it. Neither chilliness nor warmth was abundant, it just was. And, for a while, she just was.

It set the mood.

A silence happened over one of the songs long enough to let her hear a car approaching from behind her. She walked off of the road and onto the grass, taking note of the wetness of it.

By the time she at last made it to the school, all of her senses felt stretched and ready to start with the day. She walked up the sidewalk, looking down, in her "thinking space," so to speak. A couple of kids brushed up against her every now and again, and it made her realize it was probably time to start paying attention.

Lo and behold, her friend Tiffany became visible off in the distance.

Holly's fingers were crossed inside of her jacket pockets, hoping to be able to finish one last song before having to focus on the day ahead. "Slower feet ... slower! I order you to halt!" Holly yelled in her head.

It was no use though. Her prayers, if not fallen on deaf ears, fell on ears that simply cared not about the little plebeians like her. God was too busy for the common folk, but Tiffany was sent by the Devil to interrupt the singing of Amy Lee.

Nearing one another, Tiffany smiled up at Holly, who smiled back in turn, pulling the buds out from her ears.

"Have a good walk?" She may have smiled earnest, but behind her blue-eyes, Holly could sense something more devious in her voice.

"Of course," Holly replied with an inflection as deliberately phony as Tiffany's before letting out a soft chuckle.

"You are the only person on the planet that actually enjoys walking places! Like, I just," Tiffany put her hands over her face, as if building Holly's anticipation for whatever absolute gem of dialogue she was about to drop. "I'm surprised your legs aren't covered in ticks by the time you get here."

How anticlimactic, thought Holly, but didn't say aloud. "They are, but I just flick 'em off on the classmates I run into that I feel have wronged me somehow. By the way, don't look down." Holly smiled as sadistic a grin as possible, but couldn't keep it long until laughing.

Tiffany snickered as well, but Holly noticed her glance down for a second.

"It's the Blue Devils today," Tiffany pointed out. "Hopefully it doesn't get rained out."

"Is it supposed to rain?" Holly inquired, staring up at the sky. It seemed logical enough. It certainly LOOKED like it COULD rain, and from the muddy footprints on the sidewalk, it looked like it already had rained some.

"Ninety-percent chance," Tiffany claimed. She stopped dead in her tracks for a moment and took out a scrunchie from her pocket. Pulling her dark brown hair back, she maneuvered with it a couple of seconds until getting it wound up in a ponytail.

Tiffany had very distinguishable dark freckles, the cute kind, and pretty eyes. Holly was always envious of her eyes; a light-blue with a little bit of emerald in them. She wore a white t-shirt, lower cut, but not low enough to make the teachers throw a hissy-fit and over that, a purple and gray jacket. She always had on her jacket. It reminded Holly of cartoons where the characters were always wearing the same clothes each episode.

Tiffany was alright. One plus is she didn't gossip, aside a few small instances, but never anything catastrophic. She was unlike a lot of the other mouth-breathers. Drama was a massive problem in North Rites High School. There were always people causing trouble of some kind. Tiffany wasn't like that. Didn't ruffle any hairs, and had a "don't mess with me, I won't mess with you" attitude.

"I hope it doesn't either," Holly lied. Truth be told, she didn't really feel like flailing around pompoms tonight.

Cheerleading was one of the only extracurricular activities Holly participated in, and she didn't like it much. Six or seven years ago, it served a purpose.

Back when she wasn't allowed to cross the street by herself, 'showing her school spirit' got her out of the house. Though, before her father passed away, she didn't have too much of a problem with being home.

She stayed for mostly the same reason, she supposed. That, and she was "used to it".

"If it's canceled, it'll be Salem's call. Last time we had a game, we didn't get back til ten, didn't get to see my boyfriend last time!" Tiffany sounded downright outraged! Meanwhile, Holly tried her best to seem intrigued about her friend's boy-related troubles.

"That sucks," Holly said. It seemed like the appropriate response.

"I barely get to see him as it is, ... almost starting to think they owe me a day off." Tiffany laughed for a second.

Holly smiled, and they started up the stairs to the main-entrance. The bell went off, and thereby, school would soon be in-session. Holly went her separate way from Tiffany, and that was that. She would have liked to join her for whatever class she was going to, but then again, that meant she'd miss out on a precious class-period's worth of napping.

Conversation wasn't worth messing up her sleep-cycle, after all.

The hour went by in the most tedious of ways; Mr. Simpson waggled his mouth more than a dog that wished it could sweat. The History teacher was in one of his moods where he wanted to make a calamity out of everything. Where, she tried to rest her head down the same way she did almost everyday in his class, and this time, at her most relaxed, he thrashed a book down near her table.

The laughter from the rest of the class was almost unanimous after Holly nearly jumped out her chair from shock. Except for three or four of her 'clique' that gave Mr. Simpson the impromptu stares. Oh, that rabble rousing Mr. Simpson, he was a rapscallion if there ever done-did be one.

Holly appreciated their loyalty, even if most of them weren't as much friends as they were acquaintances.

She beamed a glare at Mr. Simpson, who slurred some gobbledygook about counting her absent, for she was not in-fact "present" for his class. A hollow threat, of course, and aside from that, nothing else happened and the class was uneventful.

For a second or two, Mr. Simpson tried to channel Martin Luther King in a speech about how everything we do shapes together the foundations of tomorrow and through the use of history, we are able to find an understanding of what will work and what will not. He said it all with a straight-face, carrying an impassioned radiance as he walked about the room.

Bless his heart, Simpson really did have a passion for everything he said, the only problem was he was an absolute tool.

Everything about him screamed it. A younger man, early thirties at the very most with pale skin and a full-head of red hair, spiked at the front and flat in the back, about medium length. Mr. Simpson had a handlebar mustache that made him look like he moonlighted as a porn-star. He wore khakis and a white collared shirt with a yellow tie that had a black zigzag streak like some sort of half-ass Charlie Brown.

By the end of his lecture, (he stressed calling them "lectures" to make himself feel important) he went back to his desk and twirled around in his chair a little.

Afterward, he self-consciously looked around the classroom to make certain nobody caught him being human. He took a bunch of papers in his hands and skimmed through them like Holly did a newspaper when she was looking for the funnies. At last, he decided he had looked busy long enough and neatened the papers in a stack before heading over to his computer.

There was one other thing Holly noticed in-particular about the first-hour class. It was brewing hot, like somebody lassoed the sun and brought it a million feet closer. The school was infamous about its cheapness. Investing in air-conditioning for classrooms didn't make it on their priority list.

Holly was certain that would change after a chubby fourth-grader damn near had a heatstroke and they had to call an ambulance. However, the sweet-little administrators had their convictions, and judging by the heat, also had their convection.

Never mind it, Holly let the sweat drip down her face and briefly surveyed the room. Nobody was working; after all, he hadn't assigned anything. The only things happening were muffled whispers and notes being passed with little discretion. "Permission to go back to sleep, captain!?" the little voice in Holly's head asked.

"Permission granted," Holly replied.
Chapter Four: Present – Let the Games Begin

"Catherine, or by your God-given name, Holly Prescott, The Miasma welcomes itself to you by the summons of Eric Douglas. For which reason, we pester not, for us, are here neither to judge nor persecute. We merely act upon that of which beckons."

The Man with the Wolf Head speaks like a siren with the volume knob being fidgeted with. It sounds rehearsed and routine, like it has been done before, time and time again.

Wolf Head walks near her. Holly can feel a pinching amount of fear inch deeper and deeper inside of her, like she has never felt before. An emptiness at the pit of her stomach, the kind of dread where it feels life cannot carry fourth from this moment. Wolf Head walks closer her.

The breath coming out through the holes in his helm reeks of smoke. The aroma so unrelenting she actually thinks it might choke the life out of her. The odor is every bit as thick and malicious as it is unforgiving in its clutch around her neck.

"Don't do this," Holly let out in a whimper. A stupid remark, for she knows not what they intended. A pounding strikes the back of her head. It won't stop.

Sincere fear. Complete hopelessness. Restrained vulnerability. It engulfs all of her in a misty shade. She fears the unknown. Which is all. Everything. Nothing is familiar. She fears it all. Fables race inside her head, the myths and stories of phantom beasts, of demons, stuff that once seemed so far-fetched, now, a reality. The wolf man huffs and puffs smoke out from nostril slits on his helm.

Holly feels the thickness of the air wrapping itself around her like chains, it seems even tighter now than before. And then, all at once, it releases her... Her body crashes against the asphalt of the road below her and she feels all the pressure begin to die away and dissipate.

"Let the games begin, Holly Prescott."
Chapter Five: Past – Left

Mr. Simpson might very well have been the biggest tool in the school's tackle box. Holly didn't care for him very much, but also didn't care about much at the moment. Once the bell sounded, she knew that was the last she'd have to deal with him for the day. No more having to worry about Mr. Simpson's super-serious lectures or anything else. And, before long, everything would droop by and conclude, and that would be that. Unfortunately, Holly found herself feeling much worse with each passing class period.

The heat in the school felt unbearable to her, but when she tried to cool off by venting to Tiffany about it, Tiffany acted oblivious to the heat, even still wearing her trademark purple jacket.

Holly assumed she was running a fever and that was the cause, and for her, that signaled the end of class. School wasn't imperative to her, and when she had a legitimate reason, she'd never fight through, she'd always cave.

A hall pass later and she was off to the nurse's office. Down the hallway, she went, eyeballing some of the items in the trophy case, pictures and plaques and all kinds of things to make the other schools jealous.

Though, in fairness, the school's accolades weren't all that impressive. A small outskirt of Acera, North Rites was little more than a small village. Awards didn't really change that. Fact was, The White Foxes were the introverted and out-of-shape children in dodge-ball that stood on the sideline only because it was wished for them to feel like a part of things.

Holly didn't have the good ol' school spirit like some of her classmates. A straight shooter, cocked and loaded with cynicism, she called things the way they were.

The nurse's office was a small room found right as one walked into the library, which was also quite small in itself. Holly walked and the floor transitioned from hard linoleum to dark purple carpeting.

The library was mostly for the lower-grade kids and it was presented as such with posters on the walls of apples with caterpillar's popping their smiling, teeth-filled faces out from holes. Books on the shelves about lions becoming butterflies, and various sorts of children books, ranging from the writings of Dr. Suess all the way to R.L. Stein's Goosebumps.

The intense, clashing smells of flowers and cinnamon filled the room, like the librarian had a secret stash of candles omitting tons of different scents. Holly took in the suffocating smell, paid it little mind and went over to the door of the nurse's office. Mr. Pinnacle's name was spelled out in dark-blue letters over an ordinary, plain-looking, light brown door.

She knocked on the nurse's door for a moment or two. "Just a minute," the nurse shouted back, but was still rather quick to open the door. A little boy sat in a chair opposite Pinnacle's desk. Holly noticed a small Band-Aid wrapped the child's index finger.

"Holly," Mr. Pinnacle said, a small and gracious smile, "I'll be with you shortly."

Holly nodded. The nurse turned his attention back to calming down the sobbing kid. The boy was in hysterics, doing that thing where you breathe really hard and your sobbing inherits a stutter.

Holly smiled in discomfort when the child's bloodshot eyes went over in her direction.

Hyperventilating, that was the word, Holly soon remembered, and resisted the urge to pat herself on the back.

The kid was still looking at her, snot running down his nose. Holly fled over to one of the higher shelves in the library, different books were stood up, perched on medal stands. Most of them were classic books, the kind that were already mandatory in the English class, like Romeo & Juliet or The Great Gatsby, most were likely donated. The rest were, of course, children's books. After all, that was the target demographic of the library. Any book that might have been worth the time of the older kids would've already been removed from the school for containing one too many fuck's or never bought because it was from this century and too rich for the school's blood.

Holly simply looked at the few cute, little children's books. She could still faintly remember coming down to the library in kindergarten and sitting in a circle with the rest of the class while the teacher read stories aloud to them.

At last, the sound of a door clicking shut, Holly turned to see the nurse looking back at her. The little boy, now walking down the hall, equipped with his Band-Aid, was ready to take on the big, scary world once more. Good for him.

Holly gave a weak smile to the nurse, then, let it die young, not wanting to hurt the aura of sick she wanted to give off.

The nurse didn't seem to notice, and asked politely: "What's the matter, Holly?"

Holly let out a breath and started, "I'm not feeling well. I, uh, just," intentionally stammering, "I, the heat," she added, pointing upward for no reason in-particular, maybe at the sun? "I woke up and was feeling really hot. I think I might be coming down with a fever or something."

Pinnacle nodded. "Alright, have a seat on the bed." Mr. Pinnacle turned around and walked forward to his desk, planting himself down on his computer chair. He typed something on his keyboard, but Holly hadn't the faintest inspiration of what. Chances are he wanted to appear official and this was his way of doing it.

Mr. Pinnacle was an older gentleman, a big belly, a bald head, and a neck-beard that followed down his chest, he definitely didn't meet a teenage boy's fantasy of what a nurse should look like. The fella wasn't a looker to most of the girls either, if Holly was frank. He was a nice guy though, for the most part. A softer fellow who couldn't avoid the obviousness of said fact. He fought it though, and even took issue with being called a nurse, which made one wonder why he decided to take the job in the first place.

He was very stern about making certain everybody knew his title would be Mr. Pinnacle and nothing else. The extent of his pettiness was shown when the door leading to his office once read "Nurse Pinnacle", but after he allegedly had a fit about it, management buckled and fixed it to say "Nurse – Mr. Pinnacle" instead.

Holly was fine with him. A little on the over-sensitive side, maybe fine wasn't exactly the best word to describe how she felt about him. It was more fitting to say she was used to him by now. A lot of her time at school was spent in the Not Nurse's Office. Albeit, she hadn't seen much of him the last two years, truancy putting a damper on their strange friendship.

She did as told, having a seat on the dark-green cushioned bed made of something close to, but not quite, leather. The bed always made her think of the ones that sad, rich people sat on while they chatted with their therapists about the hard times of in-house bowling alleys and having butlers. It was made from much cheaper material, however.

Pinnacle eyeballed her like a hawk, he had big eyes, and so, maybe hawk wasn't the best bird to compare him to – an owl, maybe. Truancy and other stupid laws had made absences into a federal crime on-par with mass murder, and so, it became all about appearances.

"You have missed a lot of school," Mr. Pinnacle stated matter-of-factly, "Are you certain you can't make it through the rest of the day?"

A normal person would have wanted to kill Mr. Pinnacle, but Holly, she was different, an experienced veteran, she only wanted to maim him.

"Yes, if I thought I could stay for the rest of the day, I wouldn't have come here." Her tongue cut much sharper than she intended, but she didn't have the strength to jump through hoops.

Mr. Pinnacle sighed. "Alright, let me take your temperature."

Holly felt a smirk coming on, but she did her best to hide it. Anyone that had ever been to a nurse's office ... ever, knew this was a predetermined act; inevitable. It wasn't because Holly came in and complained about having a fever. If Holly would have come with a sprained ankle, the nurse likely still would have whipped out his trusty thermometer.

Holly obeyed his instructions and then, once the "ah's" and the taste of plastic were out of the way, Pinnacle shook the thermometer like an Etch a Sketch. Watching on, Holly pondered whether that actually did anything, or if it was one of those silly myths like blowing into a video-game cartridge or honest relationships.

The nurse fiddled and fidgeted with it a little more before taking a look at the results. Holly couldn't see them for herself, but Mr. Pinnacle did a clicking sound with his tongue, "Well, Holly, you don't have a fever. Hmm ... what did you say was bothering you again?"

Holly felt like a criminal being interrogated, was the nurse trying to see if she would change her story? Doubtful, but the thought provided her some small amusement, "I haven't been feeling well. I, uh, just feel like I might throw up."

The last part was an attempt at salvation for what was, other-wise, a weak case. Elaborate explanations were easy for her to come up with on the spot. Most of the time, at least. But this time, she actually wasn't feeling well and didn't have the strength to fight on her own behalf.

"I understand that," Mr. Pinnacle said, nodding his head as he spoke to help prove his understanding, "But can you try to make it through the rest of the day? You've already missed a lot of school, I don't think it's good for you to miss another. At least try to make it til lunch, if you do that, at least it'll be a half-day. Okay?"

The inflection in his voice showed he was making a valiant effort at seeming sweet and compassionate. Maybe it was sincere. But, all the same, the only thing Holly could think about was taking the thermometer of his and shoving it down his throat. (To her credit, in her violent fantasy, she took the time to put one of the plastic lids over it beforehand. Germs were nothing to joke about.)

Holly didn't though, of course, she didn't, instead, she pleaded with him: "I really don't feel like going back to class. I have been sick like this before and my doctor told me I shouldn't be at school if I have heat flashes like this." Another lie, but it was a sure-fire lie, and with that, checkmate.

The nurse likely even knew it was a lie, but it wasn't worth the risk for him. Mr. Pinnacle sighed aloud before taking a seat at his desk, utterly defeated. Holly watched him hunt and peck his way to her mother's profile on the school's server. He pulled up her file and pointed his finger at where it listed her phone number. Finally, using the phone at the right-side of his desk, he dialed the number and waited.

Holly could hear the ringing and felt a slight unease in her stomach, realizing what was most likely to happen.

The phone kept ringing until, finally, the nurse spoke: "Hi, Olivia, this is Mr. Pinnacle from North Rites School, and I am calling because your daughter says she is not feeling well. She says this has happened before and she would like to come home. Please call me back when you get this message, buh-bye."

He put the phone back on its receiver and turned his chair over to Holly. "I called her, I'll let you know when she responds, okay?"

Holly nodded back tiredly. She didn't have it in her to fight for herself. She could've argued walking back home, but they wouldn't let her sign out without an adult. Maybe she'd leave and walk home on her lunch-break? That's what she'd do any other day. Bail out and walk home, call herself in and pretend to be mom, but she didn't feel like any of that today. Leaving the library, all these different thoughts raced in her head. Another being that she should have known her mother wouldn't answer the phone.

The feelings in her stomach and the hotness inside of her were overcome by unease for the day ahead.

Chapter Six – Past: Mr. Douglas, Home is Where the Heart Is

Mr. Douglas' was walking home. The chilly night air stood up the hairs on his skin, he heard the chirping sound of insects in nearby trees. North Rites could be beautiful looking at it in the right light. The scenery lacked the mountains of Jalint or the exquisite décor of Italina, but it did have fields of corn and wheat for miles and its great share of trees.

As he walked, many times, he met eyes with whispering students he passed by, huddled together like football players discussing a game-plan. He offered a polite smile, but they didn't reciprocate.

The occasional traffic lights snuck up behind him. He, himself, didn't have a car. Or, he did, but he wasn't allowed to drive it. Alcohol could be one hell of a substance. A delicious substance, as well, but it had done more to his detriment than benefit. The stuff stirred up trouble faster than rapists did the glass when they were trying to get the rohypnol to dissolve. That was a strange thought, Mr. Douglas had to admit to himself.

It was for the best he went home instead. No reason for him to make mountains out of molehills and get himself fired. She might have been right, but he still had great disdain for Mrs. Fount; her constant presence in his life. It seemed as though every time he showed his face as the school, she was there, watching over him like a stalker.

Mr. Douglas walked onward, hearing the sound of a dog barking behind him. He had half a mind to bark back, instead, he let lighter heads prevail. The dog followed him for several minutes; Douglas turned his head to it a couple times, but couldn't place the breed. The dark made it difficult, but through the gleam off the streetlights overhead, he could at least see its small frame and dark-brown fur. He feigned attacking it and tried scaring it away every now and again, but it wasn't until nearing the highway the dog lost interest. Such a shame, Mr. Douglas thought, he didn't mean it though, he liked animals for the most part.

All he did was look on at all the speeding bright blurs on the highway.

He remembered the car-wreck a little bit. The car wreck that got his license revoked. And a little bit was enough. The sirens that wouldn't stop once the police arrived, the sirens kept going on over and over and over again. The loudness was unbearable. The feeling of his head, like a water balloon one droplet over capacity, he thought it'd explode. He remembered the way his head jerked back. The car had flipped. The red and blue sirens brightly flashed about, the light going back in fourth. It was a nauseous feeling more than one of agony or despair.

The car moved. It wasn't him that did it. He couldn't do it himself, not in his predicament. Hell ... that rusty ol' Volkswagen, he'd be lucky to be able to nudge it, sober or not. Nobody else in the car though, none that he could recall, so why was it moving? Magic...

Mr. Douglas loved magic. He remembered having a little kit when he was a kid, a small set, with the basic tricks, "Pick a card, any card," and his mom would. Douglas laughed aloud to himself. Truth is, he didn't know the first thing about magic. Probably messed up just about every trick in the book, but his mom still cheered him like he was Houdini. Moms were like that sometimes. A good mom would do anything for their child.

He tried to learn magic as an adult; as a hobby. He went out and bought a big book of tricks, not name-brand, those went for far too much to justify on a teacher's salary, but a big black book he found at a flea market somewhere. The salesman was suave and well-versed, real fancy talking type, like the ones you'd see in an infomercial on television. Didn't catch his name. Wore attire that reminded him of a priest. The book ended up being this Satanic black magic mumbo jumbo Douglas couldn't figure out how to read. He put it on a shelf somewhere and forgot about it.

It wasn't magic that was making his car move. Not exactly, ... close, but not exactly. Rather, it was some guy shaking the car from the outside, it was a police officer. Douglas could still remember the aching his whole body felt. It felt hot, the hot that came with a fever, when you knew the rest of the world wasn't hot, but the sun had decided to give you all of its undivided attention.

The smell in his nose was a conglomeration of three distinctive scents. He smelled the faint odor of the ditch he was in, sneaking in through the cracks of his broken windshield. He smelled the pine tree air freshener that used to hang by his rear-view mirror; he had no idea where it was now though. And, at last, he smelled his own blood, a metallic scent that only added to the sickly feeling that overwhelmed him.

The vehicle tipped ever-so slightly, and from there, Douglas became aware there was more than one man. The car door popped open, a small click sound as it did. The interior lights came on as well, and from them, Douglas made eye-contact with his rescuer. The man wore a navy blue jacket with bright nylon yellow tape around it.

"You found me!" Mr. Douglas might have said had he been more consciously available.

In his head, Douglas tried to imagine the face of the EMT, was it a look of compassion or worrisome angst? The visual started as a blur, a figure with a mixed-matched face unbuckling Douglas' seat-belt as Douglas felt the blood spill from his own head.

Then, for an instant, a face bled in of a saggy old man squinting at him, his eyes a dark crimson-red.

Douglas flinched at the very thought of it, feeling his head as he stopped in the middle of the street. The ache throbbed, but then vanished, and the memory left as well.

He didn't try to pressure it or to force it. Wasn't entirely sure he wanted to see it anyways. He'd buy a new car, and one day, everything would be fine. At least the school was in walking distance and he was still able to go to work in the meantime.

Mr. Douglas looked up at the night-air. It wasn't too late out, probably a little after seven. The moon was out, but it didn't look that dark, he could see his way on the road fine. He was walking home.

That's what he kept telling himself. That's what Mrs. Fount wanted to hear from him. She wanted him to go home and get some rest. Everything could start up again in the morning as it always did. A little bit of him wanted that too, but the other part of him was thinking about Catherine.

There was no way he could ever put his feelings to words, or do right the sandman that privileged him with such glorious dreams about her. She was a dog of a different breed; not barking like an imbecile at whatever mutt happened to come her way, tail wagging. This bitch was special.

Don't call her that, Mr. Douglas told himself. A little mad at himself for thinking it. He liked animals for the most part.

His fists clenched like he was ready to defend her honor through knocking his own lights out. This wasn't healthy, and he knew it. He had been fighting it, but no longer.

Mr. Douglas was walking home, but his home was with Catherine.
Chapter Seven: Mrs. Fount, the wrinkly old hag.

Mrs. Fount said nothing as she watched Mr. Douglas make his leave from the school. She didn't want to risk dragging him back or riling him up again. She thought plenty about it, had plenty to say, most of it was her sympathy for his predicament. But, in the end, she only watched him open the glass-door and vacate the school building. Fount pivoted her body and walked back toward the gymnasium. The cheerleaders having long-since finished their routine for halftime, and the basketball was back in play.

Trying to make her way back to her seat without disrupting the game, she smiled kindly at some of the students. Some would actually smile back, but it was one in a dozen at best. She started up the bleachers, pulling her skirt up an inch or two to keep it from dragging. Behind her, she could hear the basketball bouncing up and down on the finished wood-floor, the squeaking sneakers, and the referee's loud whistle.

At long last, she met her seat. Beside her, a voice whispered out at her, "Did Mr. Douglas make a scene? It looked like he was in one of his moods again. I thought about doing something about it, that is, if it would have gotten out of hand for you."

Fount could only barely hear the gist of what was said, but she recognized the voice without even having to look. Mr. Simpson was the high school history teacher, a red haired fellow that worked carefully never to ruffle any feathers. He was about as likely to "do something" as Elmer Fudd was to catch the mangy wabbit. Simpson was afraid something fierce when it came to confrontation.

This didn't ever make much sense to Mrs. Fount; after all, Simpson was a big, tall guy that looked like he could squash Douglas like an ant if he wanted to.

"It's the usual Douglas shtick. This time, he didn't like how we took out one of the cheerleaders," Fount answered back, sitting up and adjusting her skirt on the hard, uncomfortable bleachers. Her knee accidentally nudged the back of one of the students, who turned and looked at her confused. She apologized. Cinder blocks were softer than these bleachers. The room felt very hot with all the warm bodies seated about it, Mrs. Fount could feel the sweat moisten the top of her brow.

"Did he mean Holly, perhaps? I noticed she isn't there now, can't say I'm surprised though; she slept all the way through my class. Which is nothing new," Mr. Simpson let out a hearty laugh and stopped like he thought Fount would join in. Fount humored him and gave a fake, dry chuckle. "But she also looked a little pale," Simpson added.

The ball went through the hoop on their side, scoring a point for the White Foxes. Before the ball even hit the ground, a mess of the students jumped to their feet, flailing their arms about, clapping and screaming in rejoice. Mrs. Fount did a golf clap to show her support while she waited for the cheering to die down. Then, she answered, "He said it was some girl named Catherine."

Mrs. Fount turned and Mr. Simpson, who had a scrunched up face, gingerly biting his lip, "I don't think we have a student named Catherine at this school. Hmm...., definitely not on the cheerleading team." Mr. Simpson said, staring around the filled gymnasium like he was scanning the area for her.

"Who knows what Mr. Douglas is talking about these days?" Fount said, and laughed weakly at her comment, but it stung for more reason than one. Above all else that could be said about Mr. Douglas, he really was a good teacher before everything happened. His smile was once lovely. His pearly white teeth once shined without imperfection or blemish. But all that was before the accident.

