by Park, J. R.
When she looked back toward the fire, the flames had gone. Presumably extinguished by the atmospheric currents.
With the fading light, Kayleigh was just able to view the scarred man’s companions. The others were not so horrifying, but their striking differences in appearance, from race, age, gender and build made them all just as strange for being together.
The procession had been led by a small, Indian man. He was barely five foot in height, with a hairless head and thin, withering frame. As he continued to mouth his religious chorus, Kayleigh could see crooked teeth dotting a near barren gum line. Juxtaposed to this shrivelled frame of a man stood a giant by comparison. His shoulders were broad and his features could have been carved from an artist’s dream of perfection. The expression he wore however, was battle-worn, and he looked ready for another fight. The woman appeared much younger than her companions, and even with her hair wrapped in a scarf and her face streaked with paint, the soft contours of her beauty were clear to see.
They ceased their chanting abruptly, and with the strangely dressed group now stood in silence, Kayleigh watched as the shrivelled, old man looked down at where the mangled limbs of PC Pritchard were scattered. He held his hands up, contorting his fingers into a strange configuration. His digits interlocked to produce a shape, unfamiliar to his captive, teenage audience.
They all closed their eyes, leaving only the sound of the wind to rise and fall like an invisible tide. A moment passed in this way, with everything but the breeze frozen. Even the background blur of the city traffic and screaming sirens had ceased, seemingly in respect for the ceremony taking place. Kayleigh wasn’t able to say exactly when the chanting started again, but slowly it began to build, fading in from the silence as if carried on gentle gales from some far off land.
The cultists opened their eyes, then, following the direction of their leader, closed in on the car.
Kayleigh squeezed the pendent tight and sunk back into the seat. Unsure of their motives, she prayed they hadn’t seen her.
‘Now, if you don’t mind,’ Jonathan spoke with an even more heightened sense of agitation as he waved the Uzi in his sweaty palm, ‘I’m just going to take what’s mine and be off.’
Stopping by the case he bent his knees, lowering his free hand to reach the handle.
A smile filled his expression as he gripped it, almost daring to laugh with joy. But quickly that turned to a troubled look of concern and confusion.
Something wasn’t right.
Clutching his stomach, he doubled over in pain, then righted himself, trying to find some composure whilst fighting against the discomfort that worked its way through him. He dropped his gun and pulled at his clothes, lifting his jumper to understand the burning feeling underneath; the growing agony that stung like electrified barbs. His enforced audience looked as horrified as him as they watched his skin pull apart; tearing itself from his torso. Cuts appeared like a haphazard lattice as wounds crawled across his body. The gashes grew further, deeper, past the skin and into the flesh. Tearing and pulling and ripping through him, this unnatural pox of self-destruction split muscle and snapped tendons. He watched as his intestines fell from a growing hole in his belly, coiling on the floor like a gore soaked snake. His stomach was to follow, slopping onto the ground like a water filled balloon, leaking its slushy contents as it burst onto his shoes. Unable to stand any further, Jonathan Bones dropped to his knees as his throat opened up and the flesh on his face crawled from his cheeks, wrenching itself into small chunks like a swarm of marauding cockroaches.
As the gunman’s scream withered, Scullin looked to his colleagues, but they offered him the same quizzical expression in return.
‘I don’t understand,’ King voiced their thoughts. ‘If that wasn’t us…’
‘Rare for a Stygian to be out of answers,’ came an ancient and unfamiliar voice. ‘Maybe we can offer some assistance.’
Before them stood four figures in tattered robes; one woman and three men. The bold words, sounding like a threat, had come from the smallest of them, Taal, a withered looking man with the bluster of a thousand battles in his eyes. His stare looked deep into his opponents. Beside them stood Kayleigh.
A bead of sweat rolled down Scullin’s temple.
Overpowered by Taal’s unlikely strength, Kayleigh was pulled towards him as he forcibly grabbed her by the wrist. She struggled in his grip, trying to fight him off, but was unable to break free or resist the might with which he drew her close. The old man possessed more might than his time-ravaged, skeletal frame suggested.
