The Storyteller of Pain

by Loren Molloy

  Still holding her as he was, he looked around the chapel again. “So where is this chaplain?” John said.

  “I don’t know,” Lily said quietly, sounding defeated.

  “Don’t worry. We’ll find him and he’ll cleanse this whole place and everything will be okay again,” John said while rubbing her back, trying to soothe both their fears away.

  “Maybe he’s in the Sacristy,” Lily said quietly

  “The what?” John asked looking and seeing a door on one side of the altar. He began walking towards it.

  “The place they get ready before services. It’s where the chaplain stores all his holy items as well,” Lily said sounding exhausted

  “Oh good to know. Well there’s only one door over here. This has gotta be the Sacristy. He’s gotta be in here,” John said as he stood in front of the door with Lily still in his arms.

  John only hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should knock first or not. Screw it, he thought and pushed open the door. It was much heavier than he expected as if something was against it. He was right. The room was a nightmare. Furniture and holy items were all over the room. All were shattered. The room was dimly lit but the smell of death and blood was evident to John’s retired cop nose without needing to see. His nose could never forget what those things smelled like. He felt for the light switch and gasped in pure disgust. He pulled his hand back and looked at it quickly.

  “Oh, this is not good,” John said looking at his hand before forcing himself to turn on the light that was still wet to the touch.

  The single light bulb was truly unforgiving. Bloody handprints were all over the place, multiple sets. There was also blood, splattered and sprayed everywhere.

  “Oh my. They’re even on the ceiling!” Lily cried out in horror, pointing up at the macabre menagerie of handprints above her.

  Multiply-sized, bloody handprints were all over the ceiling like a group of people were doing handstands, covered in blood. The handprints overlapped. There were just so many of them.

  “Where’s the chaplain?” John asked in horror.

  “Look behind the Sacristy credenza,” Lily said in a horrified whisper.

  “The what?” John asked.

  “The great big cabinet that’s standing on its side, over in the corner,” Lily said and pointed, her eyes wide in fear.

  With all the carnage surrounding them, he hadn’t even noticed it was standing vertically, almost touching the ceiling, it was so tall. She was right of course. The moment his eyes narrowed in and saw the cabinet, he could tell there was room behind it. He thought he saw a fingertip sticking out. It had to be him.

  John tried to walk carefully through the blood and carnage that was everywhere without slipping into it. Last thing either of them needed was to be covered in preacher’s blood. As he got to the credenza, John realized why this one piece of furniture was left intact. Someone or something had staged it so you would see the fingertip. The problem was the rest of the chaplain was detached from it and in a pile behind the credenza itself. One big, bloody piled-up mess of body parts was all that was left of the chaplain. The poor man’s face was even smashed in, looking reminiscent of a smashed in watermelon.

  Brain matter and bits of human flesh covered the cabinet, as if someone had repeatedly bounced the severed head off of it, with such force the head became more and more unrecognizable. It was the mouth that made them realize it was a human face at all. It was stretched open wide. The man’s lips were peeled back in one last froze scream. A huge, bloody, gilded cross was shoved through its opening. The evil bastard shattered all but the chaplain’s two front teeth which were being used as a holder for the top of the cross. The sight of it all caused them to scream out of horror and shock.

  “Oh-” John exclaimed in revulsion before swallowing hard and closing his eyes for a moment. That made it even worse, forcing him to open them once more upon the scene before them. John kept swallowing back the fear and bile that threatened the back of his throat. There was just so much carnage.

  Lily couldn’t tear her eyes away from it. ‘It was all staged to cause this reaction,’ she thought. She was very worried she would black out or throw up. She wanted to scream but knew if she did, she would do one or the other, so she stayed silent. She kept her jaw locked shut. In her mind though, Lily was screaming bloody murder.

  When she could finally speak, all she could manage was, “So much for the chaplain.”