Everything was different now. His grin looked crooked and disfigured. His pearly white teeth still pearly and white, but with several big gaps now as well. It was definitely sad for her to see, and the way the school treated him after everything happened didn't help matters. The school wasn't exactly the wealthiest, in-fact, that was an understatement. The teachers were some of the lowest paid in all of Acera. Mrs. Fount never expected for the school to open their wallets too much, but seeing it happen to a co-worker hit close to home.

The game ended 55-47 with the home-town White Foxes leaving with the win.

The players celebrated with their rambunctious friends and family, loud voices and silly strings and other sorts of theatrics. The losing team left like there was a fire. Their knuckles dragging on the ground, disappointed and depleted. Mrs. Fount was very happy with the result. She didn't care too much about it; never had much investment when it came to sports, but it meant a lot to her students.

Students in North Rites took their sports very seriously, particularly the ones actively involved in them. Fount remembered a bus ride home from one of the biggest games of the year, several years back. The Whites Foxes were annihilated by the competition (48-23) and any chances of making it to the regional finals came and went. All of the cheerleaders and even most of the basketball players had bloodshot eyes by the time they made it back home. It felt like the end of the world for them, which was petty, but still an unhappy sight for a teacher to see.

The White Foxes winning meant smiley faces and chins held high, and it also meant little to none of them would be throwing temper tantrums in the proceeding days.

Mrs. Fount sighed a relieved sigh and tried to pull herself back to her feet from the bleachers. The first failed, but she mustered the strength to pull herself up the second.

"Easy there," Mr. Simpson called out. He had since gone down to floor level to celebrate with some of the team members. Simpson made a point of establishing a rapport with some of the more popular, more publicly visible students.

Mr. Simpson walked up the bleachers and grabbed softly at Fount's shoulder, leading her down the bleachers the same way one helped an old lady cross the street.

Mrs. Fount sent him a death stare for his troubles, but he smiled like he was her white knight, emphasis on white, rescuing her from the troubles of old age with his youth.

She definitely wasn't as in-shape as she used to be. Then again, she wasn't too out of shape for a woman her age. In-fact, she'd go out on a limb and say she looked pretty damn good, for fifty-three or not. It was all just a matter of age starting to catch up to her.

Most of the crowd had dispersed, some of them would go home, others would venture outside to the foyer, but a few of them stuck around, mostly parents with their kids. Mr. Simpson made small-talk, but Mrs. Fount wasn't very interested in what he had to say. He left her, a second later, in a hurry, when he saw the team posing at the right of the gym for a picture in-front of the stage. Simpson was all about making appearances, after all, every photograph framed would be in the halls for years after. A career move, and to his credit, a smart one.

Mr. Simpson might have been a snob, but Fount tried not to hold it against him. She didn't really have the energy to be annoyed or upset; what happened to Douglas was on her mind much more than she cared to let on.
Chapter Eight: Present - The Game Begins

The smoke releases Holly from its grasp, but she can still feel the presence of it on her neck, like hands clutching themselves around her throat. She can feel the cold and metallic, yet distant feeling of its touch. She falls down, harshly on the asphalt. It feels as though there is a weight anchoring her down that doesn't exist. It's lies heavy on her, nonetheless. Her whole body shakes with fear and she knows not whether it is the chills up her spine or the breezy wind making her feel as such. She climbs up to her knees, having to, at first, use her hands for support. The ache of her lower limbs against the shards of rock on the ground is abundant. Her arms feel weak and shaky, like they haven't been used, like two old, wobbly table legs on the brink of being unable to support itself, about to collapse.

She vomits; throwing up on the road, the splatter sound that told of the floodgates being opened. Is it fear or the sickness she felt prior to all of this? Surely, a combination of the two. Her hair rains down her neck and over her shoulders, now riddled with puke, she doesn't care. If anything, she is happy to vomit, the act brings a strange sense of joy, or, perhaps, more accurately, it brings a sense of relief. The fullness starts emptying, like a tub that couldn't handle one more drop, throwing up was like pulling the cork.

Her breathing is fast; far too fast for her to measure and far too hard for her to think straight. Every thought she fathoms shrivels away and dies like a worm on the sidewalk during an especially humid day. Where should she go from here? Holly hasn't the faintest clue. What can protect her from ... THAT!?

All she wants to do is lay there. Petrified. Stunned by astonishment and uncertainty, her own reality shifted and bent before her eyes. But, that would be a mistake. To remain still. As, if she doesn't move, the man with the wolf head will come back and she will be dead in minutes. But, will running from it even matter?

Holly fights her way back to a standing position. She can feel the restless sound of herself hyperventilating (no trouble finding the word now,) but it feels detached. As if she isn't in-control of her own breathing and is, in-fact, sharing her body with a next door neighbor, like someone else is in there with her. A scary thought ... Holly stops thinking after that.

In-front of her, the streetlights are on, they illuminate some of the way ahead. The streetlights shine off and add a faint and vague depiction of her surroundings. She feels her shoes delve into thick puddles of water that are as black as the nightfall overhead. An abundant smell is the smell of death, that foul and disgusting odor more unpleasant than anything else has never felt more harrowing. She speculates, perhaps, irrationally, that the man with the wolf head offers her the aroma as a foreshadowing of what is soon to come for her.

Cars are parked sporadic, lining the curb, but she sees nobody's headlights roaming about. She hears no wheels turning, the area seeming lifeless and desolate. She doesn't hear the voices of the night either. None of the croaking frogs or insects. The windy breeze seems silent as well. A place of nothingness, everything once there having seemingly been extracted. The feeling she feels most is an oxymoron. She feels completely alone, but paranoid that she isn't.

There is the loud sound of a chain-link fence being shaken.

The noise scares her enough to let out a small whimper of despair, cupping her hand of her mouth fast enough to weaken the scream. Drawing their attention is the last thing she wants to do. Even though they are likely well aware of where she is.

When she looks at the fence, however, she doesn't see anything peculiar. The sight is a relief, but also doesn't do much to stifle her anxieties.

That town is so small in stature that everybody who has been there more than a couple years knows all the nooks and crannies North Rites has to offer. But all of it is far more difficult to distinguish in the night. She looks up at the street lights. A small glimmer of whiteness pulsates from each of them, flickering off and on, bringing things into view and taking them away for a few seconds after.

Her breathing starts to slow down some and the blood she once felt rushing to her brain begins to subside. Beyond the chain-link fence is a house. The house is desolate and archaic looking, but also with a certain homely and welcoming quality about its fixtures.

Somebody either inside this house or somebody inside some other house will help her. Maybe it was in her head and she imagined it all? The heat had been bothering her. This wouldn't be the first time somebody had a hallucination so vivid it looked and felt like reality. In her heart, this is what she wants to believe, and while her brain is rationalizing it the best it could, she knows this isn't what happened.

Holly walks alongside the fence, running her fingers over the welded metal, unlatching a small door that leads into the yard. Her footsteps soften as the ground transitions from sidewalk to grass.

Everything is so quiet, so unnervingly silent, it makes it feel as though even the smallest sound is amplified.

A small porch leads up to the house, wooden-planked stairs crackle and creak under her weight. It's an older house, likely owned by one of the senior folks in North Rites that didn't care too much about the upkeep.

She knocks on the door for a couple hits and listens in, hoping to hear the sound of footsteps or a comment acknowledging her existence, even a "go away" would have went far for her.

Instead, she is graced with the ramshackle and decrepit sound of supreme nothingness, the ghastly uninvited's way of welcoming her to stay in the blackness a little bit longer.

Holly attacks the door a few more times, until, at last, she hears the barking sound of a dog beside the porch. In all likelihood, also the rustler of the chain-link fence. The jump she makes from shock, if possible, would've been the jump to take her out of her skin. The jump nearly makes her fall off the porch as well. She spirals and flails about before regaining her composure, going back over to the grass.

A brown and black dog, Holly couldn't place the breed, smaller than an adult boxer, but awfully similar. It doesn't look unfriendly. It looks scared and frightened, but not unfriendly.

The streetlights flicker off again for a second, and the blackness makes the visuals of her imagination seem keener and more descriptive. Where she knows the dog to be, she keeps envisioning its figure as if it is wearing the wolf-shaped helm.

She thinks back to his fingers and how they were sharpened at the bone. The man with the wolf head spoke in a way that sounded so official and robotic. His voice reminded Holly of a police officer reading a criminal his Miranda Rights. Or like a judge that had reached a verdict and decided plainly what would happen.

Holly is grateful that when the streetlights once more come to fruition, the wolf isn't looking back at her. Instead, the dog's head is cocked to the side and staring at her in confusion. It hasn't barked at all since Holly first met eyes with it. She hasn't time to make friends with it, and therefore, opts against petting it; rather, she walks over to a nearby window peeking into the house.

A dirt-covered wood, the window looks like it hasn't been opened in years, decades even, and not through force, but over time, it looks like it most likely will never be opened again. She contemplates breaking open the window and climbing inside, but the noise itself would be loud. On one-hand, she doesn't want to make too much commotion, but, on the other-hand, she wants to wake up the whole damn neighborhood.

But, what would she tell them? To that, she hasn't the faintest idea. She would deal with that as soon as the time came. She would be fine with them thinking she is crazy or strung out or something, so long as it meant she'd have some distance away from where she is. Her fingers touch at the window, her hands reading the glass like Braille, finding the occasional crack and chip.

A small woof comes from the dog behind her.

Holly throws a stare over to it. The streetlight goes out again. Still, she can swear to seeing the shine off its eyes, even in the darkness.

The dog's eyes, for a flicker, go a crimson red. And then, return to being hidden. The dog begins barking relentlessly. Is it more of her imagination? She blinks a couple of times and rubs at her eyelids, not really knowing what she intended to accomplish with the act, however.

Holly feels an uneasiness at the pit of her stomach she decides will not be dealt with. The feeling will have to wait until she has found sanctuary and would not be agonized over a second sooner than that. Instead, she pivots her body back and starts walking the other direction. Opening the gate, she leaves back for the road, but not before taking one final glance at the canine left behind. Its eyes aren't glowing, and that is because it is nothing more than an ordinary dog. Or, at least, that is what Holly keeps telling herself. In truth, she didn't know what to believe anymore. She felt like she was on the receiving end of a bad LSD trip.

Back on the road, she walks along the pavement for a moment and several more moments after that, there were still no sign of headlights before her. For a moment, she contemplates breaking into one of the cars lining the street and hightailing away as far as she could. But it isn't like that's a viable option. After all, even if she broke into one of the cars, smashing open the passenger side door with a large rock, it isn't like she'd know how to hot-wire it afterward.

She stops a second to catch her breath and pinpoint her next move. Though, there aren't many options for her; the streetlights disclose barely enough to make out where she is, and even then, she isn't entirely certain. Some of the houses look familiar, but it isn't enough to go on.

Navigating her way home would take hours, and with recent events, that didn't seem a viable option. The only thing she could really think to do was knock on another door and hope for a response.

Finger's crossed, and all that, but, looking around, nowhere in-particular looks very inviting. Part of her would prefer curling up into a ball and sobbing until someone, her father, perhaps, swooped down to the rescue, but that isn't about to happen.

Her father is dead and she knows Olivia would never make such an effort to assist her, would never come to her rescue.

She brushes some tar and dirt off from her scruffy jeans. They are ripped at the knees, and not because she bought them that way. Blood runs itself down her leg and leaves her jeans a much darker shade than when they started. Some small, but deep, scrapes are the cause, having likely happened when she was let free from the fog and fell onto the concrete.

She hadn't noticed it then. The fear of the wolf head man must have numbed her senses. But now, she is aware, and the pain feels sharp and unrelenting. She shrugs it off anyways, however. As none of it is more than she can handle, some gashes and scrapes is all. Adrenaline and fear were powerful anesthetics, tonight had taught her that much. With a limp that is aggravated with every movement she makes, Holly heads her way toward the next set of houses; this one is far larger and far nicer looking than the last.

A white rock-littered driveway acts as a bridge across a small ditch, Holly can see a steady stream of water passing beneath it through small tubes with ends at each side. The smell coming from the creek leaves a lot to be desires though, the odorous aroma of sewage makes every inch Holly takes away from it a small victory. To the left and right of the path are the outlines for different lighting fixtures. None of them are on, of course, that would be much too convenient, but Holly has enough light from the moon to notice them.

She touches at the front of her pant's pocket. Her ear-buds are still there from the morning trek to school, same with her cellphone. Phone calls won't work, however, a fact she is sadly aware of. Phone plans were far too expensive of a commitment, and without money for them, Holly often bought a phone-card every month for a data package and unlimited calls. The whole ordeal usually goes smoothly enough, with little hiccups to report, but because she'd been saving up for a car, it'd been a few months since she re-activated her phone. This is one more way she wouldn't be able to help herself.

The front porch has three pillars holding up the second story house, she feels the rails as she heads up the stairs to the entrance, they seem to be made from pinewood. They are cold to the touch.

As she reaches the porch, she rests her head against one of the pillars for a prolonged amount of time. A makeshift pillow made of stone. The light-headedness she feels makes each second will longer than normal. Resting herself, even for a second, is a second of bliss. The hysteria has been given time to fade and because of that, everything has become much clearer to her. She could revisit the awful moment without a panic attack, if only because she isn't entirely certain if they were real. Wolf head said a name.

The name of the man who apparently started all of this ... Eric Douglas.

It sounds familiar.

Eric Douglas is the name of a math teacher. Not hers, however. He taught more advanced subjects like Trigonometry and Advanced Geometry. None of which did Holly know anything about. But, she had seen him before. Once or twice. Maybe, three times. Just through the halls and about the school. There wasn't much noteworthy about him, his demeanor was plain, he was polite and smiled every time she walked past him. Eric Douglas was just an ordinary, if a tad dull, guy.

Her arms scatter with goosebumps once the fact sets in. The fact that he might not be as ordinary as she thought. What exactly does it mean? What does the man with the wolf head mean by 'summons'? Holly has none of the answers.

All the focus changes once she hears the growling sound from the other-side of the door. She lets out a breath of air. It calms her down, but not very much.

Another growling dog and that alone isn't worth heading back to the realm of hyperventilation. Holly knows that, but with the circumstances, most of her mind doesn't have the willingness to hear facts or listen to reason.

The aching feeling of fear has evolved into an unabashed pathological phobia. The whispering sound of the wind, always sounding like it is accompanied by something else, something more. All of it culminates and accumulates into a greater portrait, an illustration of torment. Of fear. Of unknown. Not knowing.

Her eyes feel sore from sobbing, something she hasn't even noticed until now. A couple rubs aren't enough to make it better. They make it worse. Her eyes are sensitive to the touch and they feel swollen. More and more she begins to hear the sound of commotion on the other side of the door.

No part of her wants to open the door, but, at the same time, every fiber of her being wants to. She has become a living breathing oxymora.

Holly laughs quietly, almost in hysterics. It has to be in hysterics. After all, nothing is funny, but still, she laughs.

Onyx skies smile down at her with their callous and unforgiving stares, as she creeps closer to the door. The door is shaking.

It doesn't sound like hammering from a fist. Not the knocking from someone who yearns to be let out into the outside, but that of a bull ramming itself over and over with the intent of taking the whole door off its hinges.

She inches closer, not really knowing why she is nearing it, and she feels the handle of the door inside the sweat of her palm.

It isn't locked. Holly can tell that much just from the little turn of the knob. She wishes it was. But, then again, she wants to see what is behind Door Number One.

She breathes. Building the courage. She starts to count to three. But, then, by the count of one, she is ready, and in one pull, flings the door open.

Holly takes a step back from the door, letting the handle hit the side of the house as it flings open. The crashing noise of the knob slapping into the granite walls is loud.

She peers inside. It is dark, but from a small amount of light from the streetlights behind her, she can make out one or two specifics. A pair of wingtip shoes sit inside, jet black. Not too far off from them is a dark lightweight overcoat hanging over a rack.

Holly shudders, mistaking, for only a mere millisecond, the overcoat for the figure of someone.

She swallows the lump in her throat.
Chapter Nine: Past – Classroom

Although, not surprised, Holly found herself forced to endure the rest of the day. Mother dearest not bothering to check her messages spelled out her daughter's suffering and dismay.

The fever didn't seem to really break and the feeling of nausea never expired either, but, in time, it did become easier to go through the motions. The first two class periods felt more like ellipses, that is, of course, three consecutive periods, but she was able to find her rhythm.

In the rare moments her school work occupied her, the stinging nuisances lobbying themselves inside of her induced less irritation.

Math did that. Her stomach ached, but in her chicken-scratch notes and crudely fathomed arithmetic, she was able to keep herself occupied. Even for all the frustrations it caused her over the years, she gave it some credit. Kind of like solving a puzzle. An annoying, extremely specific and pointless puzzle, but a puzzle, nonetheless. She sucked at it too, which made it all the more time consuming and in the instances when she didn't know, she created her own special, albeit very wrong, way of math that led her on a wild goose chase.

As it become more and more evident that the pressure she felt in her head would not lessen, she considered a second trip to the nurse's office. Unfortunately, she knew he'd never agree to let her walk home and call it a day.

The last class before her break period, some of her friends were in the class, Tiffany, for one, and also Brandon and Heather, both nice enough. Holly may not have been the center of attention or sociable enough to bring the ever-so worthwhile banter they had come to expect, but she still appreciated their company.

The lunch period that came after was uneventful. Her stomach was in knots, so her hands were tied when it came to eating or doing anything else to preoccupy herself.

The rain never came, but that didn't really matter much for Holly.

Not in a million years would she even attempt cheerleading if she wasn't feeling well. Like school, cheerleading wasn't something she really enjoyed these days anyways.

Once classes were back in session, she felt like she had nothing else left to contribute and she had about all she could take of any of it, and, as a result, waited the next couple of classes in the silent sanctity of the girl's bathroom.

There were only three girl's bathrooms in North Rites High School, one on the second floor, and two on the first. Holly chose the one on the first floor, closest to the cafeteria because it had the best reception. It is a difficult task, finding a clean stall. A used, bloody tampon is in one of them, and another stall has a mess to it that suggests Holly isn't the only one not feeling well. Public restrooms are disgusting, Holly thought, until finding one pleasant enough to make due with.

Being able to play Temple Run with the school's wifi made time go by a little faster than it would have without it. Messaging her friends funny photographs of penguins also provided her with enjoyment. Granted, all of her friends couldn't very well respond to her texts, but even still, she had full intent on spending a great deal of the day's duration messaging them paragraph long stories about all the random facts she'd read on the internet. For example, if a Seeing Eye dog thinks they are leading their human into a dangerous area, they will refuse their owner's demand. How delightful!

In the end though, she didn't find herself acting on many of her intents, and instead, she simply sat there, suffering in peace. By the time it was all over, she had read all the little funnies scrawled on each bathroom wall as if they were her morning paper.

The bell sounded for the final hour, and with that, she left the bathroom still feeling sick to her stomach. However, she did feel able to withstand her final period, which was a study hall. If nothing else, during roll call, she wouldn't be considered absent for that hour.

She longed to crawl into bed and rest until the next day, maybe she'd feel better, or maybe she wouldn't. If she didn't, she wouldn't be going back to school the next day. As a matter of fact, she could guarantee she wouldn't be coming back tomorrow. She'd be taking at least two or three days off, sick or not. After all, she'd earned it.

The hallways soon found themselves increasingly encumbered with students while Holly tried her best to blend seamlessly amongst her peers. She bowed her head when nearing teachers and did her best to remain discreet.

"I see someone has ended their disappearing act," remarked Tiffany with a friendly slap near Holly's stomach.

Holly pretended like she was barfing all over everywhere which amused Tiff. The bad feelings in her stomach had yet to leave, however, and while they might have subsided some, all she felt like doing was returning home.

"Holly!" A teacher yelled loudly somewhere amongst the sound of rampant footsteps.

Holly stared blankly into the masses hurdling about and discovered the voice belonged to Mrs. Patterson, a young lady with a petite frame and dark skin, black hair, and a body that made the high school boys fall head over heels. Fitness was important to her, but she didn't have much in the smarts department.

Holly let out an audible groan, loud enough so Mrs. Patterson would be able to hear it from where she stood, even over the crowd. It didn't seem to bother the cheer-leading coach very much though as she neared Holly and Tiffany with the same feminine grace she always had.

"Feel better," Tiffany said under her breath, bidding adieu and heading toward wherever she was heading toward.

Mrs. Patterson met up with Holly and smiled, "Where have you been?" She asked, her voice had a certain 'gotcha' inflection in it, like Patterson had unraveled it for herself already.

But Holly didn't have it in her to smart off or say something rude, and so, she went with the honest route: "I wasn't feeling well, I was in the bathroom."

Holly didn't smile back at Mrs. Patterson, and it seemed like something Patterson must have been offended by it.

"You look fine to me," she remarked at once.

"That's nice," Holly commented, and she threw her back to the teacher and started her way out from the school.

She was almost able to make it halfway up the stairs until Patterson was able to work together a comment.

"You better not miss the game tonight. It's important, and we can't have anyone not showing up just because they don't care. Some of the students DO care!" Mrs. Patterson whined.

Holly's back was turned to her, but it was easy to imagine her facial expressions and demeanor. Mrs. Patterson was the type to throw one hand on the hip while the other hand spouted off and wiggled like a snake.

"Later," Holly said. No snappy comments or remarks were in her threshold. She wanted to though, very badly. But that would only make matters worse for her and at the moment, she couldn't imagine anything worse than being in this shit-hole.
Chapter Ten: Present – Scent

Holly enters into the blackness of the room and soon feels her other senses begin to punctuate. As if, in this room, and at this moment, she feels everything there is to feel.

In the other room, far beyond, she can hear the sound of the faucet above the sink. The water dripped down into a puddle of itself. The sound is so loud and present.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

She detects the odor of menthols in the pocket of the coat hanging off the rack. They are distinct, and for some reason, she knows that one of them has been taken out and smoked. They are the smelly kind, the kind that makes it difficult to understand why someone would ever start the habit in the first place.

Everything feels vivid, but it seems as though the room itself becomes darker the more she enters into it. It's a strange idea, the concept that complete blackness can become blacker. Yet, it doesn't seem to her detriment. She never stammers or takes time to contemplate anything ahead of her. It is as though she knows what is there without needing hindsight.

For instance, she finds herself instinctively moving off to the side in-order to keep from walking into a small dresser that rests with its back to the wall.

To the end of the hallway, Holly takes a left into a room, the living room, she is soon able to decipher.

The room has no lights to assist visuals, but Holly can smell the same cigarette odor as a residual littering itself over a leather, medium-sized couch. She slides her fingers over the arm-rest, and it tells more about it. The material isn't made from leather, after all. Rather, the not-leather couch is made from some material meant to give off the same superficial aesthetic. Holly knows not what the name of it is, but, at the moment, feels entirely certain she'd be able to remember it by the touch.

In-front of where the couch is facing, about eight or nine feet in-front of it, a fire place. Exactly eight logs in there, but it isn't lit. Holly can smell lighter fluid from a container on a shelf above the fire. She thinks once or twice about lighting it, but, for some reason, she feels more comfortable in the darkness.

The hardwood floor is slickly polished with a finish that makes it seem easy to slide on. Her shoes squeak sometimes because of it. The squeak gouged like nails on a chalkboard for her, sounding much louder than it should. Holly makes an effort not to do it as a result. Near the fire place is a thick rug that catches lent like it is nobody's business, so the house might not be as maintained as Holly initially believed.

Her head is beginning to ache, and for a moment, she believes she will vomit again, but the feeling doesn't lead to that.

She feels completely filled. As if every idea she ever thought is being reminded to her, as if every food she has ever tasted is being regurgitated back on her tongue. It doesn't taste like anything, but, yet, it tastes like everything. She could taste the cinnamon off the cake she had eaten on her eleventh birthday, and the sauerkraut she had eaten one day at lunch.

Not only the pleasant tastes either, she tastes the time her three year old self thought it was a good idea to sample grass from the backyard. She tastes this, that, and everything else.

Holly slows her movements and takes a breath, but once the air escapes her lungs, it only worsens.

Without having tried a cigarette in her life, she could taste the nicotine and the smoke. It makes her feel the need to cough without knowing why.

All of the overwhelming senses make her feel like a balloon with too much air and as her mind delves into high specifics, she finds simple tasks becoming trivial, such as putting one foot in-front of the other. Left foot. Right foot. Left foot. Right foot.

The blackness still makes things less visible to her. Among it, she is able to see the bright white outline of everything soon to come. Alas, all of her senses found themselves unable to focus on one task at a time.

Her hand travels over a wooden rail, one with the same finish as the floor beneath her. The house likely looks lovely under different circumstances. Her fingers follow the trail the rail offers her and she discovers steps leading to the room upstairs.

Thirteen steps.

She doesn't dispute with herself how she knows, but instead, just goes up them. There is a loud creaking sound of the floorboards as her shoes stamp down on them. She knows not whether the sound is actually so distinctive or if it's her newly found perceptive hearing that made it as such. Either way, the sound pounds against her eardrums with an intensity that is almost enough to make her stumble with each movement. She takes a small pause up the stairs, wondering if she should continue.

In an instant, she hears the sound of movement back by the door from which she came, but it matters not. It could have been anything; a mouse would not be able to gnaw on a small clump of cheese without Holly hearing it.

The stairs are narrow enough for her to express caution with every step. Her hand holds tightly onto the rail. The floor creaks, but it doesn't appear to be old. No loose nails whatsoever, it might have even been re-done in the last year alone. It isn't long until she is one step short of the final step.

Beyond that is an open door. Holly can tell that much by the white outline, a glowing angelic aura around the doorway and everything else that lights her path without really having to light it.

Black and white is all she sees. She is able to see nothing else whatsoever outside those two spectrums. It's as if no other colors exist beyond that scope. It's similar to living inside of a newspaper or an old-fashioned comic-book.

The final stair approaches, and with great haste, the crashing sound comes of the door slamming in-front of her!

The noise goes off like a gun beside her ear-drum. Her knees give way beneath the tyranny befalling her senses as the endorphins try their hand at easing her disarray and keeping her sanity intact.

One of her knees drives into the rim of a step, the bad knee that had already been left fallen on asphalt by the wolf-headed man. She goes down the rest of the steps, not unlike a small child backwards down a slide.

She braces herself for a feeling of agony and almost welcomes it, something personal. But, the feeling never comes. Instead, she finds herself too fixated on the noise beside the front-door she'd heard earlier.

Like footsteps. Barefoot. Not from boots or sneakers, or even the sound of human feet for that matter, ... the noise of claws scampering about upon hardwood.

"Stop it," a voice speaks, in a whisper. The voice is quiet, but the whisper speaks magnitudes to her.

Next, she sees the entity that spoke said words. The slick black, wingtip shoes he had gotten from beside the door change the sound of his movements. His footsteps are faint and light, stealthy and discreet. Any other time, Holly wouldn't have been able to hear him even if he were only a few feet away.

But, she does hear him, and she smells the desolate reek of deterioration on his breath, the smell of a rotting corpse.