‘We almost missed this one’s importance,’ Taal spoke through dry, cracked lips as he eyed the girl squirming in his hold.
‘Get off me,’ Kayleigh protested, but was unable to prevent him from prising open her clenched fist.
In her palm was a smooth yet spikey piece of silver. Scullin leaned closer, eyeing the object.
‘Interesting piece of jewellery, don’t you think?’ Taal spoke with a knowing tone, bordering on sarcasm.
His meaning was not lost on his adversary.
‘I wasn’t aware your faction believed in a sense of humour,’ Scullin mocked.
‘I didn’t know your type were able to recognise it,’ came Taal’s curt reply. ‘We haven’t met, personally, but I’m sure you know who I am,’ he spoke to the large, suited man as he tossed Kayleigh towards his own group and into the arms of his giant-like colleague, Sanay. ‘I know what you are. That’s good enough for me.’
Special Constable Forrest rose to her feet with a puzzled expression on her face.
‘Who the hell are you guys?’ she asked, gesturing an incredulous wave towards the monk-like quartet.
‘We are quite the contrary,’ came a reply from the scarred Kal. His voice was refined and soft as it sailed on the breeze, a contrast to his fierce, wounded face.
‘We are Servants of the Sacred Whisper,’ Maja explained, thrusting her staff into the ground as she announced her proud proclamation.
Scullin took a step towards the robed figure. ‘Give me the key.’
‘Give me the case,’ Taal challenged, mimicking his opponent’s movement and shortening the distance between them. ‘Its contents don’t belong to you.’
‘And yet we have it,’ Scullin’s knuckles cracked as he squeezed his fists in a deliberate sign of aggression.
Taal raised his staff and took up a fighting stance. Behind him, Kal, Maja and Sanay did the same.
‘Then we must settle the matter your way,’ the frail looking man threatened as fire burnt in his eyes.
He lunged forward, throwing himself at Scullin. Cross scooped up her gun from the dirt and took aim, shooting at the old man. With lightning quick reactions, Taal twisted in the air, spinning his body with the control of a gymnast and dodging the bullet. Landing on his feet he waved his staff above his head and whispered into the wind. Cross dropped her gun like is was scalding to the touch.
With all eyes elsewhere, Eleanor took her chance and ran towards Scullin’s discarded Beretta, eager to take the gun and avenge Sam’s death.
Grasping the handle she tried to lift the firearm but failed to raise it off the ground. She strained and grunted as she exerted every muscle in her body, but it wouldn’t budge. She pulled at it again, feeling her back tearing under the skin as she tried.
How much did this thing weigh?
Looking over she watched others struggle with the same problem.
Had Taal done something to their weapons?
Distracted with the gun, she didn’t notice Cross approach her from behind until slender fingers had wrapped around her throat and began to squeeze. Eleanor tried to fight back, but was too late, as quickly her strength evaporated. Within a matter of seconds Cross’s powerful grip had crushed her windpipe. Another moment more and the stunned audience heard the sound of bones snapping as her spinal cord crunched between her attacker’s palms. Trying to gasp for air, Eleanor could do nothing as Cross pulled at her neck, tearing the ski
n between her shoulders and head. Cross’s fingers ripped through Eleanor’s flesh as it split apart like worn cloth. Pulling her decapitated head free from her body, Cross held the teenager’s severed cranium aloft. Blood poured down the arms of the savage murderer as the remnants of the girl’s spine swayed in the wind.
Cross cried an ungodly scream and thunder exploded in the sky above them.
The two warring groups charged at each other underneath a surge of lightning bolts that flashed overhead. Cross launched herself at Sanay, holding her hands out like talons. Taking his staff, he thrust it forward, driving the end into her face. It snapped her sunglasses in two and continued, driving through her eye socket and forcing through her brain until it thudded against the back of her skull. Cross howled and shook violently as Sanay lifted her on his staff, suspending the wounded woman high in the air. Her arms thrashed wildly in an instinctive bid to reach him, but failed. Abruptly her attempted attack halted as her limbs began to shrivel and curl in on themselves. Her corpse slowly twisted round his staff like a dying snake meekly constricting its final prey.