  John just looked at her in disbelief. She sounded so casual, so blase about it. She was definitely in shock. Her eyes were huge, wide saucers that never blinked and never left the ‘human pile of chaplain.’ Her face looked even whiter than it did earlier. ’They shouldn’t be in here any longer. There’s no reason,’ he thought. ‘Just get her away from that sight of savagery displayed before them.’

  “Let’s get out of here,” John said out loud and began to head for the door.

  Across the room, the door slammed shut, very forcefully, with a loud boom.

  There, before their eyes, appeared a massive black shadow in front of the door, blocking their escape. It somehow seemed like a completely solid mass and yet the dark form seemed to waver like the air above a heat source. The shadowy figure began to materialize into substance and definition, somehow. They could see what looked like a suit jacket beginning to manifest where there was only darkness. Facial features as well. It only took a few moments for that dark black shadow to become a living-looking man before them.

  His features were out of proportion just enough to feel the need to use the word disfigured or deformed. The nose was off center. It was curled up and back, much farther than any human. Its forehead was sloped causing a look of permanent fury. The thing was hunched over with its shoulders almost touching its abnormally tiny ears; much too small for any human and much too rounded. Its hands were just shy of looking like talons. The suit he was wearing looked like it hadn’t been washed in centuries. The stink that wafted from the man-like creature was foul, like rotten eggs and dead bodies that had been decomposing in a heat wave.

  The vile creature laughed at them rubbing its filthy hands together in delight. Lily forced John to put her down slowly by silently, pushing on his shoulders then his forearms. Neither John nor Lily’s eyes left what was supposed to pass for a man.

  Just as Lily’s feet touched the ground, the man-like creature lunged at them. John pushed Lily out of the way forcing her to slide through the blood and human yuck on the floor. She crashed into the closet on the far wall. The grotesque man landed onto John with a fearsome pounce, knocking the wind out of him. Both of them fell onto the blood covered floor beneath them. The man kept laughing his hideous, monstrous laugh. It was more like a thousand wild hyenas all laughing in unison than any real laughter.

  Lily sat up and leaned against the cabinet to get her bearings. Sitting up, she heard ‘clinking’ sounds. Lily heard John scream as the man-like creature on top of him snarled and snapped his teeth millimeters away from his face. His hands were morphing into real talons which were digging into John’s flesh. His entire being was transforming on top of John.

  Right before their eyes, the man-like creature changed into a disturbing mutation, an amalgamation of animals. Its face still had those off center nostrils curled back too far but now the face was that of some strange breed of deranged baboon with a mane of a mangy lion. Its body was hideous. It had 9 legs. Each one came from a different kind of predator. It had the torso of a wolf and the arms of a gorilla. It roared in John’s face as the harpy eagle talons were digging deeper into his chest causing John to cry out in pain again.

  Lily forced herself to stand up and she leaned against the cabinet again. She was covered in blood but that didn’t faze her in this moment. She was staring at John, trying to figure out what to do. She slipped slightly and bumped the cabinet again. Once again she could hear the clinking sound of glass coming from within.

  Lucky for her, the front of the cabinet was cracked so badly it didn
’t matter if it was locked or not. Lily quickly opened one side of the cabinet and saw it. ‘Hallelujah,’ she thought.

  John screamed again bringing Lily’s attention back to him. The creature had bit into John’s shoulder with razor sharp teeth.

  “Hey ASSHOLE!” Lily screamed at it.

  The creature was so startled, it unhinged its jaw from John’s shoulder to see who was being so insulting to it, and roared back at her like a group of banshee’s screeching. Lily threw something at it with all of her might like a pitcher trying to strike out the winning runner.

  Something shattered upon impact onto the creature causing it to scream in pain and leap backwards off of John. The creature’s back was smoking like it was on fire. It turned on her and roared in fury at her. Lily just smiled a malicious smile back at the creature.

  “Didn’t like that did ya! What? Got a problem with a little water? Is that it?” Lily exclaimed mockingly. “GOOD!” Lily yelled at it before throwing something at it again, with all the force she could muster.