She hears him lift off his jacket from the coat rack, the quiet sound of adjusting clothing material. The rack skids a tad, nudging itself against the wall, but the man steadies it fast. The sound scratches at Holly's mind, making her wince.

He shoves one appendage into the jacket sleeve, then, he shoves in the other. Holly focuses on his face, but she discovers nothing, the deeper she searches with her apparent enhanced perception, the cloudier it came to unravel his intricacies.

The sound of a small woof comes from where the stairs begin, and Holly turns to see the glowing red eyes of a dog. Perhaps, it was the same dog from earlier.

She smells the strong aroma of wetness on its fur and hears the snarl of his lips, exposing his teeth. She's also, for some reason or another, able to confidently call it a male. The outlines of the dog are clear as well, the white makes his teeth even more distinctive and noticeable.

Holly climbs to her feet, having trouble staying at an upward stance.

The dog doesn't react. The dog doesn't do anything. It only stands like a statue, staring at her with its head tilted to the side.

Holly feels the blood run down her leg, and the clear and accurate taste of blood finds itself on her tongue. Like old rusty coins or iron, the moist texture of it is damn near suffocating, but she ignores it. Mind over matter, or something of that nature, she blocks it out and makes her way to the stairs, hoping what lies ahead offers a sort of salvation from whatever she's fleeing from.

Unlikely, but it seems logical enough to hope for.

For some reason, all she wants to do more than anything else is make it to what is beyond the door, and, for some reason, she knows it isn't locked.

Not just for some reason, in-retrospect, she would have heard the latching sound very clearly after the door slammed.

She makes it back up to the final step and grabs at the door knob. The sound of cogs moving catches her attention next.

They are loud. Very loud! Like the grumbling sound of the house's stomach, and then, the house begins to feed. The stairs start moving! The wooden stairs start to travel down, like a wooden escalator, taking her further and further away from the door.

She can hear the growls of the dog behind her, but she ignores them and runs faster up the planks. But, with every step she goes, her travel down increases. And, perhaps, a trick of the mind or an illusion, she soon watches as the thirteen steps become twenty, then, thirty.

No progress is being made, an understanding she is soon to come to. And, for that reason, she considers stopping. When she looks over her shoulder, the dog's white aura has since gone away and now, all she sees is the blackness of the room again.

Nothing. No outlines.

From beyond the rails, she sees nothing, not the outline of the couch nor the logs in the fire-place.

A weak stare into the black abyss of emptiness behind her soon welcomes in the sight of a pale white creature lunging toward her.

Once where the dog had been standing, it is the outline of a man. But, it isn't a man, or at least, it isn't a stable or sane one.

"Raaaaaaaf!" It yells. The creature is skinny and malnourished, like it hasn't eaten in days. It is naked, and more apparent than that fact, it has no eyes.

Although, the dog's eyes glowed red, there are none to be seen on the creature. Slits at the nostrils for it to breathe, its teeth are sharp and seem too large for its own mouth.

"Raaaaaaf!" The creature barks at her again, chattering its teeth like some novelty plastic dentures.

Holly doesn't look for long, and instead, runs faster up the stairs, hearing the sound of the creature pouncing behind her. It is chasing after her, and like a hamster in its wheel, she can make no distance or grounds away from it.

A glance back, she sees it snap at her with its teeth, nabbing at her like a piranha. It craves the taste of something, anything, by Holly's estimate, and right now, in-particular, it craves for her.

As she feels all the senses weaken and fade, for a moment, only one feeling overcame her. She could feel, with absolute clarity, the purest of fears.

She runs.

Every footstep, it feels harder and harder to continue. Beads of sweat dribble down the back of her neck and back while her breath becomes heavier and heavier. The thought of dying is a dreadful one, and, right now, it's the only thought racing through her head. Over and over again, she thought about what it might feel like, to have her flesh gnawed into. Would the intense shock numb the pain for her, or would she feel every chomp into her skin at the fullest intensity?

Behind her, she can hear the sound of a chain rattling, the sound of shackles being shook.

Fatigue begins to set in time, though, she fights it with the utmost effort, even after her chest starts to feel like it is bleeding internally. Unavoidably, however, it soon comes to where she has nothing left, where she is willed to give in. She comes to a standstill.

The stairs throw her back against the wall like a rag-doll. The ache is imminent, but not immense, as if some of it has been alleviated and relieved off of her.

The creature is absent. Wherever it went, Holly knows not, as her once ignited senses feel dampened and extinguished. She is able to see nothing in the dark.

"This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine," a voice sings, as if, somehow, reading her mind. The voice sounds thick and raspy and difficult to understand. "Lights fade, all of them," the man stated plainly.

Holly can hear his footsteps on the hardwood floor and hears them silence once he arrives to the rug.

A snap of his fingers soon follows, and like that, the fire-place is lit. A healthy flame is now opposite Holly, who remains with her back against the wall.

The man walks near the fire, his back to her, but she can make out a lot of his characteristics. A black suit and clean clothing, finely made by the looks of it, a man of class and finer delicacies, albeit, ruined by nicotine.

"No child," The man corrects. "Nicotine is not what ruined me." The man leans over the flame. "Don't mind if I do," he addresses the flame, and once he turns around, a lit cigarette is in his mouth.

Holly didn't see his face, but sees the bright orange at the tip of his menthol.

"You think you know everything, ... kids these days, they all do, but tell me, do you know what real suffering is?" The voice speaks direct, albeit, with a vaguely understandable raspiness.

Holly says nothing, more confused than terrified. She can't fathom terror at this juncture in time.

He leans his face forward, fast, in-front of Holly, and all at once, Holly gets a good look at his face, or more fittingly, his lack thereof.

"Well, do you!?" The thing's face is close to Holly's, but his body radiates no body heat or warmth from his breath.

Holly tries to look away from him, but he moves his head everywhere she moves hers. Hovering around her, like a ghost, until she finally replies, "No, I don't." Holly's voice shakes with each word.

A skeleton. A skeleton stares back at Holly. No skin. No eyes. Nothing else.

A hearty chuckle comes from the "man," amused by Holly's response.

"Hmm," the skeleton hums, and then, blows smoke in Holly's face.

He stands up straight.

Holly coughs and gags, but feels no overt discomfort, the smoke is quick to spread. She thinks once about climbing to her feet and running, but finds herself unable. Something about it, the whole moving one foot in-front of the other, seems trivial. All she can do is lift her head up and stare at the pacing skeleton while he huffs and puffs from his cigarette.

"I have to disagree with you, Holly. I think you have felt suffering. The kind that can't be measured by the amount of screams it causes or the amount of agony in your lymph nodes. That isn't suffering in the purest form." The skeleton enunciates his words without eloquence, but Holly lingers on each of them, if, for nothing else, then for the amount of enthusiasm he seems to have.

"I am talking about the suffering usually only felt at youth, vulnerability and uselessness. The times when you can't do a damn thing about it. Children are a fun example, they're what I always return to. A small child wakes up covered in sweat and tears; walks off to his mother's bedroom. His mother, so nurturing, panders to him and protects him from all the evil under the mattress and in the closet. Tells him it was all a bad dream and all in his head, that it will be alright." The skeleton stops to take another puff of his cigarette. "But, this time, when he wakes her up, the mother looks him dead in the eye and pops him right in the mouth. Tells him to go back to his bed and tells him whatever is waiting for him there is nothing in-comparison to what she can bring him. And, like that, safety net gone. Gone! Oh, gone!" The skeleton sings the final words and laughs at himself.

He walks nearer to the fire-place, throwing off the bud of his cigarette into the flame. The brightly lit aura of smoke surrounding him makes for a mesmeric aesthetic.

The skeleton's head points off into the blackness at one corner of the room, the area is obscured, but Holly does hear the sound of rattling chains and heavy breathing.

"A man that survived a war, lost loved ones, all that, but even after it's all said and done, it isn't the nightmares that keep him up at night. It's the enzyme reactivating his body that forces him to wake up. That's suffering, when reality itself is a nightmare, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. That empty feeling, in the pit of your stomach, when you feel can't continue, but you haven't the stones to make an end."

The skeleton struts off into the blackness of the house, into the corner with the shaking chains. "I mean, I can frighten you in other ways, besides that," The skeleton calls out.

Holly hears the gnashing sound of teeth-grinding before the sound of loud footsteps. Then, at once, a creature is nearing her, the evil yet vacant embodiment, the malnourished and pasty ghoul without eyes, it runs at her maniacally.

Holly crawls back, pressing herself against the wall like she intends to go through it. It accomplishes nothing.

The creature comes within inches of her, its teeth chattering crazily and its neck pushes out as a means of getting closer. Its breath reeks of shit and grime; a bottom feeder that engulfs anything that looks edible enough to devour. From the creature, she can smell all of that, and doesn't need strengthened perceptions to do so either.

As it comes within inches of biting into her flesh like a crazed zombie, the skeleton stops it. The creature's master stops it. Like a dog, it can only go to the end of its chain, growl and make snaps.

Holly lets out a whimpered cry; it is a hollow one, dead and desolate, just like she knows she'll be in a matter of minutes, or even seconds.

The chain is fastened tightly around the creature's neck, and from off its pale skin, the impressions of when it tried to break free are evident.

The skeleton yanks at the chain and watches as his pet falls back, whimpering away like a small child forced to wait until Christmas to open its gifts, in this case, the wrapping paper is Holly's flesh.

"I could release him and you'd be dead. You'd be terrified too, and he'd make it last. Isn't that right, Gandhi?"

The creature looks up at him, without eyes to see. And then, he nudges his head back over toward Holly, tugging at the chain some in the process.

"No!" The skeleton commands, kicking the frail thing in the chest with his foot. The creature whimpers away, back in the corner.

"You see, I could release Gandhi, and I could let him hurt you. Real bad too! But, you wouldn't suffer. Pain is so easy and so simple. It's an oldie but goldie, I think, but you need to have something else a little bit more to make someone really feel. To make them feel eviscerated is one thing. To make someone wish they were dead, that's one thing. It doesn't take much at all these days, a high school student has himself shoved in a locker and he's ready to off himself with a bottle of pills. Death isn't special. It just isn't the same anymore. Everybody gets to die, not everyone gets to live. That's what's special. Death is Conclusive, the Conclusion to the Suffering, but not the Suffering itself. People want to die. Suffering makes them feel it's Eternal." A small chuckle comes from the skeleton.

"Welcome to Hell, Holly." The Skeleton announces, at last, following a hearty chuckle. "Forever with Love."

Holly watches while his wing-tip shoes waltz into the black corners of the room. The light from the fire-place dissipates. There's a sudden absence as it is extinguished. Holly rests the back of her head against the wall.

Her body aches from the night's events, falling down steps and on asphalt, but none of that lingers in her mind for very long.

She brings herself up to her feet, using the wall as a crutch until she finds stability. Holly can still faintly smell the cigarette smoke, but the skeleton doesn't react to her movements.

However, the very second her mind gives thought to leaving the room, all the feelings of elaborate senses come back to her.

Everything becomes, once more, but now, even worse, tortuously descriptive to her. She can hear the sound of a deer running across a highway road and a man in a semi, the smell of beer on his breath, almost masked by the smell of cheap cologne on his flannel button-up shirt. His old, worn sneakers heavy footed on the gas pedal without a care over anything that may lie before him.

She smells the glassy plains outside Urgway, and soon, she is able to smell the scent of a forest all the way in Italina.

She can experience the hunter's dry breath in the hot air and feel the denim from his faded jeans with cuts at the knees. His boots are tied firm, a rifle readied in his hands.

She hears the chirping sound of nearby crickets on the same terrain, and once more, a deer wanders about.

All of it is too much, too encumbered, as if she is living three or even more lives simultaneously, all in the carcass of one.

"Kill me," Holly cries, she feels the heat of her head flourish inside of her, like rippling water beating against the floodgates, the streaming thing endlessly yearning to pour out from her cranium like a teapot.

"Kill me!" She yells again, and her eyes begin circling the empty room around her.

Back at the room. The room is black once more, but the outlines have returned, dignifying everything with the utmost clarity and precision. But, the room has nothing in it, besides the couch, and besides the fire place, the stairs and other fixtures, but not the skeleton and not the creature. They are vacant from their posts, ignoring their newly assigned duty of bringing her an end.

"Kill me," Holly whispers, below her previous exclamation, it is in a voice that is utterly defeated, but no retort comes to follow.

Her thoughts race on.

The wheels of the semi rotate themselves faster and faster on the road and the hunter readies himself into position.

Holly looks around the room. It is spinning. Becoming a conglomeration of different visions, of different things, nothing consistent.

At last, she sees the flicker of the skeleton walking toward her. His outline, the white array surrounding him within the dark encasement of the room.

"Stop the bullshit and just fucking KILL ME!" Holly yells, throwing an aimless fist over in the skeleton's vicinity, missing, however.

"Alright," the skeleton says, driving a blunt object into Holly's stomach, puncturing into her skin, but Holly hasn't the time to accept the blood depleting out from her or truly fathom it.

She closes her eyes.

She feels the drunk semi-driver running over the deer. She sees the visual of the deer erupting into pieces. She feels the bullet delving into her skin from the gun of the hunter. She gallops through the woods, leaving a trail of thick blood behind her. But, it is no use.

She feels herself fall on the ground, the anticlimactic flop, like a sudden case of narcolepsy, and, like that, the deer is dead.

She opens her eyes in the bedroom. The look of nothing, extracted colors, a space without stars, that is, until the white of the skeleton leans over her.

"But, I will always bring you back," the skeleton whispers.

Her eyes shut once more.

2

Holly rests in a fetal position, whimpering like a small dog after it has been kicked. Like how the creature whimpered, she whimpers. And, though, her sight is obscured by her lids, tightly shut, she knows things are starting to change around her.

A draft let in. A cool breeze swooshing and swashing itself against the back of her neck. She feels the involuntary shiver travel up her spine and the goosebumps begin to form. The small reminder that this is her life now and that there is nothing she can do about it.

The hardwood floor doesn't feel like hardwood anymore.

Her eyes have become bloodshot from the evening's trauma, but she could make most everything out. Once she found the courage to open her eyes, that is.

The road's pavement beneath her feet, not unlike before with the deer and the semi. But, there are no cars coming, no semis to flatten her.

Unlike before though, she knows where she is. The night remains, the skeleton hadn't been able to change that. But, she can see a convenient store's illuminated neon sign in the distance. The sign was brightly vibrant, but flickered every now and again like it could go off and leave her at any moment.

"Maybe there will be people there that can help me," is her first thought. Then again, it wasn't as if the folk at that nice house before were too helpful. She takes a breath and tries to calm herself.

Her chest hurts, it aches with such a tenacity that she thinks she might pass out, which might be the best thing for her. The relief of closing her eyes and not having to deal with the torturous heart-ache any longer. Everyone wants to die in their sleep.

Befalling her ears is the dinging sound of something behind her, somewhere off of the road. Upon closer inspection, the sound is more than simply an impromptu ring without significance.

She knows the noise. A deep sound, that isn't loud, but is, instead, rather faint, like someone grazing the horn of their car. The sound becomes louder once that clarity sets in. It's more distinguishable now that she can put a name to the cause. It evolves into a full-fledged honk and Holly looks on at the sight of a car, off the road, crashed into a ravine.

The headlights are glimmer bleakly, that's the only reason she is able to see it beneath the thick, long grass that other-wise engulfs it.

She walks onward. Hesitance carries with each and very step she makes. Hesitance overcomes her. She feels like the deer in the headlights. Awaiting something bad she knows is coming.

She recognizes the vehicle. A white Chrysler 300 and a bumper sticker stamped crudely on the rear window. I love my Doberman! is scribed in bubble letters above an animated dog's face. Dad always had that early 90s sitcom demeanor and approach to life. They hadn't had a Doberman in over three years since the last one ran away.

The front of the car is submerged. She nears it with apprehension. Time feels as though it is moving slower, and it isn't the skeleton's doing, it's all in Holly's head.

The weeds and tall grass rub against her leg, a discomfort she doesn't feel in the situation.

The ache of her bad knee hasn't been forgotten either, instead, rather, it is ignored. Stuffed down like a repressed memory.

She walks the down slope and feels a certain haphazardness with each step. It is obvious what she'll likely see, but she feels a disheartened ineptness to all things sane and all things human.

The skeleton has taken that away from her. The man with the wolf head has taken that away from her.

She no longer has any control over the situation. She can only follow the path presented to her and hope it leads to some leniency, or, at the very least, her survival. It is as if she is a character in a stage-play.

The car blares on and on and as she comes closer, the noise becomes nauseatingly apparent, a nauseating siren that never loses its oomph or enthusiasm.

Her hands are shaking ... shaking ... shaking!

Buckled into the driver seat of the car, as one would expect, is her father's corpse.

His head driven down against the steering wheel. In seconds, his head jerks up off the steering wheel and he lays flat against his seat, giving Holly a clear view to the remnants of his being.

Holly flinches, nearly enough to make herself tumble deeper into the ditch, but she recovers just in time. The light from his flashing car is bright. She really does feel like a deer caught in the headlights. However, more than that, it is the way he jerks up that makes her feel like a plaything for the miasma, a toy meant to be exasperated through theatrics. The way her father jolted up and fell back against the driver's seat wasn't a convulsion, it was like a ghost tugged the back of his shirt from behind and jerked him back.

He isn't mangled. Or disfigured. She recognizes him. Her father. He is most certainly dead. But, her father, nonetheless. The visual is almost a peaceful one, for whatever reason, that's how it strikes her. Perhaps it's because she could never imagine his death for herself and, when she tried, she imagined it a lot uglier than how it looked. Here, it looked as though he hadn't suffered, it looked as though it was like a candle being blown out or a light switch being flicked down.

A bruise at his temple, dark red with fresh blood around it. Some of the blood runs down the right side of his cheek. It doesn't look fatal. Yet, Holly remembers being told that it was that very wound that killed him.

"I, ..." Holly starts to speak, but doesn't. Can't. What could anybody say in a situation like this?

She stares at the blood on his cheek. Then, his torso. A freshly pressed suit. Finely kempt, albeit, old. After all, it is the only suit her father had to his name. He would've been buried in it, had he not been cremated. A small smidgen of blood has fallen down onto his white undershirt.

"Aawwwh!" A loud moan comes.

This time, the shocked exclamation is enough to take Holly off of her feet. She falls on her bottom and slides down further into the large ditch, feeling the bottom of her shoes dig themselves into the mud. She hurriedly readjusts herself, feeling some fear that another creature will come out and pay her a visit. She uses the driver's side door as leverage to help bring herself back to a standing position.

The moan hadn't come from her father. That much was obvious the second she heard it. Far too high-pitched. Instead, her eyes meet with a woman in the passenger side seat.

Holly feels her heart knock some against the front her chest, beating loud, who is this woman?

Whoever it is, she is afraid. Unlike Holly's father, this woman shows blatant signs of the crash. Her face is a crimson mask, dripping with blood. She rattles around in her seat belt like she is having a seizure.

Holly urgently races to the other side of the car, not really thinking about what she is doing, be it the logic or the inconsistencies of such an act.

She opens the car door and backs away for a second, as if, half expecting the woman to lunge at her with an attack. The whole night has been like that, after all, so she wouldn't be surprised. But, that doesn't happen, the woman remains fastened in her seat belt, a look of shock and terror written on her face.

From the small bit she can see of her, which is much too little for certainty, Holly almost thinks she looks familiar, the blood helps hide her identity as well.

Holly smiles at her, trying to come off as reassuring. But, why is she assuring her? If this had all happened before than this won't help anything or change it. Holly knows that. At least on a subconscious level. But, she acts without thought.

She leans over the woman, unbuckling her seat belt. The woman's head leans over, resting on Holly's back. She can feel the heavy breathing coming from the woman's chest.

The woman is able to offer only some support as Holly helps her out of the vehicle. The wounds on her face are mostly superficial, but the shock she seems to be feeling damn-near cripples her. Holly walks her up the hill and back near the road, the woman's shoulder is draped over Holly's neck. The weight is considerable, as is the exertion required, even without her bad knee, carrying a full-grown woman with little support would be no easy feat for Holly herself.

The woman stumbles every now and again, but she never completely loses her footing. By the time they make it to the road, Holly notices another bright light. On cue, it seems, the bright, emergency lights of an ambulance parked on the side of the road.

Several EMTs are scattered off and about, though, they aren't all headed to the wreckage Holly had just left behind her. In that moment, Holly sees a second vehicle driven off into the ravine, the vehicle has driven through the steel guard rail and flipped over on its hood.

She does not recognize the vehicle. Though, it looks like an absolute mess and, because of that, it is no wonder it took importance over her father's.

She can see all that is happening, amidst the commotion of scurrying figures, all wearing neon yellow jackets to make their outlines more visible in the night. They scrambled in looked like controlled chaos, but likely felt orderly to them, having exact and precise motivation to their procedure.

The antics are almost intriguing to Holly, but, from the heavy breathing of the woman hanging on her, she knows there is other things to tend to. Holly carries her over to the ambulance and makes eye-contact with one of the paramedics.

The woman presses off of Holly and makes a lunge toward the man. A skinny fellow with a black mustache and hair that receded everywhere except the sides.

The man holds the woman in a surprised embrace, unworried about how his light clothing is now bloodstained.

"You have to help him! He's not moving!" She cries out with tears running down her cheeks, joining the blood.

Holly's eyes swell at the sight, but she chooses not to embrace her emotions. Her father is dead in that Chrysler. The only question is why she is being forced to pay witness to it.

The man reacts with all the confidence of Barney Fife, he nods his head at the woman and runs over to the car like a Boxer looking for a tennis ball. It isn't like he'll be able to do anything to help matters. In fact, the paramedic is better off continuing to let the woman stain his clothing with blood.

Holly watches the man run off and steps to the side to allow him to pass, had she not, he likely would have run over her with how oblivious he seemed to her presence.

Holly hears a muffled whimper from the woman in-front of her, whose hands are now touched as if she is in prayer. Which, she might have been. Whoever she is, she cares about my father, thinks Holly, if only for a moment.

Had Father been cheating on Olivia? Holly toyed with the idea some, but didn't have the energy or care to debunk it.

Her eyes fester to the EMTs over by the wrecked car, the other one, the one that flipped. They aren't paying nearly as much attention to the one with her dead father inside, however. Though, as she had already included, it seemed as though this particular driver would be more in need of assistance.

A man is soon brought up over the hill back on the road, carried on a hand-held stretcher as two men of average build carry him to the ambulance. The not-currently-so fetching gentleman looks beat up and battered, but his left hand grabbed at nothingness as a sign of life.

Holly walks over to the ambulance. The lights of the vehicle have exuberant arrays that glisten in the night. The lights, a blinding red and white, perfectly contrast the black, so much, in fact, Holly thinks back to her encounter with the skeleton.

The man on the stretcher is drenched in blood. A shard of glass from his windshield must have broken off and pierced the side of his face. His eyes have maddening terror in them, unlike anything Holly has ever seen before. They are open so wide it seems plausible his eyes might just roll out from their sockets, they look like they are screaming at her, and they never stop. They never blink or show signs of wavering, they stay a constant panic.

The two men lift the stretcher and usher him into the back of the ambulance. From there, a heavy set woman with brown hair begins fastening the man in the stretcher, restraining him, though, the man offers no fight or discourse action. The look on his face looks more like someone waging a war inside their head, not out of it.

Holly climbs up into the back of the ambulance. Nobody makes any effort to stop her. It was another one of those things she did without really knowing the reason behind it.

The woman doesn't comment, doesn't glare, or even offer her as much as a single glance.

Holly sits down off to the side with her back against the wall of the ambulance. She swears she has seen the blood woman before. Is certain of it. But couldn't place a name. However, in this moment, she recognizes The Man in the Stretcher. His disfigurements aren't enough to hide the fact.

Eric Douglas. The Man Who Summoned The Miasma.
Chapter Eleven: Past – Catherine, a Lovely Girl.

Catherine's bedroom probably smelled like dandelions and delectable perfume. That's the most accurate description Mr. Douglas could come up with. That's what his expectation were set as. Even though it was cold out and allergies had more-or-less rendered his sense of smell as useless, her room would be everything he could have hoped for and more.

She lied to him. Mrs. Fount, that is. She lied to him.

Catherine hadn't went home from a tummy ache or anything of the sort. Catherine wasn't home.

Locks aren't very difficult to overcome. Someone with regular internet access could find a video or two and wrap their head around the concept.

Eric didn't have that though, which is why he chucked a big rock at her bedroom window. The glass shattered about inside the room with a loud crash. Somewhere near him, Eric heard the sound of a scampering feline, but couldn't place its whereabouts. The sound frightened him though, but it was only a small jolt of paranoia.

She had a fine house. His Catherine. Which came as no surprise to Eric, her parents likely had exquisite taste.

The exterior was beige brick, with a finely tiled granite pathway leading to the front door of the home. There was a light brown picket fence that circled around the home and its backyard, it was a few feet taller than Eric.

Aside from the broken window eye sore, it was a very nice home.

Eric walked closer to the house, looking up at Catherine's bedroom window. It was a fair bit overhead. No matter, however, as a tall enough tree was off at the side of the house and would lead him some assistance. A ring of mulch circled itself around the tree a few feet for decoration.

A short hanging branch later and Eric had successfully elevated himself enough to at least reach the ledge of shingles that led up to her bedroom. He had never been much for acrobatics or athleticism. He had never been very coordinated. That's why he was a math teacher and not, say, a football player or something else like that. That didn't matter in the long run, however. When would athletics ever matter in day-to-day life? Mr. Douglas had never once been stumped in a mathematical emergency. Although, then again, he had never faced one of those either.

On the other hand, finding his center and steadying himself on the tree branch was made difficult because of his own shortcomings.

He managed to stand up on it, hugging the tree's trunk at first, and as a testament to his physical fitness, the branch only kind of cracked.

Eric took a smack at the back of his neck. Mosquitoes were bad tonight. Such nuisances, the little bastards would likely take a pint of blood out of him before the night's end. Though, he doubted they ever stopped to measure. He missed the mosquito with his smack, but didn't take another crack at it. He hadn't time for it, and instead, he jumped forward with all the force he could muster.

Grabbing at the shingles of Catherine's abode. He clutched onto them, fighting for a grip and feeling his fingers wrap around it like a boa constrictor. Eric walked off from the tree branch and dangled from the ledge. He toed around the brick exterior walls in search of some footing, but found none, and was left to try and muscle his way up off sheer upper body strength.

Eric squirmed about and covered some honest ground toward making it up the ledge, but it was the sound of a nearby vehicle that broke his concentration. His left-hand slipped, and like a domino, his right hand and his body fell with it.

Flailing his limbs around in a failed attempt to save himself, his back crashed against the hard, grassy ground. All was not lost, however, as the tree branch was nice enough to break his fall. Regardless of that, he felt the back of his head jerk back and slam against the ground, and a ringing in his head started.

