The Cave

by Ksenia Murray

  Trish knelt beside him and used the wet and sticky scissors to cut open his abdomen. The metal lubricated with his blood glided across his flesh. Trish then ripped open the jagged cut, pulling his skin flaps to either side. She steadied his body with her knees and reached inside, pulling out his kidney.

  Trish then ripped the remaining tissue away from the kidney with her mouth, still holding his body in her lap with her nub. She took a huge bite, letting the flavor overwhelm her. It exploded in her mouth. A mixture of blood and urine filled her mouth with the vilest of flavors. The aroma danced up into the soft palate of her mouth, exhausting all of her senses. She took another bite, her mouth covered in blood and other liquids, her shirt sticky and clinging to her body. She finished it off with one last bite, the texture chewy and slick. She licked her lips and dug her hands into his body again.

  Trish then pulled out Sausage’s heart with the little bit of strength her body had left. Blood trickled out of the heart and into her lap, also onto Sausage’s face. His white snout now a deep red, drying brown.

  After taking a bite of the tough heart, she took a few moments to chew. The meat was demanding, her jaw sore.

  There was a pounding at the door. “Trish?” her father called from the other side. All at once, she regained her senses and looked around her. Trish dropped the heart from her hand. It bounced against Sausage and onto the ground with a thud. Trish spat the gamey meat from her mouth and onto the front of her shirt. Her mouth was coated in grime and slime. Once she realized what she had done, she howled louder than she ever had before.

  Trish doubled over and, with shaky hands, petted Sausage’s sticky head. Her parents burst into her room, the door swung open and hit the wall. Her mother screamed, and her father vomited, doubling over and steading himself in the door frame.

  “What have you done, Patricia?” her mother wailed.

  Will you come to me now? Xavier’s voice popped into her head, tempting her once more. She knew if she fought against him again, the next time, her parents would end up like Sausage: once loved, now devoured.