  Three glass containers of Holy Water smashed into the creature. Two shattered on to its torso while the other exploded onto the creatures distorted face. He was screaming in pain and holding his face. Smoke was coming off him in waves. The creature screeched and roared like a number of different animals all at once. All sounding like they were being tortured at the same time. It was one of the most ghoulish sounds Lily had ever heard.

  With each moment, the man-animal creature was turning back into a dark, shapeless black shadow until even that was disappearing. In the matter of moments, the shadow wasn’t even wisps of smoke. John and Lily heard one last massive booming roar come from the shadowy wisps. Then it completely disappeared.

  John and Lily knew it was gone because seconds after the last roar, the door to the room smashed open again.

  John was laying on the floor looking up at the door when Lily ran over to him.

  “Oh baby!” Lily cried out at the sight of him. Tears were welling up in her eyes.

  “I’m okay.” John tried to say but the pain could be heard in his voice, too clearly for him to sound believable. John tried to sit up but winced and laid back down for a moment causing Lily to lean over him. Using his good arm, John pulled her face to his and began kissing her. He couldn’t believe they were alive. He tried to sit up, getting lost in the kiss, but the pain made him cry out again.

  “Oh Hunny,” Lily whispered, her bottom lip quivering

  John just smiled at her. She loved him so much. It showed so clearly, it made him smile. He couldn’t help it. They were alive and he had the love of his life in his arms. In that moment it was enough. He sighed and winced again. Looking down at himself he could see why she looked so upset. His shoulder was pretty shredded. It was also bleeding, a lot. The talon wounds were bleeding badly as well.

  “Quick thinking, Sugarplum,” John said softly.

  “Thanks.” Lily said sniffling. Her voice was shaking badly. Lily sighed, a long determined sigh and rolled her neck around a few times.

  John could see she was compartmentalizing her fear and worry from what needed to be done. John knew the look. He had seen it on the force. Lily wasn’t some fragile, meek little creature. She was a warrior woman. A rare kind of soldier that doesn’t show themselves until truly needed.

  Some people are like that. John learned in his police training it’s only in the moment of disaster that truly shows what a person is really made of. Some crumble, others excel. She was the type of person who thinks, ‘I’ll deal with everything else later. Right now all that matters is survival.’ You would think everyone is that type and yet John knows hardly any ever really are.

  His warrior woman looked at his shoulder with the scrutinizing look of a surgeon and said, “We have to tend to your shoulder now!”

  “Sounds good. Any thoughts on how? This room doesn’t seem to have what we need.” John said trying for humor.

  Lily’s eyes narrowed at him. John could see she was pondering something for a moment. “I disagree. This room has the essential, first ingredient for your healing process.”

  “What?” John asked confused. “There’s blood, gore and oh yeah, more gore. What could the room possibly have?”

  Lily just stared at him for a minute with a grimace on her face.” Sorry!” Lily said before pouring a container of Holy Water onto the wounds.

  John screamed loudly in agony. His shoulder was smoking just like the demonic creature had.

  “FUCK!” John roared, trying not to black out from the pain. It was like a billion red hot pokers were all being pressed into the wound. He could actually hear his flesh sizzling. He could even smell it!

  In the background, John could hear Lily saying she was ’Sorry’, repeatedly. It was like a chant going on in the background of his mind. The pain had made the reality around him almost nonexistent. Yet there she was, like a whisper in his mind. A thin thread of sanity he clutched to. John forced himself to focus on her voice. He could hear her whispering in his ear, ‘I’m sorry. Be ok.’

  John could feel her cheek against his forehead now. He realized he had stopped screaming. The burning pain was receding. John’s breathe was ragged, harsh gasps. Some levels of pain are too much for the body to handle. He knew that. His heart was beating ferociously in his chest like a Panther wanting to be free of its cage, but it was still beating, Thank Goodness.