The feeling brought back memories of the car wreck and the sirens.

The sound of a car pulling into a driveway was heard over the ringing and he was relieved to find out it wasn't Catherine and her folks. Catherine would surely understand, but mothers and fathers were protective over their children.

The ache was imminent, but short lived, and like that, Mr. Douglas was able to return to his feet. His head had survived much worse than that. He dusted himself off, straightening his maroon tie and slapping the dirt and grime off from his back. His blazer felt a little damp, but he couldn't recall the grass feeling wet. It hadn't rained, after all.

The flying sound of mosquitoes near his ear made him give another aimless slap at one of them. Trying and failing to do away with the bastard.

Eric followed the Catherine family's lovely walkway over to the front door and twisted the knob of their lovely door.

Click.

It wasn't locked. Boy, did that make him feel silly.

It was understandable though. North Rites was a small town. It was a town where "Everybody knew Everybody", or, at least, most agreed it fit the mantra. Acera, in-general, was one of the most crime-free cities in all of Maharris.

Mr. Douglas brought the door open, careful not to allow the door-knob to hit the wall, and beheld the dwelling with the utmost intrigue. He began into the house, but not before wiping his feet off on the welcome mat. It was a matter of simple politeness.

He rubbed the back of his head. The mosquitoes would be the death of him. His hand had blood on it. He must have managed to kill a big juicy one, after all, from the looks of it.

He walked into the house.

Catherine's living space had all a family home could ever need. They had a large television set and the furniture facing it, which included two, beautifully textured, sofas and a beige tinted recliner. A small, but fancy-looking chandelier dangled from the ceiling of the dining room, which was in clear view, only stepping in. Such feng shui!

The house looked a lot smaller on the outside than it did on the inside, which illustrated the brilliance of its decoration.

Eric walked forward, away from the living room and dining room, and he walked by the master bedroom as well. A carpeted staircase led up to Catherine's bedroom.

A tingling sensation began in his hands and crawled up his spine like a spider. He couldn't move. He almost couldn't breathe. It made him have to take small breaths, he was so anxious. His hands were shaking. The first step was the worst. It became easier as he trifled upward.

He remembered all the times he'd been in her bedroom before, the many memories they had shared with one another. This wasn't the same house though, she had moved since their last visit. They'd stay up late talking and talking for hours without end.

Eric laughed. Her parents absolutely hated it. They hated him. Said he'd never amount to anything. That's why he became a math teacher. Not so glamorous, but it was a real job. It mattered. To him, at least.

Eric felt tears run down his cheek. He missed her.

Eric opened the door to his lover's bedroom. Skimming his fingers over the wall in darkness, he felt the smoothness of the wallpaper that decorated Catherine's room, then, at last, found the light-switch. He flicked on the lights. The room had white carpeting, a bed with the purple comforter thrown about, spilling out over to the floor. One pillow had fallen off as well. Catherine had never been one for excessive maintenance, not like Mr. Douglas, who had often referred to as compulsive with his neatness. Beside it was the rock and broken glass from Douglas' handiwork.

He walked into her room. The smell was refreshing. Females were such a lovely genre of human. They smelled nice. All of them.

Most of them.

Some.

Eric couldn't think of too many that didn't.

Mrs. Fount didn't. But that was one in a million.

Catherine's room smelled nice. It smelled like one of those scented candles. The ones scented to smell like forests, but smelled nothing like any forest Eric had ever smelled. Then again, Eric supposed he didn't spend a lot of his time smelling forests. As a matter of fact, he doubted he had smelled even the tiniest fraction of forests available. For all he knew, the candle could have smelled dead on like a large number of forests and he'd have no way of knowing. The candle smelled nice.

Mr. Douglas had to repress the urge to kick off his shoes and stay awhile, because as much as he wanted to, he knew he couldn't stay for very long.

He stammered over to her bed. Her floor had the short cut, fuzzy kind of white carpeting. A bed lamp was on one side of her bed, sitting on top of a small rustic-looking wooden stand. Beside the lamp was a framed photograph.

He recognized Catherine fast. Smiling. She was always a very happy person. It was why he loved her so much. One of her female friends stood beside her, embracing her with a hug at the side. Her friend was likely very nice as well. Catherine was a very good and proficient judge of character.

Eric touched the back of his head again. His hand was once more covered in blood. He looked behind him. Catherine's beautiful carpet was stained by the red stuff.

"No!" Eric said to himself. A jolt of panic brewing inside of him.

Catherine wouldn't be very pleased with him. She might have understood the broken window, sure, boys will be boys, but how could he explain the bloody carpet!? That would be a very strange conversation to have.

He looked outside the bedroom window at the black sky. He must have hurt himself worse than he had initially thought. Eric turned his back away from Catherine's bed, but turned around again. He held the framed photograph in his hands. Of Catherine. And, of some other girl.

Catherine looked so lovely.

Douglas turned the frame and pried open the back end, snatching up the photograph in his bloody fingers. His Catherine would understand.

He left from Catherine's bedroom. The blood let itself out of him with every step down the stairs. The back of his head hurt and he had lost a considerable amount of blood. Clean up would be difficult.

Even if he couldn't her in his arms, it was nice simply being some place he knew she had been, and he knew she spent a lot of her time. He missed Catherine and wanted very much to bring her back to him.
Chapter Twelve: Past – Tiffany, a Good Friend.

The final bell was about to ding and like that, school would be dismissed and the prisoners would be permitted escape. She survived, but could feel a fever coming along to make her freedom bittersweet. Not to say she was hot, but rather to say she was the envy of all other stove tops.

The whispering noises of all the students were no longer whispers at all. Teachers didn't bother trying to control them at this stage. She sat, in the class room, her final class room, a study hall, with eight or nine other kids. They chatted loudly amongst themselves. The first bell sounded. Not the final bell, but the one for the bus kids. Only one guy in the classroom left. His name was Sammy, messy hair, kind of quiet, kind of weird, but nice too. Not a bad guy.

The intercom sounded next, a teacher, Holly recognized him as Principal Alles (pronounced just as "Al," name's weird), spoke: "Hello, White Foxes!" He said. He sounded enthused. Always did. The fact made it so easy to dislike him. But made it impossible to fully hate him. The man was a walking contradiction. "The North Rites' basketball players and cheerleaders are now dismissed to come to the gymnasium for home game-prep. Repeat. The North Rites' basketball players and cheerleaders are now dismissed to the gymnasium for home-game prep."

Holly leaned back in her chair and stretched, letting out a groan as a finishing touch. She was trying her best to forget about cheerleading. She knew Mrs. Patterson wouldn't be ecstatic about her not participating in said activities, and the worst part is, she knew she couldn't just flake on it.

It wasn't like she held the White Fox's to a high esteem or anything, but Holly knew if she didn't at least make clear to Patterson of her inability to perform that she'd be on the receiving end of a hissy-fit the next time they bumped into one another. Patterson reminded Holly a lot of a teenager that way. Vengeful. Unable to accept matters that unfolded to her detriment. The type that would hold a grudge and go out of her way to make her students' life difficult. Holly knew that wasn't in her best interests, because, if that happened, she'd have to quit, and thereby relinquish one of her few activities for escapism.

For those reasons, Holly scooted out of her chair and began her way down the stairs and to the gymnasium. The sight of scuff marks in the hallways and the smell of dried dirt and grass brought in, an occasional piece of dark-colored gum stuck to the linoleum floor, school was such a decorative establishment. She felt herself become light-headed on her way through the classroom, which relieved her of any possible sense of guilt.

The game itself wouldn't for about another hour, that's the time they always happened, hence the phrase "home game prep," which, in itself, wasn't really that necessary. For the cheerleaders, it was sort of like a small rehearsal and for the basketball players, it was the coach smacking them on the ass and hyping them up. Or, at least, that's what Holly assumed.

Holly walked over to the other cheerleaders, all of them already dressed up in their green shorts and a white shirt with the black outline of a fox. She recognized each of the students, but, most particularly, she saw her friend Tiffany.

Holly made eye contact with Mrs. Patterson, who had been staring absentmindedly at a clipboard in-front of the girls. She didn't look very happy to see her. Or, more accurately, she didn't look very happy to see her not in uniform.

"Holly," Mrs. Patterson said, and that's all she said. It sounded like a prelude to something, like Patterson was about to give her "what for" or some such, but Holly wasn't willing to participate in a debate.

"I know you're unhappy, but I am not pretending or faking, I am not doing any of that. I don't feel well and I don't want to barf in front of everybody or make the team look bad." Holly tried to sound as well rounded and reasonable as possible. The last part was thrown in for Patterson's benefit, but, she didn't seem to take the bait.

"You make your own decisions in this world, Holly, and nobody can make them for you. Some of these girls care about what they're doing, maybe you don't, and that's your decision, but I insist you don't ruin it for those that do."

"God, you're a bitch," or, at least, that's what Holly wishes she had the fortitude to holler out, but, she couldn't, or, not that she couldn't, but she knew it wouldn't be worth it. "I do care about it, but I am not feeling well." Holly reiterated, but Mrs. Patterson didn't really seem to care about her defense, already having reached a verdict.

Holly sighed.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Patterson went back to looking at whatever papers she was looking at. Holly held doubt of their importance, what could they possibly have been? Blueprints to take over the world, perhaps? The first step was being rude to students at a no-name high school, it seemed. It was most likely to look busy, or, at least, that was Holly's assumption. Like Mr. Pinnacle with his computer. Everyone was about appearances.

She turned her head from the coach. Patterson might have been mad for some time, but it was something she'd have to accept, and most likely would ... eventually.

In the mean time, Holly had a trek home to look forward to, and after that, some much needed sleep. A final look around. She made eye contact with Tiffany, who offered a smile. Holly returned the gesture, albeit weakly.

But, as Holly started to make her leave, her eyes took to the bleachers.

Nobody was sitting there. Or, at least, nobody had any reason to be sitting there. After all, it wasn't like the game had started. Nothing to watch. Not yet. And, it isn't like North Rites ever had a full house. Still, a man sat. Just one man, all by his lonesome, sat at the front-row.

His face rugged and riddled with exhaust. He seemed unsteady in his demeanor. Kept. But not. Uncomfortable.

His head jerked back and looked at her. Holly looked off and away, trying not to draw any attention to herself. But once his attention was off of her, she looked back.

He messed around nervously with his tie, curling it around in his index finger like a girl did her hair with a pencil. She recognized the man as Mr. Douglas, but he looked different somehow.

Then again, it had been months and months since ever even laying eyes on the man. It must have been a rough couple of months for him as well. It had been a great while since the accident left him irascible and a bit loopy, ... that's about how everyone described him. It was a nicer way of saying he was a total nut-job or off his rocker.

The car wreck had been the very same one that killed Holly's father, but other than that, Holly didn't read much about it. After all, there wasn't anything to find. Her father was dead and all the newspaper clippings in the world wouldn't change that or make it easier to cope with. Still, she couldn't help but wonder his reasons for being here.

She felt a hand over her shoulder and knew from the blue on white polka-dot nail polish the hand belonged to Tiffany.

"You headin' off?" Tiff asked.

Holly looked at her and nodded.

Tiffany replied with a nod of her own and looked over to Mrs. Patterson. "If you want, after the first little routine, I'll be able to give you a ride home."

"Aren't you afraid Mrs. Patterson's head will explode, I feel like I'm on the verge of death and might as well have started the Holocaust in her eyes."

"Patterson's a bitch," Tiffany fired back, saying what Holly wished she could have said earlier. "Besides, I'll have enough time to head there and back without anything going amiss. Probably ..., and if not, she'll get over it."

That was fair enough for Holly, but the time gap wasn't exactly ideal, another twenty or so minutes before the game started, some other introductory crap, and, of course, the cheers, it'd be a good hour until she was home free. That did relieve her of the nasty walk though.

Holly nodded back at Tiffany, "Thank you," she said. "Let me know when you're done."

And, that was that ... Holly went out from the gymnasium and went over into the bathroom, opting against watching the bleachers fill out with people. She felt ready to throw up at any moment, and she didn't need a crowd for it.

***

The wait for Tiffany wasn't as long as she originally anticipated. A bad estimate on her part. Time went fast, thumbing through her phone on social network sites, quietly judging people.

Bless her heart, Tiffany made no strides at small talk or conversation for the car ride to her house. Holly wasn't in the mood for it and was glad Tiffany could empathize with her on that fact.

She bid farewell to Tiffany and closed the passenger side door.

Tiffany waved back, but Holly could see she was more focused on the time. They had to pull over once when Holly got too queasy and thought she needed to vomit. She didn't, surprisingly. That, and the traffic was worse than what North Rites was known for. When big games were in-session, it was usually disproportionately chaotic and this was no exception.

Later that night, Holly got a text from Tiffany sharing her well wishes and that Mrs. Patterson damn-near blew a gasket for her missing a chuck of the game.

Chapter Thirteen: The Summons – Past

Eric held the bottle of alcohol in his right hand. His finger nails were filthy and he could the see the dirt and grime beneath them. Hygiene wasn't one of his priorities anymore, but it still bothered him. It bothered him to see himself slipping, which, on some level, he was aware was happening, but knew not how to stop it. The way his life had misshapen itself over the month, but he couldn't bring himself to or muster the strength to make progression. It felt like his bed had already been made. His suit didn't seem as well-groomed as it once was, and that's because he hadn't ironed it in months, leaving the wrinkles very visible in the mirror of his bathroom.

It was easier for him not to look. That's the very why the bathroom light was turned off. The light in his living room as well. Part of him wondered if he had even paid the electric bill this month, the other part of him knew for a fact he hadn't. Some gentleman and gentlewoman took care of that for him, however. They were hired help as part of his luxurious new life since the accident. He didn't see very much of them, however.

He sat and took a swig out from his bottle of alcohol. The stuff was old. He remembered always hearing the phrase "aged like a fine wine," like it was a compliment, but this stuff didn't taste very good. It was a habit of his to leave his wine without a cork in it. The freshness was gone, he supposed.

It was all he had though and he made due. The taste was warm and thick, like chugging down a bottle of blood, except without that ominous taste of iron. Instead, the wine offered a fruitier delicacy with a rotten aftertaste.

Mr. Douglas knew Catherine would be mad when she came home. The blood left on the carpet like that. Her father was strict, didn't like him from the beginning, even when they were only kids, Catherine's father hated him! They lost their virginity with each other, a cherished memory for the math teacher. During one of their sexual adventures, however, Catherine's father walked in and damn-near rung Eric dry in-response. The man had a fierce temper, especially when it came to his daughter. Mr. Douglas couldn't blame him for that.

Eric could feel a tear slip down the bottom of his cheek and fall off from his chin. His floor, the whole thing was covered in newspapers and other garbage, things like glass bottles and food wrappers from what he'd gotten out of the vending machines, is not how Catherine's should look.

The rest of it was worse. The parts of the house he hid himself from. The shit room, which no longer had working plumbing, or the bedroom. Bedbugs were the least of it. A dresser drawer filled with maggots, a kitchen sink plagued with ants, and the rats that scurried at night. Sometimes they were nice, he liked not being alone, but sometimes, he liked to go outside to sleep.

He brought the liquid courage back to his lips, but couldn't hold down anymore of the stuff. It dribbled down his chin and to the floor. Catherine wouldn't want him like this. Catherine would laugh at him like this.

Mr. Douglas brought himself back to a standing position, his body swirling around and his knees buckling in on each other. The alcohol had settled in whereas his equilibrium had left the building. Each footstep had some nostalgia, he felt like an infant again, and like he was re-learning to walk, he trudged over to the fire place. Eric dropped forward. Falling like he had just developed a bad case of narcolepsy, but he did have enough wherewithal to throw his hands up in an attempt to salvage himself.

Eric fell, but not without slapping both his hands down onto a nearby shelf. The shelf came tumbling down with him. Must not have known his own strength. Then again, the house was old and the shelf probably wasn't the sturdiest of things.

He fell backwards on the floor and heard the sound of disrupted newspapers flying around like summer leaves. The alcohol numbed the consequence of his fall, which would have likely made for some killer aching, but didn't make it any easier for him to return to his feet. Something else is that, with the shelf, tumbled also a large black book. It landed on his chest. The book was heavy. Heavy enough to even knock the wind out of him. The book was familiar to him as well.

He had bought it at a flea market not too long ago. He could even vaguely remember the man he'd bought it from, an old man with razor sharp teeth and silver hair, his eyes a bright green. The old man had an enthusiasm that made him stick with you long after he left your life, a charismatic fellow and a very capable salesman. Eric held such fondness over that. His way with words.

The man made it seem like this big, black book was some magical entity with grasps beyond all anyone's wildest dreams. He decreed that Eric would never have to worry about anything ever again, would never have to worry about revenge because it'd be easily within his grasps. But, why did the old man think Eric wanted revenge? And, on whom? He hadn't the faintest idea. It wasn't an accurate statement either. Mrs. Fount was a worthless old hag, but he didn't hate her enough to do anything about it.

Mr. Douglas laid there for a second, recuperating from the nasty plunge he'd taken. The book caving into his chest soon became too much, making it difficult to breathe, and he had to shove it off of himself.

The sound of the book dropping against the creaky and worn floor, for no reason in-particular, told him it was dusty and old. Eric leaned himself back up and started feeling around for the book, it took him a second because all the darkness, but once it was found, he held it in his hands. Calling the book old was an understatement, the pages had that old-time thick feel to them, kind-of like he was holding a bible or something, and when he skimmed the side of the book with his fingers, he could see the book had to have been at least one thousand pages or more.

Mr. Douglas let out a chuckle for a reason that he must have only known why on a subconscious level, and ascended up to his feet, grabbing a wad of newspapers and clenching them in his fist. He bent himself over and reached around the fire-place until finding his butane lighter, one of those long ones with the handle and small metal pipe. He set the newspaper aflame and threw it off into the fire-place, bringing some light into the room.

Eric laughed again, like a small child on Christmas morning or a guy with a monocle about to curl up and read his favorite book. Eric sat with one foot folder over the other on the floor and held the book in his hands. The Aeonian was the name scribed as an indention over the onyx cover work. He opened the book. For all the old man's showmanship, it was never enough to make Eric actually read it. Rather, he skimmed it, and saw nothing but depictions of war and evil entities, but on the first page was a passage he had never bothered reading before:

It doesn't reason. It doesn't feel. No empathy. An action. It worries only about replenishment. Of entertainment. Satisfaction. Pleasure. The Miasma will help you. Simply ask.

\- Thomas the Book Keeper

The words were handwritten, and it was, perhaps, for those reasons Mr. Douglas took such an interest in them. Plain handwriting, neither chicken-scratch nor deeply elegant, the penmanship of a regular, everyday bloke, it would seem. Though, the words baffled Mr. Douglas.

"The Miasma," Eric slurred beneath his breath. He rested the book back onto the ground and rose to his feet.

Fables and the work of fairytale, that's all 'The Miasma' was, and for that, Eric knew his Catherine might enjoy the book. She had always loved literature, especially when they were kids, and now that she was a kid again, she'd most certainly enjoy such an audacious fiction. But Catherine was never anywhere to be found.

Eric brought the bottle of alcohol back to his mouth and took a large drink. The stuff never really became bearable. It was a taste that simply could not be acquired. But it seemed to help, and that was enough to justify his indulgence. Catherine will be mad at you for sneaking into her home and bleeding all over the floor like that. What sort of madman does something like that!? She'd understand, or at least, that's what one side of Eric kept telling himself, over and over again, but that voice wasn't loud like the other one, which kept yelling at him, over and over: Catherine will be mad at you!

"Well, maybe if she'd see me, I wouldn't have to sneak into her fucking house!" Eric yelled, but, at what, he knew not. Mr. Douglas took what seemed like the millionth swig out of the bottle. Catherine hates you!

Eric threw the bottle into the fire-place. He wasn't aiming for it. It wasn't his intention, but it busted itself with a loud crash and the fire grew some. It spurted off and caught the floor a tad, igniting off some spilled alcohol.

"She doesn't hate me." Eric Douglas answered with firm sincerity, but the foundations for it soon crumbled before him. Does she hate me?

The fire brewed on, neither rapid-spread nor diminishing, and Eric could feel the heat become more evident.

"She doesn't say hello to me anymore, doesn't talk to me anymore, and doesn't have anything to do with me anymore. Doesn't say hello to me anymore. Doesn't talk to me anymore. Doesn't have anything to do with me anymore. And, in turn, I am alone." Mr. Douglas decreed, his hands were shaking at his side, and he missed having the bottle of alcohol in his hand.

His hand slid into his front-pocket and took out the photograph he had swiped from Catherine's abode. In his hands, the photograph depicted Catherine's beautiful face, but he was looking at Catherine's friend. The girl in the photo, whoever she was, all it meant is that Catherine wasn't alone. Catherine had somebody, whereas he was forced to suffer through and endure the big scary world all by himself. That wasn't fair, not if he was asked. But, he was never asked anymore.

Eric looked down at the book. The Miasma will help you. Simply ask.

A sane minded Eric might have laughed at the suggestion and dubbed it as an eccentric waltz with lunacy, but he was not a sane minded Eric. The alcohol had fixed that. Amongst other things.

"Let's see it then, I want your help. Here I am, SIMPLY ASKING for your help!"

The fire traveled over the book and caught it aflame. Mr. Douglas looked at it as the blaze engulfed it.

"Some fine entertainment," but as if his words paid some sort of tribute, a loud noise bestowed itself upon his ear drums. It sounded almost like thunder, but that wasn't it. It was loud like thunder, but it sounded like what no machine nor creation of God could fathom.

The dying end of a black entity, plummeting down to its death and screaming a calloused roar the whole way down. The thick voiced and raspy howl of a wolf engulfed by corruption.

"The Miasma is at your service."

* * *

Eric Douglas mumbled nonsensical jargon, spouting out thoughts of hatred and self-pity, he pointed, aimlessly, at a woman in the photograph, citing her as Catherine.

Chapter Fourteen: Present – The Glasgow Smile

The blaring sirens of the ambulance are loud, but beneath her feet, Holly can sense they are in motion. North Rites Hospital isn't very far. One of the few perks of living in such a small town is that almost everything is in walking distance.

Holly watches on at the paramedics tending to Mr. Douglas. The man has lost a lot of blood. All because a large gash on his head from where a shard of glass had punctured into his left temple. The very sight of it looks painful, but she finds herself more taken by his unnerving facial features.

Both of his eyes are wide open, he doesn't blink or flinch, or react, to anything the paramedics did to him. A woman leans over him, she whispers reassuring words about how everything will turn out alright, but the man doesn't seem to give two shits about what she has to say. His eyes begin to look bloodshot, but that fact doesn't shut them or seem to bother him at all. His body has stopped its convulsions and stopped shaking, but there are still occasional jumps and twitches to where he has to be kept restrained.

Holly watches as the male paramedic pulls at the shard like he is in a game of tug-of-war with Mr. Douglas' skull, which seems like it goes very much against procedure. Most would assume something like this would be done in an operating room or, at the very least, with more precautionary steps, but Holly doesn't feel in any position to tell them to do anything, and it's not like they even notice her presence.

The blood starts to pour out from Eric's head even more frivolously, although, the female paramedic does nothing to stop the flow of goo from spitting out of him like water out a sprinkler system. The shard is much larger than Holly would have once estimated, which stresses how deep it must have went into the side of his head. It's a miracle in some respect he even survived at all.

Mr. Douglas seems petrified by it all. Anybody in their right mind would have been screaming like a madman right about now, but Mr. Douglas doesn't seem to be in his right mind. Perhaps he's in shock? Instead, his eyes are still open and attentive, staring up at the ceiling of the ambulance, completely oblivious to the blood spouting out and about his face.

Holly takes notice to the way his right arm shakes, held down by a brown fastener. Scared. That much is obvious, but Mr. Douglas doesn't seem scared about the accident. He seems scared about something else, as if he has spaced out or is in the midst of a daydream's nightmare.

Holly looks back to where the paramedic once was.

An old man looks back at her.

Holly immediately flinches at the sight of the man.

The simple sight of him is terrifying, though, his look seems more eerie than intimidating. The old man has emerald colored eyes and saggy skin, but with enough youth for the scars of his Glasgow smile to be visible and apparent.

The road is bumpy and Holly could feel the commotion beneath her feet. Her eyes, like Douglas', were wide open and focused on the old man. A stare off between them, one of them waiting for something to happen and the other carrying a sense of complete control. Holly plays her part well.

Blood drips from the scars of the man's face, the slits on the sides of his cheek start to look freshly cut.

"Shit," Holly said, though, she represses a desire to scream, jerking back and slamming some into the wall of the ambulance. It is a loud sound that suggests it to be more painful than it actually is. The old man has the glass shard in his hands, and he smiles big, the flaps of saggy skin severed off of him has blood dripping off like a dog does with its slobber.

"Shit," the old man says, sounding almost like he is agreeing with her, and from there, he begins puncturing the chest of Eric Douglas with the glass-shard.

It all seems like one big hallucination, an outward walk with insanity, but Holly still feels the need to stop him from killing Mr. Douglas. If, for nothing else, then because, once he is out of the way, it will only be her with him.

"Stop it!" Holly screams out, slapping the shard of glass out from the old man's hand.

It lands hard to the side of the bus with a loud smack, but it doesn't break. A hissing noise starts up from the man, his separated flesh rattles and shakes like a frightened cat, which startles Holly enough to instinctively shove him. Her eyes run off to the front of the ambulance.

A skeleton is in the driver's seat. And, in that moment, the skeleton appears to have sensed her awareness and looks back at her, and though, it is an impossibility to really see for certain, Holly would have worn to his own amusement. The skeleton waves at her, but as they start to venture off of the road, his hands return to ten-and-two.

Holly feels damn-near numb to the sight of him. The audacity of him. She is afraid. But she has no more tears to cry. It is a never-ending sense of shock and disbelief that keeps her from losing her head.

A glance back to the old man. He cradles his right arm protectively and hides his face like the Hunchback, but, in a second's time, he straightens himself and lets out a scream directed at her. The scream comes with barrels of blood, projectile vomited out from his lungs like a bazooka or a hose, and it feels like a fist to Holly's chest.

The back of her head hits hard against the ambulance walls. This time, it hurts as much as it sounds. It doesn't stop either. Her face is covered. Her body engulfed. But she feels herself somehow sinking through the ambulance.

And, like that, she feels herself flying through the air, outside the ambulance, in the speeding air, the momentum of it still highly effective. She closes her eyes.

The whole thing will be done and she'll end up no different than the other roadkill on the side of the road. She shoots through the air like a bullet, holding the back of her head in fear of collision. She keeps having the premonition of slamming to her death against a STOP sign.

The whole thing happens too fast to truly contemplate, however, and she soon finds herself sliding on ground beneath her. But it feels nothing like what it possibly could have been. Linoleum. The smell of decaying skin overwhelming her, and as she opens her eyes, it is in time to slam against a small, metal stand.