  Trish sobbed, squeezing her hands into fists and hitting herself in the head. “Yes, I will come to you.”

  ~~~

  “I need to leave right now!” Trish yelled at her father. He was standing in her bedroom doorway, blocking the exit with his large frame. Her mother was sobbing over Sausage, her hands covered in blood. She kept kissing the top of his head and petting him, which gutted Trish. I can’t believe that this just happened. I can’t believe that Xavier made me do this. I will never forgive myself, she thought to herself.

  “No! You’re not going anywhere except back to the hospital,” her father barked, his face beet red. Trish flinched away from him, her eyes twitching. She watched her parents in amazement. She had no idea that they loved Sausage this much.

  “I need to go back to the cave; I have to end this! I have to avenge Sausage!” she screamed. Her hands shook, and her eyes darted around the room wildly, back and forth between her parents, Sausage, and all of the blood. Her hands are sticky and warm.

  “You’re staying right where you are, and I’m calling the hospital. You’re the one who killed him. If you need to avenge his death, all you need to do is look into the mirror,” her father said. He turned to walk out of the room, ignoring all of her pleas.

  He’s given up on me, he no longer loves me. I wish I could make him see that I didn’t do this; that it was Xavier. Not wanting to go back to the hospital, Trish bent over to grab the nail scissors she had dropped earlier. They made clank when she picked them up, but neither her sobbing mother nor disgusted father was paying attention to her.

  “You will let me go, or I will be forced to hurt you! Just give me the car keys, and I will be back once everything is fixed,” Trish threatened. She sobbed, her breathing erratic. Her sobbing sounded like laughter.

  “Patricia, you won’t hurt me! Where do you think you’re going to go, anyway? Back to the fucking cave you keep yammering on about? Newsflash: you were kidnapped, raped, and tortured by two human beings who will possibly be on death row. Your mind wants you to believe so much that a demon is making you do this, that a demon hurt you. Who knows, maybe those people are demons? But the fact of the matter is that you need therapy and isolation. I’m getting you help, and that’s final!” he snapped.

  Her father turned around and stared at her, daring her with his dark eyes. Trish took a deep breath to steady herself and squeezed the scissors in her hand. She placed two fingers into the allotted holes and opened and shut the scissors quickly.

  “Patricia put the scissors down,” her father said, raising his hands towards her. She bit her lip and shook her head.

  “No…no…stop fighting me…” Trish whimpered while she smacked herself in the head with the scissors. She turned and stared at her father for a few beats. Taking a deep breath, she pounced into her father’s arms, stabbing him in the neck.

  He screamed and flung her off of him; she dropped her scissors to the ground with a clank. She hit a hallway wall with a grunt and whimpered while she slid down. Trish scrambled to grab the scissors again while she watched as her father tried to stop the bleeding and her mother screamed obscenities that Trish couldn’t make out. Her father pulled Trish’s sheet off of her bed and pressed the fabric against his neck.

  “Call 911!” he screamed at his wife.

  “I’m sorry, Dad, I have to do this…” Trish whispered, looking back and forth in between her parents. Her mother stared at her, her mouth flapping but not uttering anything of importance. Trish shrugged.

  She turned and ran into the living room. She smacked against the wall at several points, leaving bloody prints along the way. ‘I’ve gotta do this, I’ve gotta do this,’ she whispered to herself.

  Her hand slid down the pearly white wall by the front door, wiggling around to find her father’s car keys. The familiar jingle and cold metal alerted her to them. She grabbed them and squeezed them, the sticky blood acting as an adhesive to her hand. She unlocked the front door and pushed it open, running out into the night.

  “Patricia! Get back here, please!” her mother wailed. Trish ignored her as she unlocked the car and hopped into the driver’s seat.

  She slammed the key into the ignition, the metal smacking the dashboard, and turned the car on. Trish quickly put the car in reverse and backed out of the driveway, forgetting to put her seatbelt on. The radio burst to life, playing some pop song that she never heard before. She turned it off and put the car into drive, speeding off out of her neighborhood.

  Chapter Seventeen

  T

  rish drove for the next fifteen minutes on the abandoned dirt road. The rocks kicked up by her tires clanked against her car, leaving scratches and making a noise like hail in a summer storm. Trish bit her lip and sighed; she couldn’t see anything. There were no street lights or lamps, no signs, and no houses or buildings anywhere on this path. Dirt coated her windshield. She flicked on her windshield wipers, but it seemed to only spread the dirt around instead of clearing her view.

  She came to an opening within the forest. The area seemed like it would be beautiful in the day time; nice lush green grass, beautiful large pine trees, bushes filled with exquisite blue Hydrangeas.

  Park here, Xavier said in her head, his voice filled with jubilance.

  Trish did as she was told, but she left the headlights on to see around her. You will kill your battery and will not be able to leave, he commented.