Sanay smiled, but his victory was soon quashed as he turned to see Cross stood in front of him, free from injury and smirking with a devilish grin.
‘Confused?’ she laughed as Scullin’s titanic fist smashed through Sanay’s skull, obliterating his head in a fountain of blood and bone.
‘That’s not right,’ Aimee was momentarily taken aback by the unnatural sights that played out before her. Quickly she snapped back from her perplexed meanderings. ‘Run for it!’ she screamed to Jake, Laura and Kayleigh.
Like stunned rabbits the young trio had been mesmerised by the violent proceedings happening around them. Aimee’s call to flee ignited the adrenalin in their legs and, using the distraction of the fight, they broke free from their captors and ran in all directions.
Scullin reached out to grab Kayleigh but was blocked by a blow from the staff of Taal.
‘Get her,’ Scullin shouted to Cross and King as he battled Taal in a duel between fist and weapon.
Hands swiped at Kayleigh, but clenching the key she found more speed and broke free. A pulse of energy seemed to throb from the metallic object, giving her renewed strength. She held the charm close to her chest while her legs carried her with a speed she did not think possible. Desperately searching for cover she found herself running towards a deserted building. Its walls bowed and deep cracks danced up the time-ravaged brickwork. But the building’s near collapse didn’t concern her, hiding did, and as she ran through the crumbling entrance she found herself lost in a world of shadows.
Following Kayleigh, Aimee gave chase, and watched as both Cross and King ran into the building where the seventeen year old had sought sanctuary. An old sign on the side of the building swung back and forth in the wind. Though scratched and faded, the words Bus Depot could still be read on its battered surface. Entering the building herself, Aimee stopped as her eyes tried to adjust to the darkness inside.
Hazy as it was, her vision began to make out objects in the gloom. Outlines and shapes emerged, revealing a huge, open expanse, so wide she could not see the far end; its detail consumed by the blackness. Metal staircases to both her left and right ascended to a walkway that followed the perimeter of the room. The overhang of this elevated pathway obstructed the view of the walls underneath it, casting shadows and blocking what little of the eerie storm tinged rays found its way through the filthy skylight; itself nothing more than a sliver of dull illumination projecting a glow of faint greens and browns from the ceiling.
From what visibility she had the room looked still, draped in an unquietening silence.
That silence was broken by the arrival of Maja and Kal. The gold from their ragged robes glinting in the darkness of the building, somehow finding a luminosity from even the smallest traces of light.
‘Who the hell are you?’ Aimee, turned around and whispered a threat, holding her fists up in a sign she was ready to fight.
‘We are not your enemy,’ Maja’s voice was calm and soothing. ‘We are here to help.’
‘We want to save your friend from the others. She has something they should not possess,’ Kal explained, placing a friendly hand on Aimee’s shoulder. ‘My name is Kal, and this is Maja. Please, you can trust us.’
Forrest had no knowledge of this strange group, but of the two sides they had seemed the least aggressive in their insanity. Kal’s touch sent a wave of reassurance through her. Aimee smiled in a sign of acceptance and gently squeezed Kal’s hand.
‘Well, at least we want the same thing,’ Aimee spoke softly.
Slowly the three edged forward with careful steps. Maja and Kal scanned the surrounding gloom like eagles in search of prey.
‘Keep away from the shadows,’ Maja warned the Special Constable as she strayed closer to the edges of the depot. ‘The further into the darkness you go, the more dangerous they will be. Stay close.’
‘Who are they?’ Aimee asked as she got closer to their huddle. ‘Who are these others?’
‘They are darkness,’ Kal explained, his legion of scars exaggerated in the half-light.
‘They are the Stygian, the Dark Guard,’ Maja cut in. ‘They are at one with the darkness, not just physically, but spiritually too. The laws of nature twist and bend around their foul presence.’
‘Are they human?’ Aimee asked, remembering Knight’s eyes and the way his body buckled in death.
‘Maybe. Once,’ came Maja’s disconcerting reply.