A hospital. She is at a hospital. The ache is the least of her concerns when she opens her eyes. On the floor are scalpels and other nondescript medical utensils she doesn't recognize. Her collision with the metal cart knocked over a tray with the whole assortment. She lays there with a faraway expression and that's really just about how she feels.

"Careful there," a man's deep voice instructs with a resonance of warmth in his inflection as well.

She jolts up to her feet in fear and makes eye contact with the man.

Her hair, a tangled mess, however, it isn't as though appearances are worth maintaining anymore. This isn't high school and she hasn't a computer nor a clipboard.

It is a well composed man with a plain face, usual build, if, perhaps, a little bit more muscular than what is deemed average. A dimple on his left cheek and dark brown hair; shaven.

"Where am I?" Holly asks. It doesn't seem like the smartest of questions, all things considered, because most obviously, they are at a hospital, but her cognitive reasoning has flown the coop.

"Blood Lane Hospital, of course," the man sounds fake with his dialogue, too earnest or played out for her liking, "Are you with somebody, or ...?"

A pause follows. Holly looks around the building, she has never been here before, but the Blood Lane Hospital is familiar. The name itself, that is. Eric Douglas is likely here, as well. North Rites has one hospital, and it isn't exactly the best situated for emergency situations. It has a very limited crew and limitations in various other fields. The whole collection of bodies must have been brought here instead, which called for a thirty or forty minute drive.

The sound of the man tapping his finger nails over the counter he is standing behind is soon heard, Holly looks at him and smiles weakly, "I am looking for Eric Douglas, have you seen him?"

"Yes, but he's resting right now, and it doesn't seem like he'll be up and at em anytime soon. May I ask, what relationship do you have with Mr. Eric Douglas?"

"He's my father," Holly lies.

"I see," the man answers, thumbing through papers on a clipboard, he finally looks back up at Holly and grins, "If you'll have a seat over there, you'll be among the first to know about any changes to your father's condition."

She obliges to his instructions, at least for the time being, as it allows a moment's lapse without chaos and for her mind to digest what has happened so far.

All of the vivid imagery of the Miasma projected itself onto the white wall in-front of her, and for the time, she is simply only trying to make sense of it. She thought again of the man with the wolf head and what he had said. Mr. Douglas had summoned them by his own account. Eric Douglas was the source of all her heart-ache, or so, it seemed. But, why?

The skeleton's peculiarities are like a child playing with his food, but is there semblance in his hallucinations, is there anything of significance?

Her father died in the car wreck that also had Eric Douglas involved. He lived. Unlike her father, he was spared the Grim Reaper's hand. But the damage was still done. That much was clear off the very sight of him. The man had been left crippled and traumatized by his injuries. Wide-eyed and afraid. Mr. Douglas stopped being a teacher at North Rites Public Schools after that. His sanity was called into question from there on, some students whispered and made jokes at his expense, others mostly felt sorry for him. Holly didn't pay much attention to the newspapers and what they said about the accident. She grieved instead. But Douglas' life appeared pretty well ruined in the aftermath. Does he blame her father for the accident? She remembered seeing Mr. Douglas earlier in the night, watching everyone's preparation for the game, they made eye contact. Does he blame her for the accident by association?

Holly leans in her chair and rests the back of her head against the white, brick-patterned wall. The smell of dead skin is with her again. Hospitals don't usually smell like this, whether they are infested with dead corpses or not, they usually don't smell like this.

Then again, it sets the mood, an ominous smell that seems to foreshadow the future, and she has no doubt that's what the Miasma wants. They are all about the theatrics. Had they wanted to kill her, she'd have been dead eleven times by now.

The sight of her father's lifeless corpse is an image she has trouble getting out of her head. Tears run down her face at the thought of it. The life altering demise of her father was once the worst the thing to ever happen to her. But, now, it seems like a long and distant memory of happier days. The very idea of that is too much for her.

She buries her face in her hands. Her eyes are swollen and probably bloodshot. He died fast and didn't suffer, but that did little to ease her shaky thoughts, who was the woman his father was with? She chose not to speculate at first sight, but now her curiosity has the best of her.

"Excuse me," a woman asks. Holly looks up and sees a nurse wearing purple scrubs with her hair done up into a ponytail. "You have a phone call from the other world."

The woman looks stern and serious, and Holly only vaguely fathoms what she has said. They make no disguise for what they are, they don't hide it, nor do they leave it to question, that is it, the other world, that is where she is. A plaything that will lose her life once their entertainment with her starts to run thin.

Holly offers no objection to the nurse, and simply stands to her feet and follows her, staring down at the floor which is riddled with what looks to be skid-marks, likely from the wheels of carts and stretchers.

The nurse walks her over to the counter, right by where she once had been, and points out a telephone, off from the receiver.

Someone must have retrieved all the medical utensils Holly knocked over, as they are no longer on the floor.

"Please don't stay on it for long, these types of long distance phone calls really rack up a bill for the hospital," the man states in a matter of fact tone.

She ignores him, bringing the phone to ear. She says nothing, no hello or acknowledgment, because she assumes she doesn't need to. Their world plays by no logic.

"Hello," a voice calls out, for which, Holly recognizes.

"Tiffany?" Holly says, dumbstruck by her friend's voice.

"This is Olivia, Holly's mother, I was calling to ask whether or not you've seen Holly in the last few days?"

Holly listens in, not really knowing what to make of what she is hearing, this is a phone-call from the other world? A phone call conversation between her mother and Tiffany about her whereabouts? Why did The Miasma deem this imperative to hear? Was the phone-call meant to give her a sliver of hope? To show her the people that death would force her to leave behind?

"She isn't with you? The last I saw of her was Tuesday at school, she was really sick and so, I gave her a wide home... She hasn't been at school since then though, but I just assumed she still wasn't feeling well."

"She isn't here." Olivia said, with some finality, "I don't know where she is. I'm about to call it in, but I was hoping it was just a case of her not telling me where she is. I hope nothing's wrong," her words sound almost official at first, but the last sentence carries a fearful inflection of anxiety.

A three beep dial tone. The phone is dead.

"No, wait!" Holly lets out, "Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!"

She slams the phone down hard into the receiver, but that doesn't seem fitting enough to express her frustration. She yanks at the plastic box attached to the telephone until it rips off the counter and lands on the floor. It breaks almost entirely and pieces of plastic scatter about on the floor. She bashes the handset into the counter until it shatters as well. Her anger subsides, her breathing remains heavy. It wasn't for certain why she felt the amount of anger she did, they couldn't hear her, after all, but it felt comforting amidst her emotional turmoil to hear their familiar voices. It was a sliver of hope, which was exactly what Holly assumed The Miasma intended.

Back, instead, is the feeling of total emptiness, a sickly feeling that feels ashamed of herself in some regard. And, like that, she feels herself shake as she trembles to the floor, her throat gagging until she vomits. Her immune system has been kind enough to repress her illness for a time but had never fully left. If nothing else, at least she has given them one hell of a mess to clean up when she is gone. She regrets sharing with them her suffering, however. Anger amounts to nothing, especially in the situation she is in. The only thing she accomplishes is more entertainment for the entities harboring her inside their playground.

But, around her, she soon discovers her solitude, both ones once keeping her company, the male and the female, now, gone away, and she is alone.

Though, she knows, never really, however, if she is alone. She lets out a breath and walks about the corridors of Blood Lane. Stretchers strewn about, by the doors, and each room looking hardly unique. The only distinguishable trait for each of them are the clipboards hanging on little, plastic bins, attached to each door. The contents, upon inspection, are the names, as well as information regarding each person. The first clipboard lists a name she is not familiar with, and the same for the second.

The faint sound of a furnace creaking, a rickety sound that reminds her almost of the wind causing limbs of a tree to tap against her bedroom window, but thicker, with more callousness. The furnace doesn't seem to be working very efficiently. The hospital is chilly. Holly instinctively rubs her arms for warmth.

The third clipboard she snatches up has a name she recognizes, Laura Fount. The superintendent of North Rites Public School.

According to the clipboard, she is behind that door. A car wreck, similar to Mr. Douglas and her father. The same car wreck. Holly found it very easy to piece one and two together. The image of the crimson masked woman in the vehicle with her father checked out well and good as the superintendent. Daddy dearest bagged my superintendent, but my grades have nothing to show for it.

Holly held the metal door handle in her hands for a second, but lost interest. Instead, she walks over to the room parallel to it and goes in. The name on the clipboard says Eric Douglas. As expected, he lays in his hospital bed neither lively nor attentive.

"You're the reason for all of this." Holly says, with sincerity, though, she knows not how he did it.

Chapter Fifteen: Olivia, Mother of the Year – Present

The absence of her daughter comes as a small shock to Olivia. She first noticed her daughter being unaccounted for when she went to wake her up in the morning for school and found herself minus one Holly. It struck her as odd, but not enough to disturb her ever constant sleep cycle.

After all, her daughter is known for misbehavior and rebellion. Teenagers, she supposed. Chance had it this would be no different from all the other times before. However, as she came home from one of her part-time jobs, she saw that Holly remained unaccounted for. She found herself begrudged with a sense of worry.

All of her friends, or at least Tiffany, didn't seem to know where she was, and the waiting game left Olivia's teeth on-edge.

"Did you and your daughter have a fight or a disagreement that could have made her angry enough to act out?" the Police Officer asks with a by the books tone to his voice.

A black man with a bald head and dark sunglasses, cleanly shaven and with a beige uniform on. Handsome.

Olivia pauses for a moment, trying to recollect the last time she saw her daughter. "Not that I can recall. She seemed her normal self the last time when I saw her."

"And, when was that, ma'am?"

"The day before yesterday when I woke her up for school."

"Any particular reason you waited until now to inform the police about her disappearance?" The Officer sits up from Olivia's couch. It doesn't seem like it is meant as a power-play or to show suspicion, but more like he forgot the severity of the situation and is adjusting to a more suitable disposition.

Olivia looks at him; a slight guilt struck her chest she hopes isn't visibly apparent.

"Holly's like that sometimes, distant. First, it was the divorce between her father and I, and then, his death. We've both grieved in our own way, and she's a teenager, and so, she doesn't tell me everything, or even anything about what she's feeling." She feels herself becoming lost in rambles, speaking in circles. The man never throws her a line either and only watches her suffer. Eventually, she stops.

"It's fine," the Officer, who earlier introduced himself as Officer Timothy, said with a small smirk that reset to his factory settings in quick time. "When it comes to teenagers, most disappearances are on-account of runaways. Arguments with family members is a sign of that, but traumatic events such as the loss of a father could certainly trigger it as well." Timothy leans forward some and snatched up the mug of tea Olivia poured for him. He swallowed some down and rests the cup back onto the coffee table. He makes politely satisfied sounds, but Olivia knows the truth. Her tea always tastes either too sweet or too bitter and never seems to find a middle-ground.

2

At the porch of the beaten down trailer, Olivia smokes.

Her eyelids are sunken in from crying. It has been almost three days since she last saw Holly.

The view in-front of her is of garbage strewn about: soda cans, plastic sweet wrappers, and even one or two white paper-bags from whichever restaurant she ate at. Unkempt grass means that walking through their yard was an invitation for ticks to visit. Why would Holly want to leave all of this?

Olivia only hopes Holly's leaving is of her own doing.

She takes another puff of her cigarette, letting it enter her lungs, then lets it leave her.

It is a nasty habit. She is well aware of that. Her mother died from cancer, after all.

Habits plague her like, well, like the plague. She'd fight them, she'd lose, and she'd succumb. That is the way of it.

When the smoke left her, as it did, she enjoyed the view of the smoke in the night-time air. The white fog. The dancing mist. The foul miasma.

To be fair, she didn't pick up the habit til her asshole husband started sleeping around with the Superintendent. Rest in peace, she supposes. She smokes without thinking of the consequences of her actions. People did that sort of stuff a lot. Be it for reasons of depression or addiction, people allow their stability to crumble in exchange for something else.

This is why Olivia smokes.

3

A city where everyone knows everyone feels like a ridiculous, untrue cliché to anyone that hasn't experienced said phenomenon at work. North Rites is one of those cities. And, what's funny is, actually, with a population of around one thousand or so civilians, it can't actually be called a city. Not technically, anyways. The sign reads Welcome to the Village of North Rites upon entering, and it is, in-fact, as tightly-knit as a town.

A lot is shared by default, unlike what would be seen from one of the other neighboring towns. The gossip is small and focused, almost singular. And by this, it takes only one post from Facebook from Olivia to rile up the troops in a search for Holly.

They find themselves spread about like a diagram of a scatter plot, headlights and flashlights seen sporadic in the night. They never find her though.

And, once the first day has failed, signs are posted up and about adjacent cities.

Olivia could feel the heaviness of her eyelids. She hasn't slept. In the same way one couldn't imagine the phenomenon of a city acting like a single organism, one couldn't imagine the threat of losing a child at its peak until the threat hit them like a swinging pendulum.

She circles back around North Rites at least three times over in around three hours, eyeballing each corner like she is expecting to find the start of a breadcrumb trail. The mileage likely didn't feel like an exercise for her mini cooper. It has certainly seen brighter days, Olivia could remember buying it only four, maybe five, years ago. It hasn't aged well, mostly due to her own lack of maintenance on it.

Olivia doesn't care if her car falls apart, so long as she could walk Holly back home.

She stops by each of Holly's friends several times, half-expecting to see this be some elaborate revenge scheme and that Holly is staying over with them. That would have been a relief, but it isn't the case.

Instead, this time, when she drives by Holly's closest friend Tiffany's house, she sees a police car parked in the drive-way. Olivia stops her car at the side of the road. Leery about her next action, it is more than nosiness that plagues her, it is a sense of strong paranoia. The North Rites Kidnapper or something similar to that moniker, running about the town snatching children! She pulls out her phone to call Tiffany, whose phone number has been in her contact list since Tiffany first got the damn thing. Olivia's deceased husband had been a close friend of the family and Holly spent a lot of time there as a child.

Olivia fidgets with the buttons on her phone for a moment or two, scrolling through her contacts. It takes only a few seconds before she finds the name she has been gunning for and clicks it. Soon after, the ringing sound and, "Hello," Tiffany speaks, seeming tired by the inflection in her voice.

"Tiffany, hi, this is Holly's mom, I was calling to ask whether or not you've heard anything about Holly or not?" Olivia stops for a moment, realizing she has said "or not," one too many times in that dialogue. Tiffany isn't the only that is tired.

"Um, yeah, Olivia, no, I haven't heard anything, I'm sorry," it isn't a fluke that Olivia detects in her voice. Tiffany sounds exasperated, and that confirmation preludes the next thing Tiffany says, "We actually had someone break in again last night. You remember I told you about how someone broke into our house and bled all over the place like they were on their period, searchin' for a tampon?"

Olivia smiles, even though she knows no one is there to see it. Tiffany has always had a colorful way with words, uncaring about who she is talking to. In a millisecond or less though, the smile instead turns back into a frown. Tiffany has nothing to help her and Holly is still missing. "Yes," Olivia answers back, tapping her finger nails against her car's dark colored dashboard.

"At first, mom and dad said it was an addict or something, maybe someone who was hurt or thought he was in-danger. The police concurred with the assessment, but they didn't want to leave us alone, so, they began monitoring the house."

Olivia taps her fingers harder against the dashboard, Tiffany clearly has some groundbreaking news of her own, but Olivia has other matters to deal with. She watches while the police officers leave the house, shaking hands at the door with Tiffany's parents. Olivia starts her car once again and begins to slowly drive off, her cellphone presses between her cheek and her shoulder.

"Like they thought he would, the fucking psycho showed up again. This time, his body was cut up and his clothes were soaking wet. They arrested him this evening, and in his pocket, they found a photograph I had on the dresser by my bed, a photograph of Holly and I."

Olivia's ears prick at the final words, Holly's name thrown about in the same conversation as a psychopath. The North Rites Kidnapper is starting to seem less and less far fetched. "And, they got him? They arrested him!? Who was it?"

"Eric Douglas, he used to be a Math teacher, before," Tiffany stops for a moment.

"The accident," Olivia finishes for her. "Where is he now?"

"No idea. In jail, I assume. The cops arrested him last night and all I heard was sirens and Eric hollering out some girl's name like bloody murder. My parents are talking to the police now about charges," a small pause, "Or, were, I don't know if they're still here or not."

"Do you know what the girl's name he was saying?" Olivia asks.

"Catherine, I think, ... do you know that name?"

"Yes," Olivia answers quickly.

4

North Rites Public School is difficult to forget. It has been nearly twenty years since Olivia dropped out of school, pregnant with Holly, but she still remembers the building's nooks and crannies like it was yesterday. Maybe because how small it is, and that there isn't really all that much to remember.

Olivia stares down at the tiled floor, dirtied by footprints. The janitors do so little to earn their keep. Then again, the maintenance for a school of bratty kids is nothing to look past or underscore. The floor has chips and nicks from where pieces have broken off.

Olivia walks by the trophy case, eyeballing them with a feeling of nostalgia that makes no sense at all. She has never played sports and it isn't like any of her old friends are in any of the framed photographs. However, one of two students, she recognizes. A boy, now, a man, named Dave, he is a few years behind her. Really into sports, even as an adult, Olivia always saw photos on his Facebook of him playing baseball with his son. Grew into his big ears too. Finally looks like a real life human being and not the monkey he was teased as being.

Olivia feels as though her mind is rambling, scattered like a bag of marbles spilled onto the floor. At long last, she turns the bronze-colored door knob leading into the main office. The service desk lady has already observed her presence through the window and is on the spot to come to her aid, "What can I do for you, hon?"

Had Olivia been in a better, more playful mood, she might have rattled off a restaurant order as a joke. Instead, she simply speaks: "I need to speak to the Principal, I am the mother of Holly Prescott, a student that has been missing."

"What can I do for you, Olivia?" A voice calls out by an opened door at the other end. The Principal's Office. A larger man by the name of Marcus Alye (pronounced Al-I), he is built in a way that reminds Olivia of a tree trunk, either that, or right to say it looks like he could be the quarterback for a football team if he wanted to. He wears a maroon buttoned up shirt and tan slacks, and his face looks mid-to-early forties at worst. Short haircut, kind of reminds Olivia of a drill sergeant, with black at the top and a fade of grey on its way down.

Olivia hesitates before she speaks, "I want to ask about a former employee of yours named Eric Douglas.

Marcus Alye's face becomes plain and serious, "Step into my office, Mrs. Prescott."

Olivia obliges, walking past the woman at the service desk who smiles politely as she did.

The principal's office is one of the only areas of the school that Olivia only vaguely can remember. To her credit, she didn't spend a whole lot of time there. The office is small, not exactly cubicle size, but too close for comfort. Olivia doesn't exactly have a yard stick on hand, but a guesstimate tells her the room is only about nine by nine, if that.

In the office is a small wooden desk with two blue cushioned metal chairs at the front end and a black, leather computer chair on the desk side.

Marcus walks into the room and motions toward one of the empty chairs like some sort of presenter. He waits for Olivia to enter the room and have a seat herself before quietly closing the door behind them and sitting down in his own.

"Mr. Douglas was a former Math teacher of ours, and for his time, the school and the students reaped a great deal of benefit from his experience and knowledge. What exactly would you like to know about him?" The man's voice is stern and heavy, and once more reminded her of a drill sergeant, or a military man going to bat for one of his old war buddies.

"He was arrested last night for breaking into a student's house, before that, he stole a photograph of that student and my daughter. Lastly, Tiffany tells me he has attended every basketball game this season, showing up before everyone else to each of them." Olivia's glare is damn near sharp enough to pierce the leathery skin of Alye, who keeps his composure, simply nodding as she speaks.

"You think Mr. Douglas might have had something to do with your daughter's disappearance then?" The Principal replies, a straight shooter's reply.

His face looks calm and collected, in a peculiar manner, like a child trying to play the role of an adult. A better way of describing it might have been someone in over their head. Olivia already knew of Principal Alye before all of this, but hadn't met him personally in the few years he'd worked at North Rites. Principal's rarely stick around, always trying their hardest to move onto better things whenever they could. Alye was a sillier type of person though, from what Olivia had gathered. For school cancellations for weather, he'd leave messages on the parents' phones doing bad impressions (like Elvis or Donald Duck) telling them about it. What she sees now is that same character trying his best to appear like an authoritative leader.

Olivia nods her head. "If he's willing to break into houses, and is apparently targeting these two girls, I don't think it's too much of a stretch. He also had a motive with Holly!" Olivia could feel her face turning red. The mere utterance of her daughter's name makes it difficult not to cry from shock and worry.

"You're referring to the accident?" Mr. Alye asks, though, he doesn't wait for Olivia to answer. "After the accident, I wouldn't put much past Eric Douglas. The accident left him easily irritable, forgetful, and downright off his rocker. That's why he made his leave from North Rites Public School shortly after. We've called the police on him a couple of times and we've recommended having him committed, but, ... it's episodes, he can turn on normality on occasion, and it would be like talking to him before the incident."

"Do you think Eric Douglas took my daughter!?" Olivia asks, resisting the urge to bash her hand against his desk.

"I don't believe Eric Douglas, at his current state, is capable of acting on a motive. The accident broke him, both emotionally and mentally. I would still report it to the police, however."

"I have," Olivia says without hesitance.

"Good," Alye concurs. "If there's anything else you need, be it further spreading the word about Holly or more information, my resources are at your full disposal."

"If Eric Douglas might be dangerous, why do you allow him into this school?" Olivia shows no anger in her words, but her intent is malicious and accusatory.

"Guilt and sympathy," Ayle answered. "Until now, Mr. Douglas has never given me reason to believe he is dangerous. A bit of shenanigans in the hallways, which we have warned him for, but never anything violent or that bad. Mrs. Prescott, when the car crash happened, Mr. Douglas lost everything he had in this world. A lot died in that car with him, and one of those things might have been Douglas himself. If I could alleviate his misery by letting him attend some games and still feel a part of something familiar, and it's in my power, I will do it."

Olivia simply shakes her head weakly. Eric Douglas has lost a lot and she sympathizes with that fact. At the same time, if he has anything to do with her daughter's disappearance, if he hurt her in any way, he stands to lose a lot more.

Chapter Sixteen: Thomas The Book Keeper – Present

Holly stands over the lifeless Mr. Douglas, she looks over every wrinkle and blemish on his skin as if she seeks for them to spell out the answers. The wolf headed man and the skeleton, if all of them were summoned, somehow, it is Mr. Douglas who summoned them. How? It is difficult for her to theorize about such ludicrous happenstances, and it isn't like the "how" mattered. Why? Revenge? That seems to be the most reoccurring thought she has. Mr. Douglas' eyes are shut now, which makes him appear as much more relaxed and peaceful. The subtle change made all the difference, making him look like a completely different person. I.V.'s are in his arm and tubes are in his nostrils, a white wrap is around his head where the gash was made. His predicament seems very deadly serious, though, it isn't, Holly knows, as Mr. Douglas, to a certain degree, survived the accident, whereas her father did not.

Douglas' hand twitches from time to time, a sign of life, or just instinct, like a grasshopper with its head ripped off.

Holly turns her back to him, and on the linoleum floor, a large black book sits in the middle of the room. Holly didn't recall seeing it as she first approached Mr. Douglas' bedside. Holly takes a second look over to Douglas' hospital bed, but when she goes to look, it isn't there. In-fact, none of it is there. The hospital bed, the machines and computers, none of it, not even the window that peeked to the outside. She looks back at the book, and as she does, she notices the door is gone as well. It is just her inside of a big empty room, black and white checkered tiles, and the black book lying smack-dab on one of the white tiles. It is almost a perfect fit. If not for the little space of white that peeks itself out from the corner.

The black book has "The Aeonian" imprinted on the cover, a name that strikes no familiarity with Holly. Suddenly, the book levitates into the air, higher and higher, until it is about at eye level with Holly. The book's position changes, the front facing her, it begins to skim through itself, pages turning and turning, until, at last, it stops.

The page illustrates a dastardly man, with big red horns, his hands pressed together like someone conducting a scheme, a sly half-smile on his face. On the page adjacent, is a white silhouette within darkness, running for their life from a hooded figure that looks an awful lot like Jack the Ripper. Written in the book are undecipherable words written in a different language, but as Holly thinks that thought, the words make a seamless transition to English:

"The Summoner is allotted "One Victim" for The Miasma to rid them of. The payment for said act is the soul of "The Summoner," who will join the confines of The Aeonian. (pictured above the "dastardly" man)

The Victim is targeted, unless pending the death of "The Summoner," as payment cannot be received for said act. The Victim will be allotted chances for his or her own survival."

The second Holly reads the words, the book shuts in front of her, startling her, she flinches, closing her eyes. When she opens them again, she stands on a cobblestone path, the cold air much colder than she remembered outside of the hospital. The sooty, dark and bumpy stone rock ground is certainly unlike anything she has seen in North Rites before. The smell in the air is of fresh bread and smoke, a good smell, despite the latter.

The sound of a horse whinnying behind her catches her off-guard her. Makes her jump.

"Watch it, girl!" A thick accented man yells out. She turns around to meet eyes with a heavy man with a thick brown handlebar mustache. He sits inside of a large carriage, being pulled by two horses.

Holly obliges him, "watching it," she steps off to the side and allows him to pass, watching in confusion at the dirty glare he gives her.

The man seems peculiar, but from the look on his face, it would seem as though he thought her to be peculiar as well.

Holly watches the carriage roll down the stone road, and while, at first, she assumes him an Amish man in his carriage, she soon notices others in carriages as well. A vast amount, in-fact. A crowded amount, roadways encumbered by chariots. Men walking in black top hats, and women in white, long dresses.

She steps further down the roadway, the moonlight lending some inspection on her surroundings, as usual. That, and some lanterns hang up above the porches of many households. The houses are all strange, a Victorian setting for many of them that harkens back the allure of a very different era, built with brick in slate roofs, many of which look unsanitary, old or abandoned. All jammed together tightly with only small spaces in between them.

The scent of the city is dampness, whatever that means, it smells wet, mildewy even. Unclean. Holly walks through the crowds of untimely dressed civilians, bowing her head so as not to be observed or noticed.

Beside the carriages are women, smiling widely, their legs puffed out like they did in the black and white movies for when a woman was trying to hitchhike. Unlike many of the women in the carriages, these women wore more revealing dresses, much less left to the imagination.

The men whistle at them, making grabs with little courtesy of where they grope. They are whores, Holly utters beneath her breath, without really meaning to. The simple surrealism left her blood running cold.

"Madam!" Holly feels her jacket being unzipped and jolts, making eye contact with an older gentleman with a bald head. This man wears a black top hat and a well-treated suit, his wrinkled expression brings to mind the closed curtain after a school play. She resists the urge to drive her forearm to his skull, but he seems taken simply by her restraints. "How dare you? Have you the faintest clue who I am?"  
Holly backs away, zipping up her jacket, she shakes her head, "No," with her head pointed down.