  She ignored him, knowing that she needed the lights and hoping that her family would be able to find her once all was said and done.

  She stared out into the clearing, gripping her steering wheel tight. Her knuckles turned white, and her wrist cracked. Her hand and arm, still covered in Sausage’s blood, now brown. The scent of his blood had filled her father’s car to the brim along the way. It took everything within her to not vomit and sob. Trish knew she could never live with herself after what she did to Sausage, ev
en though it wasn’t really her. She didn’t change clothes, so her once comforting pajamas now stuck to her in an uncomfortably sticky way. The blood dried onto the fabric, which adhered itself to her skin. She couldn’t wait to peel the clothes off of her later. Her hair was a matted mess, and her eyes looked wild.

  She glanced down at the nub of her missing arm, the scars very much still visible but faded into a nice skin-color, no longer pink. Trish thought about the scars covering her body, her extensive broken bones, and all of the relationships she has lost because of this. Even though she felt revulsion toward ever accepting James back into her life again, if she survived the night, she was glad to have had someone she thought was a friend there for a while.

  Quit postponing the inevitable and get out of the car. I have waited much too long for this to sit here and listen to your mindless thoughts.

  Trish climbed out of the car and walked into the clearing.

  “Where am I going?” she asked.

  Straight ahead, you should see the cave right in front of your face, Xavier growled.

  Trish walked forward, her eyes darting around the clearing until she saw the cave shimmer into existence. A black cloud, just like the one that appeared every time Xavier needed something from Trish, maneuvered about the trees. It shifted and waved red glitter amongst the darkness, small cries pleading throughout it; a deathly glaze of unnerving invincibility the cloud was. A small cave, approximately six feet tall and ten feet wide, opened up before her. The grey rocks were covered with moss and dirt, slick with moisture and condensation.

  Go on now, do not be shy. This is our destiny. Xavier laughed.

  Trish shimmied toward the cave’s entrance, her breathing shallow and her mind racing. I hope that I survive this. I’ve been through far too much to die in a cave, never to be seen again. The closer she got, the more the feeling of dread enveloped her every cell. She smelt the familiar smell of decay, moss, and rot. It almost felt like home to her, pulling memories that could have been recorded onto an old VHS tape but only remembered by watching it. The memories flooded back to the night she spent in the cave, worshiping Xavier and tearing apart her own body. The riddle, the lights, the music, the rape; all served a purpose within her soul. A purpose of which built her into who she was today: a survivor.

  She knew she’d get through this, one way or another like she did the first time. Trish didn’t care that she was now missing an arm, walked with a perpetual limp, and would most likely be homeless once all was said and done. She figured she would have to be on the run as her parents would have her committed if her father was still alive. If he died, her mother would surely have nothing to do with her ever again. All she knew and could think about was that she was more than happy to end this all tonight - no matter the cost.

  Trish stepped into the dark and malevolent cave; the sick black cloud hovered above her head. The cloud then lowered itself in front of her and forced her to walk through it. She tried to hold her breath but failed and breathed in the familiar atrocity against her soul. Trish coughed and placed her hand over her mouth and nose. Once she stepped inside, the walls that were lined with torches lit up in flames. The flames burned low, the embers hopping off of the torches and danced in the darkness.

  Shadows of what she thought were human forms, sexless and mischievous, danced around the cave walls. They hopped and shook to the beat of the low hum of dreadful music that now burned her ears. The forms reached out to grab her. Trish screamed and sidestepped them, placing herself squarely in the middle of the cave, as far away from the walls that she could get.

  “Welcome home, Patricia,” Xavier said from deep within the cave. She couldn’t see him, but she could hear footsteps. Is he showing me his true form? Is the cloud his true form? Why do I hear footsteps? She thought to herself.

  “Are you a human?” she asked, her voice trembled. Her throat dry.

  Xavier laughed. “No, Patricia, I am not. I just decided that tonight would be more fun if you could see me while also being able to feel me.”

  “I’m not going to touch you,” Trish yelled. Her stomach somersaulted in her abdomen at the thought of having to touch his form, which she figured would be slimy and cold.

  “It will not be you who will be doing the touching,” he quipped. “This is my realm, and I will enjoy you for as long as I feel is necessary. I do not think you will be enjoying it, though. I do wish that you would.”

  Trish sighed and shook her head. “You will not be touching me, Xavier. I came here to bargain.”

  “Bargain? You have nothing to bargain with,” he said, his voice haunting.

  “Yes, I do. I have my soul.” Trish stood straighter; her shoulders squared.