  “Stay with me baby,” Lily screamed at him.

  His eyes opened with a start. John had indeed blacked out on her. “I’m okay,” John coughed out with a croak.

  “Oh, thank you,” she whispered and kissed his forehead.

  “Thank you !” John whispered to her before he kissed her.

  Somehow he knew that for the holy water to have such a reaction, that demonic thing must have left some form of evil on him. It was the only reason it would do that. John knew Lily had saved him. He would never have thought of doing that. He also had no idea what that evil would have done to him, if it had been left in him. That thought was scary enough by itself.

  John looked at them both. They were indeed ‘covered in the chaplain’. It was something out of a nightmare, yet he knew he was awake. The pain was too great for him to be sleeping.

  “We need to get to my office,” Lily whispered very quietly into his ear. Louder she asked, “Do you think you can walk?”

  “Yes,” John said. He somehow felt better. Honestly in comparison to the burning fire of holy water, he felt great. ‘I guess it’s all relative,’ John thought. He was exhausted and his shoulder was still a shredded, gaping wound but he managed to get to his feet, with a lot of help from Lily.

  John swayed a few times from the pain and felt like he was going to throw up, only once, before they were able to move forward.

  “Wait!” Lily exclaimed as they took a step for the door.

  Making sure John could stand on his own, Lily went back to the closet in the far wall. Lilian stared into it for only a few moments before saying out loud, “Please forgive me for any disrespect but we need you, and the chaplain’s dead.”

  John froze in fear. He couldn’t image who she could be talking to inside that large closet. His mind tried not to think of any creepy possibilities and failed.

  Lily pulled out a piece of white linen that had a cross sewn on it and opened it fully. She then took out a covered, gold container with a cross on it and opened the cover. It must have been empty because John watched as Lily placed the white linen with the cross on it inside the container. Lily started taking out several glass containers of holy water and what looked like vials of oil. She placed them in the white linen. When she had what must have been all of them, she covered them with the white linen and then closed the lid on the gold container.

  Lily looked at the cabinet again then at the container and said, “I mean no disrespect. Please forgive me.” Lily turned and began walking towards John with the container clasped in her good arm. “Ok. Now we can go,” Lily said to John.
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br />   John gave a look back at the closet, still wondering if she was actually talking to someone or something in there. It showed on his face.

  “I might not have been raised in this faith but I certainly don’t want to disrespect or piss off any member of the good side. Something makes holy water holy, no matter what name we use. It’s a powerful force to be reckoned with, that’s for sure. I know the only ones who usually would be touching these items, would be a priest or the chaplain. This water & oil was blessed. Last thing we need is any bad mojo because of me not showing respect for the power that saved you and me.”

  John smiled at her for saying ‘bad mojo’. He chuckled inside. She always surprised him. “Very smart as always, Sugarplum,” John said as they began to slowly make their way out of the room.

  They could hear the sounds of screaming as well as the relentless sounds of those Hell Hounds. With every step, Lily was sure the demonic dogs would appear, but they never did. John kept seeing gruesome rotting faces appearing from the darkness and disappearing back into it.

  Finally they were in the administrators’ wing. The flashbacks from what happened earlier to Lily hit her instantaneously. She began to shutter and breath harsh, fast breathes.

  John realized, with one look at her, what was going on. He could even see where it must have all happened. About twenty feet down the hallway, there was a huge section of one wall and floor that was covered in blood. Even the ceiling above it had blood spatter on it. The horror of what she actually dealt with hit him hard and he pulled her into him and kissed the top of her head.

  Lily’s shuttering and breathing slowed as she calmed down from his embrace. John stared at the spot where it had to have happened which caused him to be even more upset and concerned than moments before. He realized something very important from looking at the scene before him. It was missing one vital key item; Doctor Charles Pages’ body. That meant only one thing. Even after that much blood loss, that bastard got up and walked away, somehow.