"I'm your undoing, Holly Prescott," the old man announces, and as Holly raises her head, the man laughs loudly, a delirious cackle of gleeful excitement.

She recognizes the old man, he is the same old man that was in the ambulance with Eric Douglas. Holly tries to run away from him, but as she does, she feels her arm clutched by the haggard and scarred man. She battles with him, shoving him forward, she breaks free and disappears amongst the crowd of civilians.

But, in the midst of the crowd, she feels the scenery change again. Before her very eyes, like flickering lights making a less than seamless transition.

Before her, she finds herself in a room, men encumber it, shirtless, their bodies scathed with blemishes and wounds. Fire from nearby torches illuminate the room. Their containment resembles that of a dungeon or a chamber even. In the breaks in the crowd, Holy can see steel pillars that remind her of a prison cell.

"Men and women," a voice speaks, Holly recognizes it as the old man's, "All of us are animals by nature, no fancy suits will ever hope to change that. We fuck like animals and we hunt like animals, but society can't allow such behavior to be deemed as the norm."

"Aeonian! Aeonian! Aeonian!" A chant gathers throughout the room, in unison with a clap from each of the shirtless males and females. They wear only short black clothes as leggings.

Holly listens in on their ululations, and through the cracks in-between figures, her sight bleeds fourth to behold the old man sitting at a throne-like chair, a slick jet-black chair with a book spread over the top like an overhead banner. The book has the same nondescript language as the one she'd seen earlier, a betting man would assume it as The Aeonian.

"The only book that has ever mattered, our actual Bible. It is said that five figures once ascended up to the heavens, sacrificing themselves for the good of mankind. It is also said that their sacrifice created destruction, and from the debris of their turmoils, a residual aftermath burrowed into the Mountain of Jalint. Captured, but a taste of the Mountain's confines, The Aeonian." The old man pauses, allowing for the chanting to continue, until, at last, putting his hand up and causing for them to cease. He commands the respect of the crowd at its entirety, whoever he is. "Some do the right thing for the wrong reason, some do the wrong thing for the right reason, and some do the wrong thing ... because they're bored. And, ladies and gentleman, by these correct principles it can be found there is no wrong thing that can be done, and thereby, let us be entertained!" the old man concludes, throwing his hands up in the air as he did so.

Behind her, Holly hears the sound of rickety wheels traveling over the ground floor, which are stone steps, larger, but not entirely unlike the ones lining the roadway outside. Men and women roll a cage over near the front of the room, rolling it forward, meanwhile, the old man looks on with quiet enjoyment. Inside of the cage, a man wearing scruffy peasant clothes, his face dirty by soot and grime. His body shook with fear, his eyes, unwilling to look up and face the old man.

"This man has been sentenced to death. And, for what reason, I ask you?" The old man speaks with a stern grin, the sound of self-righteous conviction in his inflection.

The man inside the cage is silent, doing his best not even to acknowledge the old man that is speaking to him.

"For what reason, I ask you!?" The old man jerks up from his chair, the anger radiating in his voice. And, as he does, one of the half naked men jabs a spear into the back of the caged man. It isn't a small nudge either, but rather, a puncturing stab that digs into his flesh.

"...whistling... woman," the man mumbles.

"Excuse me, I didn't hear that? Let's try and make sure we're nice and clear next time," The old man replies, putting the tip of his finger to his ear to illustrate the fact.

"Whistling at a great lady," the man speaks, better enunciating his words.

"Whistling at a great lady," the old man repeats, making a snappy tsk tsk sound with his lips. "You're lucky we didn't string you up by your scrotum for such an act.

Small laughter comes from the crowd, them even aware of the outlandishness of the punishment. Holly feels a sudden unease, which she has felt through the entirety of her tenure in the world of madness, but now, particularly, it stings like a thousand wasps. She looks around the room for an exit, but nothing jumps out at her. The smell of body odor and the coppery aroma of blood is the only things evident.

"You will die, but your legacy will live on, as once was, our entertainment." The old man smirks, looking over to the book at the top of the throne. "It doesn't reason! It doesn't feel! NO EMPATHY! An action. It worries only about replenishment. Of entertainment. Satisfaction. Pleasure. Miasma, as The Book Keeper, our friend here beseeches your service!"

Holly feels the cool chill of smoke around her ankles and winces, as it reminds her of the Miasma's clutch around her. The only solace is in the fact the Miasma doesn't appear to be with her in mind.

In an instant, a wall of fog becomes visible at the side of the throne, a figure steps out. Holly immediately recognizes it as the man with the wolf head. He walks with purpose, not acknowledging anyone at all in the room except for the caged man before him. The sound of his steel boots on the ground could be heard in the silence. The room is hushed, and not only are the boots plainly heard, but Holly could swear she hears the sound of the smoke breaking around him like water steaming over a fire.

"The Miasma is at your service," the voice speaks, once more with its random inflection, varying from high pitch to soft. The noise is robotic almost, and now, upon inspection, the wolf indeed wears armor, burnt black. "We shall target and eliminate one person, the price being your soul, for eternity shall belong to us."

"He accepts, he accepts, he accepts! Of course, he accepts! The life of his child depends on it, after all!" The old man screeches, yelling loudly.

The man with the wolf head throws his eyes over the old man for only a brief second until jerking his head back fast to the man in the cage. "Is this correct?"

"What are you going to do with me?" The man asks, his voice clearly rattled as he speaks. His hands pamper his stomach from where he had been attacked with the spear earlier, the blood still shedding itself out of him.

"You will join us, and we will be as one, you, a member of our flock," the man with the wolf head walks around the cage. He does not stop to make sure he isn't running in-front of the neighboring crowd, and instead, as he nears, the crowd backs itself away from him.

"Does it ... hurt?" The man asks, his eyes not making contact with the wolf.

Holly's eyes look over to the old man, his expression shows disinterest in the peasant's worries; anxious more than all else, ready is another word to describe him.

"Immeasurably, but you'll be feeling far more than simply pain as one of us. You will sensations of all sorts, both good and bad. Some don't like what they feel the welcoming touch of The Miasma's grace, they describe it as the feeling of sharp prongs protruding into each pore of the body. They, then, acquire a satisfaction, find their place amongst them." The wolf's voice is far from reassuring, if anything at all, his demeanor intimidates Holly and his voice makes her nervous with its radiating array of pitch.

"Ah, yes, yes, what will it be, a little bit of scrapes and bruises, or your dead son's head on a wooden stake in my master bedroom?" The old man bellows.

The wolf straightens his composure, and judging by his body language, it looks almost as if he is irritated by the old man's participation.

"What will it be?" The wolf asks again.

"I'll do it," the peasant speaks, looking up at the wolf with bloodshot eyes.

The crowd cheers loudly in response, Holly finds herself brushed against and shoved by the herd of wild men.

"Who is your victim?" The wolf asks.

"He'd like you to kill his wife," The old man answers fast, and in mere seconds, finds himself grabbed by the throat by the wolf headed man.

"You will not speak on his behalf again," the wolf's voice does not change tones, but keeps a fiery, deep intensity.

It was clear that the man with the wolf head had very deep rooted principles in-place regarding his tasks, that he had guidelines that had to be followed exactly as they were cultivated.

"Of course, of course not, no, never," the old man says, surprised by the wolf's actions. The crowd seemed surprised as well, they had gasped in unison with each other at the very moment the wolf's clawed fingers clutched their leader's throat. "It's just, we have his wife and son, and both are dead if one isn't."

"You're going to burn in hell for this," the peasant yells out, fueled more by anger than sadness or fear.

The man with the wolf head releases the wrinkly book keeper from his clutches. The old man, then, pampers his neck, theatrically gasping for air, then, spoke: "No, you are."

2

Holly finds herself walking through a dark alleyway with the same sense of confusion that comes with her almost as second-nature. The look might as well have been plastered on her face. The alleyway wreaks of muddied rain water and the foul odor of horse manure, or, at least, she presumes it belongs to a horse. In a moment, she takes sight of someone or something not far from her.

A figure with a hat on his head and a long, black coat.

Holly is leery with her footsteps, so as not to make him aware of her. In an instant, however, she has to muffle her own wince at the sight before her.

The dark figure holds a knife in his hands, and pinned against the wall is a woman, her screams muffled. Her mouth covered with his forearm and the sleeve of his overcoat. He gouges at her with the large blade, however, he targets not the face or the throat, but the lower section of her stomach.

The man handles the knife with fast precision, knowing exactly where to slice and exactly where to stab. The only sound Holly hears in the faint darkness is the blade's movements, she can hear the sound as it pierces one part of flesh, then, the next. In seconds, however, before Holly has a chance to even fully regain her composure lost by the spectacle, the man brings the knife away from the woman and Holly watches on as something spills onto the ground.

Holly screams the moment she fathoms what it is. She couldn't contain it. And, while she cups her hand over her mouth, it is of no use, and the figure is now aware of her presence.

She backs herself away slowly, feeling a certain petrified fear that makes it difficult for her to turn away from the murderer. No matter, she soon watches as the figure takes his attention off from the fallen victim and motions his knife, pointing it out in her direction. It strikes her as a silent promise that what happened to that woman also awaits her. The man zips toward her. And, the word "zips" is meant quite literally, with the figure moving too fast for Holly's eyes to adjust.

In a moment, the figure is nose to nose with Holly, the warm breath coming from the mouth holes of the helm, this is the man with the wolf head at work. Having already toyed with his prey, the same way as he is doing to her.

"Oh, the things we still have to show you," the wolf squeaks, the light of a nearby lantern shining on his helm, Holly could see the stains of dried blood and the smell of charcoal on his breath.

3

Holly drops to her knees and lets out a scream at the top of her lungs, the scream has enough power behind it to be heard from the highest of rooftops. Hell, if Olivia would listen, she might even have been able to hear it from the "other side," but the words aren't audible.

Muted, her words cannot be heard at all. She couldn't cry her cries or sigh her sighs. No longer in control. The vessel she resides in arose to its feet. Not her. Someone else.

Her, the figure, sprints throughout the blackness of the night, walking about the cobblestone pathway with a sense of know-how and direction. The vessel leads itself into the street-way, looking about the town with purpose. Holly makes her best effort at trying to squirm or disrupt the maneuvering, but it has no effect. She has no control of her body at all, and she is beginning to panic. Herself, feeling reduced to nothing more than the vehicle for some embodiment, herself no longer in her body's driver seat.

Still, she does not hear the upbeat commotion of her heart or her hands shaking, she isn't in control of them after all. But, her thoughts rush together like the shouting whispers of a thousand and one muffled screaming heads.

The figure leads itself on through the streets, walking at a brisk speed. Its head jerks left and right, and by default, that is where Holly looks. She can hear its heavy breathing, and is thereby able to identify it as a man. He runs in front of a carriage, flailing his arms and yelling, "Stop!" with a voice that sounds more like a boy than a man.

The carriage obliges, "What the hell do you think you're doing?" The man in the carriage asks, and, at that moment, the man springs to the side of the carriage, at the door, and snatching a knife out from his pocket, slits the carriage driver's throat.

Holly winces to herself, unable to do it aloud. The blood leaves him, it's darker than she would have imagined. It looks like oil in the night. The man gags, holding his throat as if he is intending to plug the hole in his neck, but it is no use.

The man flips the carriage driver over the carriage door and down onto the cobblestone streets. From there, the man climbs over and into the carriage, taking the reins. And, as he does, Holly notices he (they?) has been carrying a large book in one hand. The Aeonian being the only book that seemingly matters, it is easy for Holly to imagine which it is.

He places the book by his side in the spare seat and slaps down the ropes of the reins, forcing the horse to continue forward without its fallen master. The horse obliges without dispute and hurries about with their travels throughout the city.

Holly makes careful note of all the buildings, the out of date intricacies, the brothel, and the whores killed in the dark alleyways by the hooded figure. Had the cult group she'd seen earlier killed often? She knows the answer to that question without really needing to ask. The cult is a group of mass murderers, killing through the use of the book. Furthermore, it seems certain that this is a different time-period, the miasma had taken her back to her father's accident, but this was much, much further than that.

The man drives his bloodied knife down into the book unexpectedly, but it can't even puncture through the cover-work. "I expected as much," the figure admits, but it isn't aloud. Rather, the voice is coming from inside his, ... their head! "To kill the snake, you cut off the head," He whispers to himself.

"STOP!" A group of men yell from behind him, three or four carriages follow after him, them traveling fast with rifles rested on their shoulders, men posted at the side, ready to shoot when the order is given.

"Fuck! Fuck! FUCK!" The man yells. Holly knows for certain that this is aloud and not in his head. "Fuck it, have to do something else," and, at that exact thought, Holly hears the sound of a gun being fired.

The bullet hits a wheel of the carriage, causing for it to swivel uncontrollably for a moment. The horse reacts; frightened, it whinnies, but it keeps it pace. The man flicks open the book, his eyes are watching on at the street ahead.

Another bullet fired, it misses.

"Miasma, I request your service, kill Thomas Chile, kill The Book Keeper!" The man yells, and, at that moment, watches as a bullet drives itself into the side of his horse's skull. He leaps out fast from the carriage and hurries off into a dark alleyway, racing off from the guards. "Now, all I have to do is stay alive long enough."

Holly hears the footsteps of nearby guards, their boots clinging against the ground at a synchronized pace.

4

Holly lays on the floor of the dungeon. The room that had once held the cult of shouting men is now empty except for two souls. Herself and Thomas. Holly tries to rise to her feet. But her hands feel too weak to help her. They swivel from left to right until her body falls back down to the ground. She awkwardly brings herself to her knees and looks up at Thomas sitting in his throne.

Thomas looks nervous and afraid, twirling a glass cup in one of his hands with rattling finger-tips. Shortly thereafter, a smoke fog wraps around his neck like a leash and yanks him harshly off from his throne with such suddenness that Holly even flinched in-response to it. Thomas rolls forward, the "humph" sound of his surprise, he falls harsh against the hard floor, rolling once. He climbs up to his feet fast.

"No, no, please," he cries out fast, scoping out the room, looking for something, some way to free himself from the entity's clutches, until, at last he is fully seized by the smoke.

And, then, answering his plaintive cries. The man with the wolf head steps from the blackness out a corner of the room.

"You'll have to excuse the restraints; while it makes formal conversation imbalanced, it is imperative for such occasions."

"You can't kill me!" Thomas screams defiantly, "You NEED me! I got you more business than you could ever dream of."

"Abundance means nothing to us," the wolf comments. "And you mean nothing to us. You are a nuisance. A pest." Soon, as The Wolf raises his deeply scarred and clawed hand, the leash around Thomas' throat evolves into a noose, lifting him into the air, gagging him.

"Wait... wait, you can't kill me yet, "The Book Keeper yells out.

"Oh, rest assured, we have no intention on being hasty," The Wolf replies back, a small chuckle beneath his breath that sounds raspy, like a burn victim that needs a machine to talk for itself.

5

The screams are loud and seem to be without end, Holly watches on with no other choice than to watch the man be decimated before her eyes, taking some small satisfaction. Seeing a man as vile as Thomas Chile treated as such, but it is in seconds that the satisfaction becomes discomfort, and then, disgust.

Thomas Chile looks as though he has been beaten, a battered face, shirt ripped off to expose battered ribs. Holly knows from his expression, however, the first of it was the mental torment. Whatever he has been through, the cuts and scrapes are the least of his problems.

Blood runs down from his temple to his cheek, then off his chin. "Kill me," Thomas says quietly. Holly remembers wanting the same thing with all her heart at one moment. She walks near him, without thinking of why, and a second later, sees as the smoke snatches him by the arms and leaves him outstretched, yanking and pulling on him. The smoke starts to engulf him as Thomas screams in agony. And soon after, the smoke drips off his body before fading away as if it were never there. The smoke isn't the only thing that drips off of him, however. His flesh slides off from the bone in a way that seems so seamless and without complication. Blood spilling out of him in thick splashes. Intestines pouring out onto the ground below, making an acidic hissing sound as they hit the ground.

"Goodbye, Thomas Chile," the voice comes from behind Holly, who jumps at the sight, falling down to a seated position. The man with the wolf head is literally inches away from her, but like everyone else, he doesn't acknowledge her.

She watches on as the smoke engulfs the wolf, wraps around him in a swirling fog that acts as a portal of sorts where only the sounds of screams and suffering could be heard. Blood sprays out from the inside of the haze, dampening Holly's face. Wearing the crimson mask, Holly makes no attempt to wipe it from her brow and instead looks on into the fog, as if anticipating her own future.

The smoke soon leaves, splattering down into the cracks and crevices of the ground, going away without a trace. What is left of Thomas the Book Keeper is nothing except for a large ocean of his blood and skeletal remains.

Holly feels tears stream down her cheek, knowing, in-fact, she will inevitably die inside of this "other world," and, not only that, but it'd be a painful death that leaves her body as a creature among all the others.

She looks up at the man with the wolf head, who remains still, looking at the remains of Thomas Chile.

His head jerks abruptly, however, and looks onward at Holly, who flinches.

Her next sight is not on him, however, but the reassembled remains of Thomas The Book Keeper, who stands tall.

"It hurts to revisit moments from ones' past. The painful ones. I, for one, ... well, I understand that."

The Skeleton walks closer to Holly, who feels too overwhelmed inside to feel fear anymore and instead, goes back to feeling a sense of heaviness and excess angst.

"But that's exactly what we're going to do, Holly. Until you understand and decide," The Skeleton stops for a moment and looks at the wolf. "No hard feelings, aye, fuck-head?"

The Man with the Wolf Head doesn't reply, instead, he simply turns his back to him and walks into the fog assembled portal that leads to God knows where.

"Don't mind him, his tastes are more exquisite, more excruciating, but I, myself, I'm rather singular. I want to traumatize you." The Skeleton drops to one knee. "I'm like a surgeon doing an exploratory procedure. I have no idea what I'm trying to find, but I keep digging and digging, and then, after that, I'll have Wolfie rip your spine out and feed your remains to Gandhi, how's that sound?"

Thomas stops for a moment, "I'm joking, your remains will be with us forever, but maybe you could be Gandhi's playmate? I can see it now, ... Gandhi and Holly, Holly and Gandhi. We will have to come up with a new name for you too, I'm afraid."

"What's the point of this? Why prolong it?" Holly asks, it is a fool's question and she knows it, but at the moment, all she wants is to have The Wolf rip out her spine and for her to be done with it.

"What's the point, oh, Holly, my friend," A soft chuckle, "We prolong it to teach you that! Do you understand what the most agonizing form of torture is? Boredom. If you're looking for rhyme or reason you won't find it here, but what you will find is a lonely world filled with very bored residents. We prolong it to fulfill our boredom and to show you that you have a choice, which we give you, out of boredom!"

Chapter Seventeen: Alcohol, a Powerful Thing – Past

The hangover's headache never struck Eric Douglas, no waking up with a sense of nausea or discomfort. He chose not to sleep. Or, rather, more accurately, couldn't sleep. He stared up at the ceiling of his room, watching the fan blades turn round and around. Or, he would have. Had they spun. Had Eric paid his electric bill more efficiently.

His couch crawled with critters, creatures that had wandered into his humble abode in search of refuge. He always hated them and wished they'd leave, but in armies, they amounted.

He endangered Catherine last night. Though, in his drunken stupor, he couldn't be for certain whether it was his own lunacy speaking, or if figments of truth had been found in his imaginary-reality.

The one point, however, remained consistent, echoing itself in his head. He endangered Catherine last night. In his own childish shenanigans and recklessness.

Eric Douglas smacked away some of the bugs off from his arms and returned to his feet. The book laid down by the fire-place where he left it.

"I took her away from me. I took away my Catherine," Mr. Douglas stated, knowingly. Feeling sorry for himself. It is about all he felt good at these days. "But I don't just feel sorry for myself," Eric announced, fighting his own thoughts, "You're everything to me. I don't deserve to live if you're not alive, I don't want to," Eric took a swig of alcohol. The liquid drowned the bad thoughts, stuffed them back down under the surface, but those thoughts were becoming more and more difficult to run away from.

"I never really believed in much of a God, always found it illogical, but I pray to you," Mr. Douglas stopped for a second, as if trying to restrain himself from becoming overly cliché. The black book, The Aeonian, he walked over to it. "I recant my summons. Please leave Catherine alone."

Eric waited for some type of response, but received nothing for his troubles, not The Miasma, not even the slight flicker of a page turning by itself.

Could it have possibly been his imagination running wild again? He hadn't the foggiest idea, only messy afterimages scrambled in an effort to piece together what little bits could be remembered.

* * *

Mr. Douglas walked about the school without many a thought running through his head. The alcohol made the room a dizzy swirl like a tornado of colors and arrays. Eric could still vaguely decipher the objects put before him. He had come to work at this place everyday for the last fifteen-something years after all.

The smell in his nostrils is of bleach, ... or sanitizer, or whatever it is the janitors mop up the floors with. Still not the tip-top shape that Catherine deserves, but Eric no longer wished to waste time on such trivial matters.

Mr. Douglas stopped in his tracks for a moment, realizing why he had decided to come to the school.

Catherine's whereabouts and conditions troubled his mind, had his unmerciful nightmares been accurate. The creature looked like a dog, he imagined it with sharp teeth and sword-like claws. Surely, if he wanted to, the creature could maim his Catherine with mere flicks. Pierce her flesh like a knife through butter. Squeeze the life outta her like flicking a switch onto off. No, Eric did the best he could to wipe away such brutal and vicious thoughts.

He saw a trio of students and looked away without really thinking about why. He knew very well that they were staring at him, however. He hadn't been to the school since Mrs. Fount caused a scene and led to his unceremonious dismissal from the game. And, before that, he had been sick with a bad case of the sniffles. Eric sniffled, the allergies are a special case, one that only triggered when it was convenient.

Beyond the slopped on cleaning products, the school was lacquered with the smell of students. Especially as Mr. Douglas went by the door leading to the gymnasium and got a good whiff of the body odors frolicking about. Eric was surprised his sense of smell worked so well, what, with his illness.

"Eric Douglas, what are you doing here!?" This screechy, high pitched attempt at masculinity belonged to Mr. Simpson. A red headed moron that struggled at putting one word in front of the other and had a desperate need to be respected amongst his colleagues.

"I'm looking for something I lost," Mr. Douglas mumbled beneath his breath, not knowing whether he said his words loud enough to be heard or not.

"I think you've lost IT, Mr. Douglas!" Mr. Simpson exclaimed, his face scrunched up in an obnoxious matter of fact way that made Eric want to grab him by the throat and ring out all of his freckles like water from a rag.

"And, I'm TRYING to find IT," Mr. Douglas replied, walking down the stairs, his fingers skimmed down the rails as he did so. The lockers right before the cafeteria belonged to the middle school kids, not quite high school, not quite children anymore, they were deemed capable of having lockers, but not capable of having locks on said lockers. Eric eyeballed them, noting the sticky notes plastered onto some, little flower shaped cutouts on some of the girl's lockers.

"Douglas, you can't just walk away from me!" Mr. Simpson yelled as Mr. Douglas was trying to walk away from him.

"I could if you'd stop following me!" Mr. Douglas yelled, then turned to Mr. Simpson with an angered look.

Simpson halted, dead in his tracks, perhaps understanding that Mr. Douglas wasn't interested in a dick measuring contest with him. However, instead of relenting, Simpson's face hardened, a stern glare on his face that Douglas hated with such absolution. His wolf shaped ears and canine muzzle, Simpson barked at him.

"You need to leave, Mrs. Fount feels sorry for you, but you've lost your fucking mind!"

The barking doesn't relent and it echoed inside Douglas' head, "You've lost your mind! You've lost your mind!"

And, all at once, Eric Douglas let out a scream and drove his fist to Simpson's wolf-head skull, bringing him off of his feet as Simpson yelled in agony. Eric refused to relent, tackling Simpson while he was down, Eric continued his assault, feeling his hand bruise itself across Simpson's face.

All of it ran through his head, all the feelings of anger and sadness, and self-hatred, ... Eric watched the blood pour out from Simpson's nose, broken and disfigured. "You've lost your mind!"

Mr. Douglas felt his arms restrained by someone from behind him. And as the adrenaline coursing through his veins diminished, he found reality once more begin to set in and so, he relented.

The person's arms lifted him back up to a standing position and tried to keep him still, Eric offered them no fight.

The blood dripped off from Eric's finger tips and he began to realize the full extent of what he had done. The person behind him, the janitor, an older fellow with a white mustache and white hair on the sides, wore a worried expression on his face, a pleading and fearful expression.

Eric Douglas looked at the fallen Mr. Simpson with a feeling of dread and horror inside of him. Tears began to roll down his face, Eric couldn't remember the last time he had cried.

The silence he heard tap-tap-tapping against his eardrums lifted, and from there, the sound of Mr. Simpson screaming bloody murder was evident. Simpson crawled backward, leaning himself against one of the lockers, a broken nose and bloody lip worn on his face, he stared at Mr. Douglas like he was staring at the man with the wolf head, which Eric soon realized, Simpson was not.

"You fucking psychopath," Mr. Simpson cried out, his tone and demeanor no longer the highbrow self-righteousness of yesteryear, "You fucking ... fuck!"

Eric Douglas loosened his tightly clamped knuckles, letting his fingers dangle. Tears continued to run down his cheek, and with each passing moment, his vision flickered, off and on, between what was and what wasn't, he barely noticed a difference anymore.

"You almost fucking killed me," Mr. Simpson said, the blood stained his buttoned up shirt and spilled on the floor. The blood ran down his face. Down his wolf head shaped face, but not, no, Mr. Douglas looked away. "Your ass is going to rot for this!"  
"I never meant," He sniffled for a moment and stops, he heard the sound of footsteps traveling down stairs, the sounds of the main-office door's swinging open. "I never meant to hurt anybody." Eric Douglas said. With watered eyes, Eric brushed past the small gathering of people, ignoring their stares, shielding them off from his eyes like a vampire trying to block out the sun. The pain in the back of his head refused to halt, throbbing uncontrollably, it never diminished.

"Eric, wait!" A voice yelled out from behind him, the voice sounded like Mrs. Fount, but he didn't stop to look.

* * *

"I've lost everything in such a short time," Eric Douglas spoke, looking down at the Aeonian book, a bottle of whiskey in his hands. He could see the maggots that infested it now more clearly, but simply no longer cared. "Something I never thought would go is my ability to see the difference between real and fiction. Fables and storybooks or life and the hurdles it throws at you along the way, but, here I am, and I don't really know anymore. I feel like I have a noose around my neck. And, room to room, it just sort-of follows me, wherever I go." Eric stopped in the midst of his words to take a swig of his alcohol. The taste is horrendous, but it moistened his throat.