‘Our great master Taal knows more than we,’ Kal explained. ‘We heard the call, Taal saw the vision. We had no choice. We had to leave our place of worship and come. Seek out the riches that had fallen in the wrong hands.’
‘What are these riches? This treasure? What’s in the briefcase that’s got everyone so worked up?’ Aimee whispered. ‘Money? Diamonds? Gold?’
‘There are things far more valuable than money,’ Kal answered. ‘Somethings have a wealth you could not conceive.’
‘Then what?’ Amiee asked, growing annoyed.
‘A dark time approaches, Aimee Forrest,’ Maja answered. ‘The Stygian refer to it as the Calling, a time when their original masters grow closest to this existence. The contents of that briefcase contains something very special. Something that can bring the most delirious joy, but in the wrong hands it could unleash beings of unimaginable power; creatures even we cannot stop. The Calling begins today, and if they are successful, if these demons are released, it would bring about an age of destruction and suffering, the likes of which you have never seen.’
Aimee tried to laugh off the story, but the conviction in Maja’s face, convinced her of something, though she didn’t know what.
‘Then why is it just left out there?’ The Special Constable motioned to where they’d come from. Looking back through the open doorway they could just make out Scullin and Taal trading blows in the distance, whilst next to them the briefcase leant on its side, propped up by a chunk of disregarded plaster, and ignored by all.
‘It is safe,’ Kal replied.
Aimee looked back at him incredulously, ‘It doesn’t look safe.’
‘It’s safe,’ his reassurance sounded smug in its confidence.
‘It’s not safe,’ Maja whispered, cutting back in to the conversation, but still searching the shadows with her eyes as they kept their steady pace into the depths of the old depot. ‘It’s dangerous. Don’t go anywhere near it, for your own sake. You saw what happened to the man that tried earlier. Taal cast the Eolhx to guard it. It’s still out there.’
‘The what?’ Aimee asked, growing frustrated with the riddles.
‘The Eolhx. It is a word,’ Kal answered. ‘It protects.’
‘Why not set it on this Dark Guard?’ Aimee was barely keeping up with the thread but probed for answers, looking for a way to end this already out of hand scenario.
‘Eolhx does not attack. It protects. It can be nothing else.’
‘I thought yo
u said it was a word?’ Aimee grew more confused.
Maja took her by the shoulders and looked her in her eyes. ‘There are sounds with meanings that go beyond your understanding of language. Scared syllables with powers that you can only begin to imagine. There are words that can kill, words that protect and words that can call across dimensions. The Servitude guards these secrets as we serve the sacred whispers on the wind. And they’ve been calling us here. Drawing us to you.’
Aimee tried to absorb what she’d been told, but there was no time to seek clarity. From out of the darkness came King, charging at the group with a swift speed. His fist struck Aimee and knocked her to the floor. Kal swung his staff but missed the man in the light grey suit. By the time Forrest got to her feet, King was out of sight.
‘Stay close,’ Maja commanded as they huddled together, back to back.
A scream-like cackle screeched through the building like the sound of a motor accident with a bus full of school kids. The terrifying noise was followed by King’s face, a vision of twisted hatred, as it thrust out of the gloom once more. He dodged Kal’s staff as it swung for his head and countered with a powerful punch that sent his would-be attacker flying backwards. By the time Aimee turned to help her new found colleague, King had caught hold of the Special Constable and, with impressive strength, lifted her above him. Maja turned and thrust her staff into the back of King’s knee, making him fall to the floor and drop Aimee to the ground.
Quickly, he turned and swung a punch. Maja blocked it with her staff, pivoting the other end round to strike him across the face. King’s sunglasses fell to the floor as he staggered sideways from the blow.
Another swipe caught the suited aggressor below the ribs, but before she had a chance to pull her staff back round, King took hold of Maja’s weapon. He pulled it from her hands and tossed it behind him. It landed on the ground and rolled out of sight, disappearing into the dark. The next blow connected hard, sending Maja crashing to the floor. She lay unconscious as King approached her; defenceless against his brutish power.