  “Your soul? I thought we had established that I already own your soul? Do you not remember the glorious night that we spent together?”

  “You keep claiming that, but I know that to not be true,” she said, stepping forward.

  “Oh, really? Do you not remember solving that riddle? Do you not remember the illustrious, as you humans say, lovemaking that we enjoyed? I told you that you would owe me if I granted your life, survival, happiness, and here you are. You stand before me with your one life, the only one you have left, and it is all because of me.”

  “No, it isn’t. I’m the one that survived. I don’t give a flying fuck what happened that night. That night meant nothing to me. Everything that happened at the hospital and afterward is what matters the most to me.”

  “You are talking nonsense. How exactly did you get to the hospital? The last thing you remember is passing out in here. As a matter of fact, your blood is still pooled on the ground over there. It brings me great joy to lick at it and play in it. You are unbalanced, insane, mad, unhinged; it made it easier for me to get you to come back to me, your one true love. Your salvation, protector, and your light. I will take great pleasure in balancing your mind for you,” Xavier said, howling.

  Trish didn’t know what to say. She hoped that she was right and that it truly was her all along fighting for her life. In the pit of her stomach, she felt as though she could be wrong. If she was wrong, then she would welcome death with open arms. It was what she deserved after Sausage.

  “Ah, yes, Sausage. What a little delicacy he was, was he not? Sacrifices taste oh so sweeter when the person sacrifices someone or something that they truly love. I have gotten tired of goats myself, and Sausage was a welcome treat,” Xavier chuckled, his laugh bounced off of the cave walls.

  Trish howled; her scream echoed around her, filling her ears and mind with nothing but sorrow. “Shut the fuck up!”

  Xavier laughed. “How about this, you come here and make me ‘shut the fuck up’? I think it will be fun, just like last time.”

  Trish sighed and shook her head. “No way! You come out here!”

  “That is not within the rules. If you want to see me, truly witness me, you need to come to me. You are the one who came to me, after all.”

  “I was forced to come here. And where exactly are you?”

  “Forced? You came here willingly. You killed your dog, attacked your father, stole his car, and drove here. I did not force you to do any of that.” he called. “I am back here. Follow my voice, and you will surely find me.”

  Trish stepped forward and walked deeper into the cave; the air grew colder, and the light dimmed. The shadows were long gone.

  “Come on, you can move faster than that. You are not an invalid, are you?” Xavier taunted.

  She ignored him and kept walking, her breath shallow and her mind wild. As she neared the back of the cave, the air grew frozen. The torches snuffed out. The pitch-black cave took away her security blanket. Her body shook, sticky with brown congealed blood, while the temperature dropped. The smell of decay heightened, her eyes burned, and her nose bled. The blood from her nose dripped onto her shirt, fresh red contrasted against the deep brown, melting together into one sticky mess. She coughed, trying to clear her throat. Trish heard something drippi
ng, thicker than water and making louder plops. She tried not to dwell on what it was.

  At the back of the cave, a smooth wall with a three-foot circular hole in the middle of it stood before her. She only noticed a shimmering red light permeating through the wicked gloom.

  “I am in here,” Xavier called out to her from inside of the hole.

  “I don’t think so,” she said, her fingers caressing the rock, slicing her finger as she traced the circle.

  “Do you want this to end or not? I have of eternity to make your life hell. I will kill your parents, kill everyone at the veterinary clinic, kill some more animals, kill James—”

  “I get it, please stop,” Trish sobbbed. She slowly inched her hand into the hole, feeling nothing but cold air and moist rock along the other side. The water danced on her fingers, the air swinging by to freeze them. She whimpered, her hand gripping the side of the hole, and hoisted herself into the opening. The manhole squeezed her while she crawled into it. She used her nub to help drag her along; the jagged rocks and dirt scrapped and cut her body.

  The slick wet rocks enabled Trish’s hand to slip and sliced it open. She cried as she kept crawling. I’m going to turn around; I can’t do this, she thought to herself. She attempted to maneuver her body around in the hole, but she had no room to turn. Trish allowed herself to sob. She knew there was no turning back.

  After what felt like a lifetime of crawling, Trish found the opening on the other side. She didn’t have enough room to pull her legs up into a crouching position, which disabled her to crouch down. Her small body just small enough that the hole didn’t suffocate her. She took a deep breath, bit her tongue, and slid her body out of the hole. Trish somersaulted, and tumbled out of the hole, hitting her head on a rock. She groaned and pushed herself up into a sitting position. Touching the spot on her head, she exhaled when she discovered that there was no blood.

  “I am pleased that you have made it into my domain. Now, take your clothes off,” Xavier commanded. She couldn’t see anything. Trish looked around and couldn’t see a shimmering cloud, person, or any light whatsoever.