"Ever since the accident, everything seems 'off,' like someone broke into my house and moved everything around an inch. I don't even know if you're real, Catherine. The memories I have of you blur in the same way as the ones I know can't be real. But, you were real to me," Eric poured the alcohol from the bottle onto the book, his white shirt covered in Mr. Simpson's blood, his tie uneven, his hair unkempt and messy, the alcohol dampened the pages. "You were real to me."

"I don't know where on the spectrum of reality this book falls, but if I brought any heart ache on you or anyone else, then, it's for the best." Eric took a final drink and then, smashed the bottle of whiskey over the wooden coffee table, shattering all of it, leaving him with only the neck.

He looked at the decaying walls, at instances, in only brief intervals, his vision flickered and showed what he had once seen. A nice living room couch and coffee table, now, no longer. Chipped away and stained, ants marched one by one (hoorah!) on his white carpet that no longer looked white.

He smiled. The only time he ever smiled these days was at the thought of Catherine, and right now, that was all he was thinking about. He held the neck of the bottle in his hands, and, at once, opened the book and took a stab at its confines. It was peculiar, the way none of the pages seemed effected. The pages weren't pierced! The thought baffled him, and the more and more he stabbed, the more he realized the extent of the book's durability. But, it wasn't simply durability, it felt as though he couldn't apply pressure against the book, as if every time he came too close to it with the shard of glass, his strength weakened and his body went numb. He'd try and slice into it, think he had, then, realize he hadn't.

Eric climbed up to his feet, dropping the remnants of the glass bottle and lifting the book up with him. He tossed it into the fire-place. Then, using a lighter from off the shelf above it and the plastic label he'd plucked from off the bottle, he lit the logs and the book aflame.

"Good riddance," he said, and through the flames, in his gimcrack mind, makeshift, held together only by drugs and pure grit, he saw a life he could have lived with Catherine, a life that would have happened. But not anymore.

He felt the back of his head. It had started bleeding again. He felt woozy, like he was about to lose consciousness. The flickers were less rampant. It just felt darker.

He would return to Catherine's house to see if he had loosened the book's constrictions, but, really, to see, perhaps, if she had ever even existed.

Eric Douglas felt his death nearing with each pounding thump on the back of his head.
Chapter Eighteen: Catherine - Present

Holly limps her way through the onyx surroundings. Her leg no longer aches, but, instead, feels numb and useless. She walks using her good leg, and simply lugs around the bad one to advance. The cool air soothes her, and for some reason, so does the darkness. The simple fact that she can't see what is awaiting her and what is awaiting her can't see her either. She feels the long grass of an unkempt yard, the wetness of each blade, and eventually, she meets a sidewalk.

Croaking frogs and chirping crickets are evident, and while the night-time makes things indistinguishable, for some reason, she knows she is back in a North Rites of some form or another. There's a certain home-town aroma or wind blowing through the air that strikes her as familiar. Thoughts race inside her head, thoughts of committing suicide are some of the most avid of them. After all, there is little reason to stay alive, if only to succumb herself to more torment as The Miasma's plaything. It would be easier to find a sharp enough blunt object and slice her wrist, to bleed out for the man with the wolf head to find. The thought she decides on though is taking her MP3 player out from her pocket and plugging her headphones in her ears.

The music plays, the gleeful sounds of acoustic guitars and a singer's soft voice not committing too much intrusion. The nothingness before her now seems even more obscured, unknown seeming even more unknown, but she doesn't care. No more crickets, no more frogs. The moonlight projects so little as her feet leave sidewalk for road. She can faintly see the white line in the middle, the shine from a street lamp offering its assistance.

The instrumental playing from her MP3 player does help take her mind off what's happening to her. It is the little things, and it makes her feel as human as she can possibly feel in such a circumstance. The little things, of hopes and dreams, of a future, of marriage or children, all of it feels so miniscule and petty, she realizes, with a faint comfort, the answer to every existential crisis is the discovery of a lack thereof.

Interestingly enough, Holly didn't recall have any instrumentals on her player. Must have been some of those freebies that were already on her computer or something, she assumes. Instead of walking, she ventures off the road and back to the grass, pampering her leg, most of the blood has dried on her pants, a dark maroon stain on them. She plops herself down in the grass, feeling the wetness of dew beneath her fingers. She didn't mind it at all. She welcomed it, in-fact. The coolness is soothing, Holly finds herself with a melancholy outlook.

Her heartbeat has slowed down, and, in that moment, she feels a lot like she is in purgatory. Somewhere between life and inevitable death, pretty soon the fog will surround her, bind her, constrict her. The fog will wrap around her like a snake. And, she will let it, because she no longer has the will to fight.

A light from afar peeks out at her. It's a light that, at a distance, seems to be nearing her. The headlights of a vehicle are shining bright as they drive toward her. Holly watches on with her deteriorated psyche, her music has switched from guitars to violin, a symphony-type sound that reminds her of Beethoven. At last, the vehicle becomes close enough to depict, a hearse with a crudely done yellow paint job, making it look like a taxi. She can even see smell the fresh paint and can see it dripping down off the car to the road.

Holly shields herself with her hand and squints as the brights gleam at her with tenacity. She can vaguely see the driver side window roll down, a man's face aimed at her. Aimed at her, for, the man cannot stare, as he has no eyes in his sockets.

His grin is wide and seems exaggerated, like he has too many teeth in his mouth for practicality, his face is stretched, shaped like a guitar-pick, it reminds Holly of that painting of a screaming man that she has seen in museums, but this man is smiling. As if the man expresses an unflinching happiness that goes undisturbed by the dreary, desolate world encumbering them.

The man with the big teeth spoke, "Enter."

Holly can barely hear him over the sound of the violin playing in her ears.

"There is so much more to be seen." His voice sounds garbled, like his jaw isn't able to open more than an inch because his teeth.

Holly stares at him, making contact with the holes where eyes belonged. "Fuck that," Holly replies, thinking how little she cares to experience the "more" he is talking about.

The man looks at her confused for a second, then, snaps his fingers like a light bulb has appeared over his head with inspiration. The headlights of his taxi lessened, and overhead, Holly sees all the neighboring street lamps go black as well, until suddenly, she is once more in complete and utter darkness.

She feels a chill make way over her spine, but tries to stifle her own discomfort with the music. It works a little, but ultimately fails. Simultaneous to the vehicle's dome lights illuminating her surroundings, Holly can feel the backseat's cushions beneath her. In front of her, the man with the big teeth with a shit-eating grin on his face.

"Oh, happiest of days! I'm so glad you'd join me on this adventure!" The man with the big teeth hollers with that slobbery-like tone, then, sings:

"A boy woke from his bed

to find his special one was dead.

Gone without a trace,

never there; erased."

In tune with his singing, the music playing from Holly's MP3 is manipulated, the sound of a symphony, an orchestra of overbearing and unrelenting instruments. The taxi cab goes into motion, picking up speed at a rapid pace. Holly feels the panic once more fill her bones, and it feels strangely welcome in place of apathy. She tugs and pries at the seat belt over her chest, but it seems as though it is melted into the plastic buckle where it is fastened. She can even feel the burning sensation of heat from the touch of it.

"With all his toys, hardly touched,

and children games he once loved so much."

Holly pays little mind to what the smiling madman is saying, and simply watches the surroundings outside the car windows. They have driven into a tunnel, and like projectors on the walls, like a scary show at some theme park, as they pick up speed, bizarre images begin to appear outside.

Visuals of men being choked to death by smoke or having their appendages pried off by them. The smoke fish-hooks the mouth of one and contorts it into a smile, that only lasts long enough to have a sword slash through the smoke and take the man's face with it. A close-up visual of maggots crawling about inside the empty eye-socket of one of The Miasma's victims. Of Gandhi biting into the flesh of a victim, ripping open his rib-cage and gnawing on his intestines as if they are chew toys. The skeleton cheers on in the background with amusement.

Holly tries to look away but the second she does, she feels the jerking sensation of something pulling her head back and forcing her to look.

"All these things,

just things he had,

only things,

they weren't enough."

On the walls of the tunnel, the visual harkens back to an old memory of her father's funeral. The visual is more than a memory within seconds, she finds herself, literally, back at her father's funeral. She looks around, trying to investigate. Herself standing quietly with her sobbing mother, uncertain of what to make of it.

And then, her father's casket flies open, and out comes her father in a suit and tie, his face grotesquely mangled, his eye drooped out like a cracked-open egg, his jaw disjointed, and his flesh as pale as snow, dirty and starting to decompose.

A second after, she finds herself back inside the ambulance, and the music stops, only to speed up once again at the end of the third line.

"And,

the boy,

he felt alone.

Broken castles at the shore,

hand-made motes were dug no more.

Paper crowns all made in vain,

makeshift scepter's prelude our canes."

The taxi cab speeds on, faster and faster, Holly can feel herself being forced back in her seat. Her eyes lock onto her father as the visual closed in on her, the top of his mouth and the bottom of his jaw separate and flap like a crude homage to Pac-Man, until, at last, it stays open and projectile vomits blood that sprays into the open side door window of the taxi.

Holly panics as the blood piles into the vehicle, spilling out onto the floorboards. She brings her legs up onto the seat, trying her best to steer clear of the blood. But, soon, when the music speeds up even faster, the blood overflows, already filling up half the car as the smiling man remains undeterred, singing his heart out, flailing his arms about, his hands nowhere near the wheel.

"The little boy fell to his knees,

with scratches and colored bandages.

He teared tearful tears and crying cries,

watching innocence become nostalgia.

The boy conformed and pulled the trigger,

standing up; a man.

The blood raises higher and higher, until, finally, it overflows out the windows of the car. Outside the vehicle, Holly sees, past the blood that had hurt her vision, her mom standing at the casket, and heard the somber whispers, "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I should have been more involved, should have tried harder," the whisper could only barely be heard over the loud symphony and the man's screaming, as if it was coming from inside her mind and not from the outside.

"But, at least he wasn't alone...?

And, at least, it was enough!?"

The taxi drives off the side of the road. There is a loud screen noises that comes from the tires while they fly off and into a ravine, flipping and turning multiple times in midair. Holly feels herself underwater beneath the blood, unable to open her eyes, she tries her best to keep from swallowing too much of the thick red stuff.

The loud striking sound of the taxi cab reaching its final resting place comes with a thud, the sound of metal breaking and bending, blood swishing and swashing, leaving the car through the side windows.

Holly lays dormant for a moment, turned upside down, hanging from the seat by her seat belt. Her long hair hangs, dripping, until the buckle gives way and her body falls down to the bottom of the car's hood. No further sign of the smiling man, Holly crawls down and out from the back window, feeling the soaked ground below try and swallow her, digging her deeper in his contents with every attempt to advance, moistened and muddied by blood. As she begins climbs up the hill, crawling through the grass like an army man until she musters the strength to return to her feet.

"Oh, Laurie, don't, uh, don't you worry about Holly, she'll come to accept it, it'll just be a little of an, um, an adjustment." Holly hears her father's voice slur, though, she can't pinpoint his whereabouts. "I'm telling you, once the divorce is finalized, everything will start to settle down. Olivia knows we have no chances of reconcile," her father's voice continues, "Road's a blur, maybe I'm a little drunker than I thought," she hears him laugh.

Holly finds herself on the asphalt, walking on the road, her equilibrium feeling unbalanced, she stumbles dizzily in a daze. Forward, she sees a car speeding in her direction.

"What's this guy doing, he's swerving on the road," a voice calls out, one that Holly doesn't instantly recognize.

The vehicle in-front of her nears on, Holly watches, like a deer caught in the headlights. However, the car drives past her, missing her only by a couple of feet, and as she turns around, she watches the car drive off into the ditch, in an effort at preventing a head on collision with the other vehicle on the road.

The car flips and contorts, and it takes seconds for Holly to realize she is once more witnessing the crash between her father and Mr. Douglas.

"Why are you showing me this again?" Holly finds herself asking, as an ambulance appears at warped speed, EMTs piling out of the ambulance with stretchers ready and at-hand.

She looks down at the ravine where Mr. Douglas' car has flipped, and watches on while paramedics assist him out from his vehicle. The same thought crosses Holly's mind again while she looks on, in that, Eric Douglas is very lucky to be alive after such an accident. Eric is hardly responsive as they bring him out of the ravine and onto a stretcher, in the previous rendition, she recalls seeing him wide-open in a state of shock, but that isn't the case here.

Instead, Eric's eyes flicker, only showing faint signs of life, and as the medics assure him without confidence that everything will be alright, he mumbles something over and over again: "Catherine."

The paramedics stretcher one more person, but not out from Eric Douglas' all but destroyed vehicle, but from the ravine. A woman, Catherine, Holly presumes, who shows no signs of life whatsoever. Either unconscious or dead, Holly supposes. Golden brown hair stained with blood, and as the stretcher wheels closer, she sees the blood that's pouring profusely out from her neck. She had been thrown out from the vehicle.

Holly watches while the woman is brought toward the ambulances. She couldn't help but notice nobody said to her that everything would be okay. This woman is dead.

"Catherine!"

Holly looks back at the yelling Eric Douglas, whose bloody face has a look of sorrow and disdain. Eric fights with the stretcher, restrained by the straps.

This is what you wanted to show me, is it? My father and his lover drove drunk and sent Mr. Douglas and his wife? ... off the road. That my father left him in broken shambles and this is him getting his revenge!? Holly watches as the ambulances load themselves up with the four bodies and drive off into the distance, the blaring sirens loudly audible and brightly lit. If that's his trouble with me, so be it!

"Bring me death!" Holly screams to the heavens, although, it seems as if, perhaps, this world behaves and reacts at the whim of a different God. Either that, or perhaps, The Devil himself.

2

"Hello," Olivia is fast at answering her cellphone, not even bothering to look at the caller I.D. to see who it is. Anything pertaining to new information about Holly is considered solicited and welcome.

"Hello, Olivia, it's Laurie," the woman on the other end announces, sounding like she is bracing herself for the worst.

"Rightly so, after all, to Olivia, Laurie Fount is nothing more than a bitch of a woman who slept around with her husband while they were still together.

"What is it?" Olivia asks, dulling her tongue in favor of self-interest, letting lighter heads prevail. "Do you know something about Holly?"

"You came by the school yesterday asking about Eric Douglas." Mrs. Fount states.

"Yes," Olivia remarks, sitting Indian-style on the couch where Holly usually slept, her blankets are still strewn about, spilling over the arm rests.

Olivia's hair is tangled and messy, it has been a long while since she has slept. There are bags under her eyes and her makeup is smeared, but she hasn't been able to muster enough strength or enthusiasm to take a shower.

"After the accident, Eric Douglas was left shattered and broken. Losing his wife, I think that had just as much to do with his snapping as the head injury did."

Olivia bit her lip, fighting the urge to state the obvious, that it is Mrs. Fount and her deceased husband that caused the whole occurrence during one of their drunken affairs.

"Pretty soon, he started attending games, and, at first, I just felt bad for him, his wife was his whole life, that, and teaching, which, of course, he could no longer do."  
"Laurie, what is it!?" Olivia demands.

"Eric Douglas attacked one of the teachers today, as a matter of fact, he beat the living hell out of him!" Mrs. Fount exclaims. "He had temper tantrums once or twice before, but never like this."

"Eric Douglas was just arrested for breaking into a students' house," Olivia quips fast.

"I'm not saying Eric Douglas has anything to do with Holly's disappearance, but I at least think it's something worth looking into," Mrs. Fount clarifies.

"Thank you, Laurie," Olivia says before hanging up her phone.

* * *

Olivia wastes little time before her next move. Spinning the wheels of her car beyond what the speed limit permits, Eric Douglas' house was a nice house. The key word being that it "was" a nice house. Before the accident, that is. A nice, small but cozy house Olivia drove passed everyday before work. Shingled roof and a wooden deck and front-porch. A garage that sheltered his nice little SUV.

Since then, however, Eric Douglas' abode has reduced itself in drastic ways. A yard that is damn-near a jungle with how long it has went without being mowed and a deck littered with boxes that have been waterlogged and ruined by the rain. Olivia cringes at what it must have looked like on the inside. Then, she notices her own hypocrisy reeling in its ugly head. Her own house has seen sunnier days, and, in a lot of ways, she empathizes with Eric Douglas. How he has lost everything, and, like her, the deterioration of his mental health make for a very deep hole to climb out of. But depression isn't as open and shut as what Eric Douglas has. Olivia could return from the depths.

The sun shines brightly this morning, enough to make Olivia have to squint her eyes as she drives onward. At last, she gives in to her distress and pulls down the sun visor. In one instance, she notices her car is wobbling, then realizes her shaking hands on the steering wheel are the cause.

She pulls up in Mr. Douglas' driveway, it is empty and there is nothing out of the ordinary about it. After stepping out of her vehicle and closing the door behind her, she finds herself hurrying out, not even bothering to pry her keys out of the ignition. She cuts through the lawn, eyeballing the numerous skeletal remains scattered about. It's a peculiar visual, like walking through an animal graveyard of sorts. She counts more than five rotted animals about his yard. At least one buck and ones that resemble either foxes or cats, or dogs or possums, honestly, she doesn't take too much time to investigate.

Instead, she walks up the creaky steps leading to his front-door. The door is shut, but with a turn of the knob, she discovers it isn't locked.

A single thought races inside Olivia's mind, and it is a thought that wraps itself around her psyche in a vice grip. It is a thought that has no real merit or reason for authenticity, but she believes it. Holly is in there.

"Holly!?" Olivia yells out loud, walking through the opened door of Eric's abode. In her nostrils is the odorous scent of garbage, she gags over the smell. The smell is something between shit and spoiled filth, and it doesn't relent. It emits a fume that delves through her cupped hands and finds way to her nostrils. She does her best to ignore it, but the smell makes her feel even more afraid of what she'll find. The idea that she'll find Holly's lifeless corpse in the crawlspace, or see that her skull has been made into a bowl that Eric Douglas drinks soup out of.

Olivia stops for a moment, but only a moment, trying to reassure herself, trying to prevent herself from having a breakdown.

"HOLLY!?" Olivia yells a second time, this time much louder than the first. It is useless, however.

Tears begin streaming down her face, the panic, the rampant beating of her heart just won't let up.

Holly doesn't respond.

Olivia walks into his kitchen. The counter tops are infested with ants and his floor is littered with empty food cans, all dented and broken up, like they were opened by being smashed repeatedly over and over again against the ground. Guess his head injury made him forget how to use a can-opener.

She walks back into his living room, but only offers in a glance, seeing the ripped up leather couch with white stuffing peeking out of it.

His bathroom is covered in shit. Heaps and heaps of it, in-fact. Some of it is smeared onto the walls, as if the perpetrator grew leery of even going into the room and instead just chucked his feces into the bathroom like a monkey.

Strangely enough, the bedroom is locked. But, not for long. Olivia drives her boot into it repeatedly and even rams it, all until she finally breaks it open. Expecting to see Holly tied up or something worse, she is surprised to see the bedroom is actually kempt. The comforter on the bed is made and the pillows are assorted properly. The bedroom looks completely normal. The carpeting is clean and unstained, and the insect critters didn't inhabit it. She wonders why it was locked, but loses interest when she realizes that it has no answer to Holly's whereabouts.

Sprawled out on the kitchen table, Olivia sees the remnants of animals. Maggot infested, there are also flies buzzing around them. The eating utensils are off to the side of the dead animals. That explains the animal graveyard in the front.

Holly isn't here and that is for the best.

She walks back toward the living room, preparing to make her leave. No sense getting herself arrested for breaking and entering, that would bring her no closer to finding Holly. However, as she takes a final look around, her eyes take to the fire-place. Or, more so, the book that rests atop the burnt logs.

The book is unscathed. Untouched and no worse for wear, it hasn't been burned, but it would seem that was Eric's intent. Olivia walks toward it, and soon, she holds it in her hands. It is warm to the touch.

* * *

She sprawls the book out over the steering wheel. The book's contents are in a language that Olivia hasn't ever seen before. The only thing she can understand for certain is a scribbling on the first page from someone named Thomas the Book Keeper: "It doesn't reason. It doesn't feel. No Empathy. An action. It worries only about replenishment. Of entertainment. Satisfaction. Pleasure. The Miasma will help you. Simply ask."

Olivia feels a shiver begin up her spine at that instant, a small one at first, aggravated by the simple thought that the book is warm, like it was completely unharmed beneath a burning fire. It could have been the calling card of some sort of satanic cult, or some voodoo bullshit psychopaths, but how was the book unharmed!?

She browses through the pages, skimming through each one with precision. The words are undecipherable, but the images depict cruelty on various fronts. Drawn illustrations of men propped up on spears like a kabob or jaws pried open to unnatural extremeness by hands of smoky figures. In every illustration, however, Olivia notices a man with a suit of armor and a helm fashioned to look like the head of a wolf. A striking presence, but in none of the illustrations does the figure act. Rather, it simply stands, a silent watcher.

Olivia feels the pages of the book, thicker paper with a slightly brownish yellow tint. The book looks like it was from a much different time, but looks to have been preserved very well. "The Aeonian," Olivia says aloud as she closes the book and looks at the cover-work.

As far as Olivia knows, finding this book gets her no closer to finding Holly's whereabouts. It is nothing aside from another piece to a much larger puzzle.

Olivia sniffles. For no exact reason in-particular, she feels at fault for all of this. She rationalizes her own innocence in her head, but it does little to stifle the hellish guilt. It is a red herring for all the guilt she has amassed over the years. Tears run down her cheeks, dribbling down off from her chin. She looks at her bloodshot eyes in the mirror of her visor while she sobs. It looks like she has aged a decade in only the last couple of days.

"I need to be better," Olivia thinks to herself, a generic statement that she finds sentiment in. Bad feelings of dread feed on the memories of all her mistakes, of how everything has been taken away from her. But, not everything, at the same time, because everything has not been taken away from her. She still has a wonderful daughter, and if she finds Holly, she needs to be better. When she finds Holly, Olivia corrects herself.

All the pettiness and feelings of betrayal she has projected onto Holly, all the ways they'd grown apart and become strangers, has been deterred by the worry that overwhelms her.

These feelings replaced only by hopeful thoughts and bargaining, as Olivia sobs, she brings her hands together and leans them on the steering wheel. She understands her own hypocrisy. Of all the times she has skipped out on church, of all the times she's not done the right thing, times she has sinned. And, like so many religious people she frowns upon, she finds herself praying to God right now, only because she wants something, but that doesn't stop her.

"I have never asked for anything in my life. I have never prayed to you. I have never went to church by my own decision." Olivia begins, quieting her hyperventilating as she focuses on the prayer. "If Holly comes back to me, I will change everything for the better. I will better myself as a person, I will make more of an effort in Holly's life. I'll stop drinking, I will do whatever it is that needs to be done to better myself. If you're up there and if you care, you'll please keep Holly safe."
Chapter Nineteen: The Call – Present

"Why don't you just kill me?" Holly screams at the sky, "I've been through enough!" Her whole body is starting to ache with agony, agony over being tossed about like a rag doll, but she fights past the pain as she gallops through the roadway. "I lost everything that night, and you want me to live it over and over!? Is that it!?"

The streetlamps go dark again, and in-front of her shines the glowing aura of a levitating book. Again, it's The Aeonian. As she comes closer, she can see the book is turned to the same page as earlier, the page depicting The Victim and The Summoner. Holly reads part of the description aloud, "The Victim is targeted, unless pending the death of The Summoner, as payment cannot be received for said act."

Holly stops for a second, letting a few breaths escape from her lungs. "You want me to kill Mr. Douglas, is that what you're trying to tell me!?"

As if waiting on a cue, the book slams shut, spinning and twisting at a blurring speed, and by the time it stops, it is not a book at all, but rather, a wooden stand, on the stand, is a phone.

"Make the call," Holly hears from one corner of the blackened nothingness, heard as a whisper. "Make the call," she hears again, this time from a different side of the room. "Make the call," "Make the call," several times now, coming from all directions.

2

Eric Douglas might not have kidnapped Holly, but he has an idea of where she is. That's what Olivia convinced herself of once she'd cried out all her tears. The police station has a low-tech, minimalist vibe about it. It isn't like the lesser part of Acera really needs state of the art forensics or expensive labs, but it still does little to comfort Olivia on how much assistance they will be. North Rites didn't actually have a police station, but rather, it is a police station in Bellville that oversees neighboring and adjacent cities.

Olivia walks through the doors with a sense of self-consciousness, not understanding all the cogs and inner workings of an unfamiliar territory. Beyond a front desk that reminds Olivia of where a hotel clerk might sit, Olivia can see an assortment of flimsy desks, each with computers for use. The floor has a bland gray carpeting with spots of black splashed on for an added texture, the walls a solid gray color as well.

"You spoke to me on the phone?" an officer asks. Olivia recognizes him as the bald headed, clean shaved man she'd spoke to earlier about Holly's disappearance.

"I wanted to ask you this in person," Olivia begins, she drops The Aeonian book on the desk, spreading the pages out in-front of him. "My daughter has been missing for over three days now, with no information pertaining to her whereabouts. Eric Douglas is the only person with a motive for it, and with him being arrested for breaking into Holly's friend's house, and earlier, I found out he attacked a teacher!" Olivia yammers fast, saying every word that comes to her mind without a moment's thought.

"Okay, okay," The officer says reassuringly, resting his hands on Olivia's shoulders. "Breathe. Now, tell me, what is this book?"  
"This book belongs to Eric Douglas," Olivia begins, hoping he wouldn't interrogate her about how it came into her possession. "It's called The Aeonian and most of it is written in a language that there is no proper documentation of. I looked into it and apparently, the book is connected to various different missing people cases around the world. I'm thinking it might be some type of cult or affiliation that kidnaps children, and I'm thinking that Eric Douglas might be involved in it."

"Do you have any evidence of this?" The Officer, his name-tag read Officer Piers, spoke, skimming his fingers over the pages of the book.

"None other than the book, but I figured you could question Eric Douglas about it, and see if he knows anything," Olivia says, trying to steer him away from the legality of the matter and also stress the severity of the situation.

"I will take a look at it, Mrs. Prescott," Piers remarks.

"I mean, can't you ask him now?" Olivia pushes further. "I mean, you have him in a cell right now, don't you?"

"I may," Officer Piers closes the book and smiles, "I understand, Mrs. Prescott, that you want to find your missing daughter. I understand and I sympathize with that. I am treating it with the utmost importance and I will look at it."

"You HAVE him!" Olivia yells, feeling the heat pile on in her chest. "There's nothing to look at, all you have to do is go up to him and ask him where the fuck my daughter is!"  
"Eric Douglas is in an unconscious state, Olivia. He obtained a head injury at some point and when we found him, he became non-responsive and was taken to a hospital. Now, I understand that you're upset, but I need you to calm down."

"You are fucking useless," Olivia screams. She looks around the police station, eyes belonging to police officers and other visitors are directed at her, but she doesn't care, "All of you are fucking useless!" She grabs the book off from the desk and runs out the building, pushing open the glass doors.

3

"What call do you want me to make?" Holly asks aloud, looking for answers in the blackness that engulfs her.

"The call," the voice whispers, over and over again, whispers from overhead, from the ground, and all around her.

Holly turns her body opposite the phone and finds herself in-front of a building with a sign that spells out "Dero's Orchestra" in large neon letters. The sign beams and gives off a sound like a bug-zapper and she could hear music coming from the other-side. Cautiously, she opens the front-door, sounding a bell that is hanging from the top of the door. Beyond the door, she could now plainly see the bar in all its glory.

Strobe lights flutter about in such a manic and schizo intensity that leaves her surprised about not having an epileptic seizure then and there. She walks forward with a haphazard leeriness, the dance floor is amassed with figures strutting about without cares, wingtip shoes waltzing about like stage-performers putting on a show, the figures all wear formal attire, suits and ties and fancy dresses. The distinction that Holly notices is that they are all missing their skin. They are all hallowed out skeletons.

And, not only that, but many of them are animals. Cats and dogs, and pigs and cows, propped up in a human manner, walking about without a care in the world.

Holly stops dead in her tracks, a feeling of unrelenting unease hammers about her innermost thoughts. She looks at the series of bar stools spread out in front of the counter, upon them, suited felines chug large mugs of alcohol, all of it spilling down from their mouths onto the floor and their suits. There is the loud noise of music being played that keeps her from listening in on the chitchat between said animals, but she can see their jaws flap in apparent conversation.

All at once, she feels the gnawing bite of an animals' teeth stabbing into her arm. Holly turns abruptly, flinching fast, it alone is not enough to pry the animal's jaw off from her appendage. She screams, turning her body and looking at the animal, the dog digs its teeth into her flesh and Holly could feel the blood begin to dissipate out of her. She reacts instinctively, kicking the dog in an attack on its legs. The attack succeeds, on some level, severing the leg bone from the rest of its body, the rest of the dog follows suit, collapsing to the wood floor of the bar. However, the dog's jaw does not come unclenched from Holly's arm, now by itself, biting into Holly. She can vaguely hear the sound of growling over the music, but she doesn't know if it is real or her imagination. She slams her arm down onto the table, crushing the dog's skull in the process.

The wound from her arm spurts blood, gushing out like cherry filling from a squished doughnut, she covers it with her hand in an effort to suppress the withdrawal. It soon becomes clear she has the bar's attention, all of them shrouding her, walking toward. The remnants of monkey's playing xylophone on their own rib cages, Holly can smell the odorous wreak of death but cannot place an area of which it is most distinct, death is everywhere.

"Stay back," Holly utters, but with little conviction, audibility barely above that of a shouting whisper.

The skeletal beings continue to crowd her, cornering her. She grabs a beer bottle and smacks it onto the table from whence it came, shattering it, keeping hold of the neck, readying the shard of glass as a weapon. The blood from her hand is debilitating, but she is able to distance herself from it. Adrenaline is powerful, and though her mind dwindles in a downward spiral, her instinctual need for survival remains. The animals close in on her, and it is true that she could have been dead in a matter of minutes. On one hand, she knows a broken beer bottle won't protect her from all of them, on the other, the empowering feeling of smashing that skull into the table is a feeling she wants to feel again.

"Stop!" A deep smokey voice screams. The flickering strobe lights shut off, and in the dimly lit room, Holly looks through the crowd to see, not an animal skeleton, but The Skeleton himself, and from his voice, she knows it to be the very same one that has haunted her throughout the night. "This could have been your end. The end you've been asking for. 'Kill me,' I believe you begged to Hell's ceiling, but," the skeleton motions his arms, motioning toward the beer bottle in Holly's hand like he is presenting it, "Here we are."

"You don't want to die, after all, so it seems," the skeleton comments, the rest of the skeletal figures in the bar scoff at him, clearly angered that he interfered in their festivities.

"I don't want to be mangled to death by you fucking assholes," Holly barks back at him.

"Then, sweetie, I'm not doing my job," the skeleton quips fast. Taking a cigarette out from the pocket of his coat. "Do as I say, not as I do, kid. After all, these things can kill you," the skeleton chuckles at himself some. He brings the cigarette to his teeth and holds it there for a moment, then takes it out and holds it between his fingers. "I want to offer you a chance to save your own skin. And, I do mean literally, your own skin." The skeleton walks over to the bar and stares at a prodigious elephant skeleton that stands behind the counter. "You gotta phone in here?"

The skeleton doesn't bother waiting for an answer, snapping his fingers and making a phone appear out of thin air. An old fashioned phone, one with a rotary dial, metal and rustic looking, "More theatric," the skeleton comments, reading Holly's mind. "Morality is a fragile, man made contraption. The deer in the headlights is no different than a human in the headlights. Not in the eyes of God, not in the eyes of anyone other than men. In civilized society, we have no problem bludgeoning pigs to death for our supper. But dogs or cats, those are special, at least in our man made perceptions. When they shouldn't be," the skeleton looks around the bar, "No offense," he quips.

"God creates the Heaven, the Earth, and all this and that, but you ever stop to think about everything else he made and for what reason?" The skeleton took himself away from Holly, and for an instant, she contemplates the idea of taking a stab at him with the broken whiskey bottle, the chuckle that comes next from the skeleton tells her it isn't worth the effort. "If everyone and everything is created in God's image, everything with a master-plan and a purpose. Hell's already waiting for you, isn't it? Think about it. I know I've thought about it. You do a lot of thinking in these parts. Let's say you step on an ant, boom, you're a killer. You took one of God's creations. Yet, you feel nothing, nothing at all. Let's raise the stakes, let's say you run over a deer. You'll pout about it, but you'll get over it."

"I know what you're thinking, what's the point of what I'm saying? You see, I only know two things. Two things, in particular. Morality can bend at a person's whim. Morality is man made and irrelevant in the mind of God. The other thing I know is that you don't want to die, Holly." The skeleton looks up at Holly, tilts his head slightly as if he is in awe of her.

"Someone who wanted to die would rest that glass bottle on the table from which she found it, and let Wolf Head come in here and rip her in-half. Do you know what that is? I think it's because you have hope for survival. And hope, believe it or not, should and will be rewarded. Because of your strong will, you are allotted one single phone call."

"To whoever you want, that doesn't matter to me. But if I could be so kind as to make a suggestion, call someone who will kill Eric Douglas for you." The skeleton laughs some again. "With Eric Douglas' soul no longer up for grabs, old Wolfie will have no, ahem, bone to pick with you."

"I don't have anyone I can call that will do that for me," Holly says, her bloodied arm and leg show the ache of the day's wearies.

"Oh," the skeleton utters out, seeming almost baffled, "I'm sure you'd be surprised at what a mother will do for her child. Wouldn't hurt to try?"

4

Olivia drives aimless through the easygoing breeze of traffic. North Rites never has a lot of vehicles passing through, and thereby, the only thing racing is her mind. Her thoughts are of the worst, of Holly being in some sort of danger that she couldn't protect her from. It seems a lifetime since she'd not cried, as if it was a constant she had never not been the recipient of. Better, she would be better, this is the thought she keeps holding onto, the thought she keeps saying over and over again in her head, bargaining with God that he'd let this all end up alright.

Losing her husband was breathtaking, and he was an asshole drunk who cheated on her, but if anything happened to Holly, she would never be able to live with herself. She runs through her thoughts again and again, digs through them, like she is trying to uncover some answer that she has not noticed before, but she finds nothing whatsoever. On occasion, she makes glances at The Aeonian book that sits in the passenger seat of her car. A feeling of rage overcomes her at each glance, provoked by the images visualized in her head about what Holly might be experiencing because of it.

Her cellphone begins to ring, and without thought, she answers, cradling the phone in-between her shoulder and cheek while she drives. "Hello?"

"...Mom?" A voice calls out that sends shivers up Olivia's spine.

"Holly, is that you!? Where are you!? Are you okay!?" Olivia could feel goosebumps on her arms, the hysteric shock of relief.

"No, I'm not," Olivia can hear Holly crying on the other end as she speaks, sniffling as well, "Mom, there are these creatures. I'm in this place. Like our world, but it changes, and they say that Eric Douglas summoned them," her fast paced hammering halts for a second. "Mom, they say he surrendered his soul to them, that they'll kill me, unless he is killed himself."

Olivia says nothing.

"Mom? Mom, are you there?"  
"Yes, I'm here, Holly," she answers at once, unable to hide the shaken tone of her voice.

"Mom, I love you."

"I love you too," Olivia says, before hearing the ringing noise of the line going dead. "Holly? Holly!?" She screams, unable to lessen her speeding heartbeat or quiet her hyperventilation.
Chapter Twenty: The Final Chapter – Present

"That's all we needed," the skeleton announces, clapping his hands together and making the phone disappear in thin-air. "I love it. Complete cooperation. You never thought even a single time about Mr. Douglas life or the morality of it all."

"He's the reason I am in this mess, he's no saint."

"Neither is a stupid, innocent baby bird that eats the worm his mother fed him."

"Fuck you," Holly fires back.

The skeleton points at himself indignantly, "Fuck ... me? I'm the one who gave you your one phone call that may save your miserable, little life. The only one getting fucked is Gandhi out of his supper." At once, the skeleton claps his hands again and like that, before Holly's eyes, she is once more in the blackness.

A chilly rushing breeze tells Holly that she is no longer in the bar, but is, in-fact, outside again. In a moment's notice, she finds the sight of the skeleton, standing some feet away from Holly, lantern in-hand, she could see the zombie like Gandhi standing beside him, body pivoting and shaking uncontrollably, restrained by his chain collar.

"For some time, I almost feel like you've been my pet, Holly. Like the cat or dog that I can't kill. It gets ever so boring in the nothingness of this hell forsaken heap, but it's approaching for our time together to come to an end!"

The lantern goes off, and now, all Holly hears is the sound of a chain dropping to the ground and the sound of scampering feet. She knows it is time to run.

And so, she gallops forward, running as streetlights come and ignite her path. Beneath her feet is not road, but dirt and tall grass. The wind is sharp, with tearful rain denigrating the sky. The smell on her nostrils wreaks of depravity and she does her best to silence her breathing, hiding behind one of the trees.

She takes a moment to look above her at the streetlamps overhead and discovers them to be nothing of the sort. They are slimy faintly luminescent thin trees uprooted from the ground, with cobwebbed leaves that contain bright shiny eyes stuck at the top, surveying her and watching her every movement.

At last, she calms herself, at least enough to listen in for the movement of the creature that pursues her.

The whistling sound of the wind is all she hears, and also, the sound of sticks slapping against themselves in a rhythm. It makes her think again of the animals at Dero's Orchestra and the compositions she overheard. The sound is meant to distract her, either that, or to set the mood. It's difficult to pinpoint exactly what The Miasma's agenda is. She simply tries to distance herself from it. She walks beyond the trees, pussyfooting about the leaves beneath her as if they are eggshells.

It is a time game, Holly knows. It's no telling how long it will take, but that's why they meant business. The Miasma wants their feed. This is a sport to them. A ritual. A means for entertainment.

It's a feeling close to suffocation that Holly notices next. Her own leeriness has caused her to neglect such delicacies, but when the matter is forced, she breathes small breaths.

And then, she feels something ram into her back with a vivacious force. Too large to be a fist, it feels as though she has been attacked by a boulder, and on reflex, she drops to her knees and turns herself to the perpetrator. The neck of the glass bottle flies out from her hands and disguises itself within the grass.

The creature, Gandhi, as the skeleton called him, stands before her with vile intent, slobber drooling down his chin, the top of his head is busted open. While Holly is unable to hear much beneath the macabre melodies making themselves heard, she can see the creature's nostrils flare, clearly, that is among his main sources of detection.

He crawls toward her and makes a presumptive leap, leaving Holly with only seconds to make her next move, rolling out from harm's way and beginning her search for the broken glass. An immediate thought plays itself in Holly's head, the thought of slicing the broken glass shard across his throat. However, before she can find it, she feels his bite into the flesh on the back of her leg.

Holly lets out a scream of anguish, feeling the dreadful disturbance of more blood vacating the premises of her body. She tugs and pries herself forward, trying to yank herself free from Gandhi's jaws. Alas, the creature refuses to let-up, continuing to bite down harder and harder, it is clear within that he'll sever through the bone. But then, in a rare bit of luck, he relents, letting out a dog-like whimper as the broken shard pierces through his foot.

Holly climbs back to her feet weakly, and runs deeper and deeper through the scenery about her. She finds herself is a woods of some kind, a forest of some type or another, however, peculiarly, all the trees give off a neon fluorescent glow, resembling that of a rave or a light-show.

Through the cobweb bushes on the trees, colorful snakes make biting jabs at her, but she keeps her distance from them. The hissing sound is one more evident noise through the chaotic festivities of the celebrating monstrosities, already celebrating their successful conquest.

At the start of what appears to be a mountain, she finds what appears to be refuge in the form of a cave. She hurries into it, hoping she'll be able to seek shelter away from the skeleton and his pet until whatever will happen happens.

Inside, she feels the warmth of heavy breathing, but is unable to place its whereabouts. The feeling is strange and sends shivers up her spine, causing her to flinch and scope out the room with brewing paranoia. She does not hear the heavy breathing, not over the schizophrenic sounds playing about her head. She feels the warmth of the breath on her.

Then, she hears the loud screeching sound of singing, and it's a familiar tune, albeit, in a much angrier tone:

"A boy woke from his bed

to find his special one was dead.

Gone without a trace,

never there; erased."

Holly looks about the cave, until, at last, she sees sharp ridges begin to push themselves out from the ground. Large, sharp white rocks come out from the ground and chomp up and down, closing the cave shut and opening it again. The singing continues and now, Holly knows the heat she feels as being from a large mouth.

Soon, the creature known as Gandhi wanders into the cave, finding safe passage through one of the gaps between the caves', ahem, teeth.

Holly backs away and tries her best not to make any abrupt noises that might set off or expose herself to Gandhi's wrath. She circles around him, watching as it sniffs about aimless in search for her. Holly feels fear that the scent of her blood might give her away. Nevertheless, she continues to go around it, tiptoeing out as the cave's mouth keeps opening and shutting, it isn't until she makes it to the teeth that her leg gives in and she lets out a quiet cry of agony.

Like a startled animal, Gandhi jumps and faces himself toward Holly, running toward her with snarling teeth. Holly climbs back to a standing position and begins to limp away. The single gap in the closing and opening cave, however, is too far a distance and before she can even come close, Gandhi rams her forward into the white ridges.

Holly manages to keep her footing, but sees as Gandhi readies himself to ram her once again. This time, however, she moves out of the way in the nick of time and causes Gandhi to go head first into the white rock. The cave's mouth continues to open and shut like a compactor, but it's with desperation that Holly makes the attempt of actually climbing a tooth. As she is nearing the top of it, Gandhi makes a grab for her leg, but Holly is quick to react, driving her boot into his face and using him as a springboard to catapult herself to the outside of the cave.

She falls harshly and is left looking up at the creature, who is making the same attempt. Gandhi is awkward in his climbing, clearly at a disadvantage without sight. Holly watches on as the creature is only able to get part of his body over the ridge before the ceiling's teeth come chomping down, decapitating him like a guillotine.

Gandhi's upper body dribbles down in-front of Holly, who is able to take some sadistic satisfaction in the visual.

"NO!" She hears a loud voice yell out. "Goddammit, he was domesticated!" The skeleton screams, but Holly simply returns to her feet and continues to flee. "I would've killed you, Holly, I would've done you that courtesy, but not now, no, sir," the skeleton screams.

Holly continues her movements, limping through the devilish forest with small, but consistent footsteps. The lights of the trees give her some clarity in the blackness of the night, but also make her much more apparent to her hunters.

However, as she looks forward, a beacon of greenish light shines out from within the forest, a brightly lit aura that reveals itself as The Man with the Wolf Head walking toward her.

2

Panic ensues inside Olivia's head. Her foot driving down hard on the gas pedal, she is terrified. She is terrified, but doesn't really know what to believe. In her head, replays of her phone call with Holly sound in an endless loop. Creatures. Creatures? Olivia wonders the implications of that word. Could she have been exaggerating, or labeling, or did she, in-fact, mean that creatures were after her!? Summoned. Eric Douglas "summoned" the "creatures and they were after her.

Olivia looks over at The Aeonian book again, this is the book that he summoned them with, she supposed. It cost him his soul, however, from what Olivia gathered.

The concept is too ludicrous to wrap her mind around, but what else is she to believe. All she knows for certain is that Eric Douglas is the cause of the whole fiasco. The mastermind behind the entire ordeal, plotting his revenge against her family for taking his. By this alone, she believes Eric Douglas deserves to die, but how would that bring Holly back to her? She feels such confusion.

She feels the wind blasting her hair back as she continues to speed past the speed limit. She rolls down her window. Thoughts of killing Eric Douglas are on her mind. But did she really consider it? Olivia isn't sure of it herself. The hysteria she feels makes it seem all too easily attained, however. After all, Eric is lying incapacitated in a hospital somewhere. Which hospital? That is an easy enough question for Olivia to answer.

North Rites' Zaron Health Center, most likely. Chances are, that's where Eric Douglas would be. The only other possibility is if they flew him to Saint Mae's out in the city, but that is only for extreme cases. It is only a half hour away from her, less if she continues at the speed she is going.

Olivia stands over Eric Douglas' bedside, I.V.'s in his wrist and tubes up his nose, he is unconscious and unresponsive. Olivia walks to him, leaning him forward and moving the pillow out from under his head. She drops him down in his position without care, watching the back of his head plop down against the wooden frame. Looking back at the door of the hospital room to make sure it is shut, at once, she places the pillow over his head and starts to take the remainder of life out from him. He doesn't fight. Doesn't flail his arms, remaining unconscious, but still, there comes a time when she knows his life has finally been taken. A sudden stillness in the air, like a pause, as if the world around her has come to a stop for the moment.

This is what Olivia would have done, how she would have felt, she assumes, and it would have brought Holly back, she hopes, hadn't she been met in a head on collision with a truck.

3

The Man with the Wolf Head glows a bright green, the color itself seems to radiate off of him. He moves fast, running with his body bent like an ape, a smokey fog trail behind him as he goes. Holly turns her back to him and attempts to run away.

She fights forward, running through the brightened forest, snapping branches beneath her feet, until the ground gives way beneath her, the current of a large creek dragging her along for the ride.

She fights the stream with all her might, but it is of no use, the tide is unrelenting, a black tar-like substance that is given a dull sparkle from the light.

She watches as The Man with the Wolf Head meets the shore of the creek, looking on at her with glowing green eyes. What she sees is a figure that is all business, no nonsense, no enjoyment out of its task. Robotic, in a sense. The Wolf Head now wants her dead as soon as possible.

Holly continues on with the tide, feeling the black liquid go overhead for an instant. She fights her best to stay afloat. She sees the Wolf Head following her, off the side, but, soon, he disappears from view.

At last, after some distance, she manages to grab a low hanging branch from a fallen tree, a cob-webbed mess that sticks to her hands as she tries to climb it. The black liquid hangs off her clothing, dripping off from her and the current pulls her as she struggles to find stability out from the creek. The liquid appears to clot her wounds, keeping them from bleeding any longer.

She lays for a moment, but only a moment. Long enough to spit some of the black liquid out from her lungs. After, she crawls back to her feet with unease, the wounds on her leg and arm sting from the river's embrace. She runs, beneath her heavy breathing and the rain falling down at her feet, she hears the rustling of hurried footsteps and she knows that Wolf Head isn't far from her.

She continues her rampant movement until taking shelter, crawling inside of a hallowed log that's neon colors have started to die out.

Inside the log, she listens in at the pitter-patter of rain, in unison with noticing the smell, she becomes aware that the rainwater is a crimson color that glistens from inside the forest.

Holly lets out a sigh, she has little faith in her mother. Little faith that she will actually commit a murder off a phone call's demand. In-fact, she wouldn't have been surprised to learn Olivia had written it off as a prank, shrugged her shoulders and returned to bed.

The sound of footsteps echoed in the forest, then, the howling sound of a wolf. Through a knothole in the log, Holly peeks out and can see The Man with the Wolf Head trudging through the forest, scanning through the area like an animal in search of its prey.

4

Olivia feels the nagging agony from the wound at the top of her temple from where her head struck itself against the steering wheel. What she feels more than that, however, is the ache of her neck from the way it was yanked forward. She tries her best to adjust and move her head, but it is no use. Her legs feel hot and numb while her head throbs with white hot, unrelenting severity. Her surroundings look darker than before, for some reason. She adjusts her head some, unable to lift it.

The airbag had went off in her car and has since depleted itself, in front of her, she sees another person in their vehicle as well. They are unconscious. Hopefully.

In time, she musters the strength to take her head off from the steering wheel, her eyes fluttering in a way that makes her feel as though she might lose responsiveness at any moment. Fading, she leans over her passenger side seat and lifts The Aeonian off from the floorboard where it has fallen, struggling some at lifting it.

The book feels heavy in her hands. She opens it and reads the handwritten passage again, "It doesn't reason. It doesn't feel. No empathy. An action. It worries only about replenishment. Of entertainment. Satisfaction. Pleasure. The Miasma will help you. Simply ask."

Olivia strums her fingers over the page, feeling the engravings from on the page where it was written. "Please help me, please kill Eric Douglas," she says aloud, resting her head against the steering wheel again.

5

Holly cups her hand over her mouth in an attempt at silencing her breathing, from all the pain she felt, she knows she is on her last legs. The Man with the Wolf Head walks about the forest, looking behind trees and in bushes. As the quietude allots her thoughts to conspire with one another, Holly begins to accept her fate.

In this world, The Miasma has complete and total control. Able to bend reality at its whim. If The Miasma wants her dead, in time, she will surely be dead. The idea of dying inside of a hollowed log doesn't entice her very much.

Holly crawls out from the hollowed log with leeriness, with a mind that feels the screaming thoughts of a million voices.

The Man with the Wolf Head notices her presence almost immediately, charging toward her with tenacious speed, ramming her to a seated position as he digs his claws into her shoulder.

The immediate response is a release of air from Holly's lungs, a startled flinch, she had expected it, but it still caught her off-guard. The feeling is like nothing Holly has ever felt before, neither pain nor agony, but an extreme pressure as she feels her arm being pried off of her body like a loose hair.

And, indeed, it is. She feels the blood pour of her and it feels a lot like she is becoming emptier, light-headed and lesser. The wound burns as well, she looks on as residue from the black tar spills out over where her arm was fully pried off from her body.

She simply lays there, her body convulsing like a madman tossing himself over and over against a padded cell. The Wolf stands over her, his eyes a bright greenish tint. He mounts her. The way one does to their lover on prom night. The way his armor gleams off the light from the trees and the moon is peaceful in itself. Holly smiles, feeling the release as The Wolf delves its claws into her left eye-socket, piercing it, blinding her, leaving her only to shake in a discombobulated manner. She is as good as dead now. No different than the grasshopper that spins its arms after its head has been ripped off. No different than the deer in the headlights.

"Wait!" A voice yells out, she recognizes the voice as belonging to the skeleton. "We've been rerouted!"

With her one good eye, Holly looks up at The Man with the Wolf Head, who is suddenly uninterested in her. The Wolf climbs off of her and follows the skeleton.

Her left arm a distance away, thrown wherever The Wolf had tossed it. Blinded in her left eye as well, it droops out of her like the morning eggs that mother used to make. The colorful trees, a decorative array, Holly feels the burn as the tar from her clothing dampens and falls over her wound.

Tears run down from her cheek.

At last, she knows what it means to truly, sincerely have no fight left, to truly want death's touch. To no longer have the urge to fight against the inevitable.

She's unfulfilled.
Epilogue

1

The man carries himself with an astute know-how to his character, a true showman. George Olsen finds it difficult to hide how taken he is by the gentleman's upbeat and enthusiastic approach. George smiles, his only defense against the oncoming laughter. Most of the salesman that come to his shop with propositions and deals didn't have the same charisma.

"The book is an heirloom amongst magicians and illusionists, the sheer ownership of such a fine item as this is surely to bring a certain level of class to your establishment. I'm telling you, no matter what you price this book as, it will sell, that's how wondrous it is." The old man flails his arms about, exhibiting the utmost of flare to his antics and body-language.

"I've been searching it online, and, well, the history for it, well, it seems to have a long-history with kidnappings and some shit," George replies, standing at the other-side of the counter, typing away on the keyboard to his computer.

"A very well established marketing campaign, newer models, reprints and phonies come about, and what better way to make an easy-penny than to write up some spooky mystery about how the book is haunted. I can only tell you that it isn't wise to believe everything you read in tabloids or other gossip."

"And, you're just giving me this, what's the ulterior motive, ... what's the catch?" George taps his fingers atop the cover-work of the book, scribed as The Aeonian, until seeing a grimace and angry look from the old man. George stops tapping his fingers on the book.

"I'm sure you've thought it once or twice, just meeting me, but I'm not getting any younger," the old man says, as if he read George's mind, "Once upon a time, I had a lot of enjoyment out of this book. But, rather than take it to my grave, I would like to leave it to somebody that will appreciate it."

Mr. Olsen smiles sincerely, the older gentleman seems a kind soul, and even if he'd sooner drop dead than actually put this dusty old book on display in his store, he didn't want to dampen the old man's spirits. "I will gladly take this book off your hands and will take your contribution to my store with the highest honor. Please take a complimentary button on your way out, sir." Mr. Olsen winced some at his own insincerity and actually felt bad about it for a tiny second.

The old man looked at him with a twinkle in his eye and smirked, "Oh, please, call me Thomas, and I will gladly take a button from you."

Mr. Olsen nods his head, watching as the old man takes a button out from the small cardboard box on the counter. The button is a solid white color with the words "G.O.'s" in big red letters (George Olsen's initials, of course. He is quite proud of the name.) and in smaller, blue letters, it says: "Emporium of Illusion".

The old man looks at him with a prideful look. The poor sap must not have much else in his life to be getting off at the sight of a cheap button.

Mr. Olsen keeps his facade, giving a big teethed grin, "Have a good day, Thomas."

"You as well," Thomas says, nodding his head before he turns his back and begins to make his leave from the store. However, for a second, he turns himself back around and looks on seriously, "But I must warn you, that book is for experienced magicians and those more comfortable with the darker arts. It isn't a book I'd recommend for a novice such as yourself."

Thomas nods his head again, then, turns himself, walking off until he meets the glass doors and makes his exit.

George Olsen chuckles while he watches the old man leave his line of vision. He looks to the book on the counter for a second and shakes his head. Then, he lifts up the heavy old book and drops it into the small trash-can on his side.

George rifles through his pockets for a second until finding his carton of cigarettes, then, searches a little longer for his lighter. Shoving the loose from the pack stick in his mouth and preparing to light it up as he makes for the door, hoping to be able to take a short break in-between customers.

Then, however, he comes to a standstill, laughing at himself some, he turns around, shaking his head: "Novice."

