DarkTalesfromElderRegionsNY

by Hieber, Leanna Renee

  “Did I hit my head again, Dr. Peterson?” Daniel’s mind was cloudy and his tongue felt like cotton. “Where’s the Boat?”

  “Again with this fucking boat. See Doc? Why don’t we shove him out back? What’s the use here, like ol’ Franny says—”

  “Tim,” the grey-haired man growled at the bald Justini. “You meddling little shit—”

  Both Justini and Timothy seemed ready to brawl like two children in a schoolyard. Dr. Peterson held up his hands, smile evaporating but snarl lingering, as Daniel took in his surroundings, becoming more aware with each passing second.

  “Uncle Tim? What’s going on? Where am I? What are you—” His heart banged so hard he felt it against the back of his throat, he gaped at the grey-haired figure he had recognized as his Uncle Tim.

  “I fucking told’ya kid. I’m not your goddamned Uncle Tim.”

  Daniel threw himself forward, onto his knees, gawping at the bald man towering over the other two. “And you’re the paramedic. The one from when I hit my head on the boat—”

  “Like gramps said, there’s no boat, kid.” Justini stood far enough away from Daniel so that if the kid started crawling around on the floor there was a wide berth.

  “Dr. Peterson? What’s going on? Why am I in this straight jacket?” Daniel shouted to the man he had known as his therapist, who only smiled, adjusting the cuff of his shirt that stuck out of his white lab coat. In the scant moment of silence as Dr. Peterson gazed at his patient, Daniel noticed the cufflink the Doctor had been adjusting. Daniel’s eyes shifted to the bald Justini who was still fussing over his clothes, correcting his wayward ID-badge that had begun to slip off his collar, again buffing his the metal pin in an almost obsessive way. Daniel focused on the pin and noted the other man, the one he had known as his Uncle. Perhaps taking a cue from Justini, perhaps taking some perverse pleasure at the horrified look overtaking Daniel’s face, the grey-haired man took a similar ID-badge from inside his shirt pocket to clip onto his shirt and began neatly primping and polishing the same round pin on his own ID badge. Daniel realized the pins and cufflinks all were the same stark, sickly shade of gold.

  Daniel shook his head. It was the sign. The Yellow Sign. The exact same that he had found in Raritan Bay, only smaller versions set onto round pins of metal, emblazoned on the doctor’s cufflinks. Just beyond Dr. Peterson’s shoulder, Daniel noticed an array of alien symbols, runes and occult sigils on the padded squares of the padded cell. The same symbols from his journal, and more besides that he didn’t recognize. Anger, confusion, rage welled inside Daniel and he opened his mouth to howl, wordless, spittle dripping from his lips like poison.

  “See, doc? He’s at it again. Why didn’t we just shove him out back. He’s too far gone, this one. Why can’t you understand that, doc?” Justini chuckled as the albino’s shoulders visibly sagged.

  “I’d have to agree with the guinea bastard on this one, Dr. Peterson,” Timothy groused, his voice a veritable shout over Daniel’s baying. “I mean, dragging this out —what’s the good?”

  “We must know how to open the book and why our King chose to speak through a witless boy. I am certain that amongst all this chaos there must have been a catalyst —and you both know full well that mechanism was the Martense boy back in 1977. We tried with this one’s father, but failed utterly.” Despite the anger and exasperated head wagging by both orderlies, Dr. Peterson focused back on Daniel with a sigh that was more of a growl.

  “Oh Daniel, we are trying to treat your condition.” He shook his head and walked over to the medical cart. “You have not been very cooperative and forthcoming to our questions, so we have to take more extreme measures.”

  Daniel stopped wailing to twist around, scuttling almost crablike backward toward the wall opposite the cart and Dr. Peterson. Looking up, Daniel noticed the window. His window. From his apartment in Uncle Tim’s basement. There. Above his head. And beyond it were his trees.

  Dr. Peterson continued, “You are already mad, so there’s not much more to lose —except the information we need. We need to know why the King spoke through you and your half-breed cousin. Unless you want to end up in Potter’s Field like your father young man you will start answering our questions about that summer and about your cousin.”

  “C- cousin —you mean Jonathan? What Potter’s Field?”

  “Yeah. Out back behind the house —there’s the cemetery on the other side of this building, just beyond this window.” Replied Timothy with a nod toward the window above Daniel’s head.

  “No no no no, no. There isn’t any cemetery out there. I walked all through those woods. Not possible. No Uncle Tim it’s not—” Daniel’s voice came in a rush, his shaking words tumbling into each other as he tried curling himself tighter into a ball but the jacket made that both uncomfortable and impossible.

  “I told you kid, I’m not your fucking uncle, just as I tol’ you not to go out there,” the grey haired man stepped forward menacing his fist despite the good doctor’s raised eyebrows. “I told you, goddamn it; it was dangerous. After the last rainstorm some of the graves sunk down and we haven’t fucking filled em in. With you getting past fuckhead and his nurse girlfriend the other day, you runnin’ out there, fucking slipping down in the mud and nearly braining yourself on a pine box sticking out of the swamp? You get it through your head —that ain’t no fairy land woods you go traipsing through. Got it?”

  Dr. Peterson scratched a few notes on a clipboard attached to the side of the cart as Justini turned to Tim, “I suppose I can see that whole delusion. You kinda look like an uncle —a twisted and sad uncle, but an uncle, I suppose. And maybe the kid was looking for dear old dad out there in the muck. I mean, you got to hand it to him —even though we wired up this outfit like a chicken coop, he still managed to get out.”

  “Because you were too busy thinking with your other head when your Nurse Grable is around. You sick—”

  Dr. Peterson cleared his throat. “Enough of the pleasantries, Timothy. There’s no need to explain every detail. We must proceed.”

  Daniel’s chin hit his chest as he felt himself cave into defeat. “Dr. Peterson, can you answer one thing for me?”

  “It all depends on whether you’re willing to answer our questions, Daniel.”

  “Did I ever leave Willowbrook? I mean, have I been here since 1977?”

  All three men laughed, long, hard and in an oddly flat way that reminded Daniel of the end of an episode of Scooby Doo.

  “Does it matter, Daniel?” Dr. Peterson asked, turning around with another large syringe with a clear yellow liquid the same shade as his eyes. Peterson gave the needle’s plunger a quick tap with his thumb and a small about of the fluid shot out and onto the floor.

  “Now Daniel, you will tell us all about your cousin Jonathan Martense and the summer of 1977 when you were a Boy Scout at Pouch Camp? Otherwise, you’ll meet my other friend again. And we remember what happened last time, right? You screamed for days that you were burning, inside and out. It was a pity, but one I will absolutely repeat. All right? Begin again?” Dr. Peterson smiled his wolf-like smile and nodded slowly at Daniel who closed his eyes, tears silently bathing his face.

  With an exhale that took a small fraction of his soul, Daniel looked up above his head, at the trees beyond the window, “The darkling stars glittered and I tasted ashes in my mouth…”

  ~~END~~

  Afterword

  Scotophobia. Achluphobia. Nyctophobia. It goes by many names, but it all boils down to one thing —a fear of the dark. At a young age, most of us tend to instinctively develop this fear. But why? Could it be a genetic echo from our ancestors, serving to keep us safe from nocturnal predators? Perhaps it is the byproduct of a maturing intellect as the mind struggles to quantify the unknown. When we are young, our minds summon up an endless array of horrors to inhabit that darkness. In those early stages of life, the fear is at its purest state since there are no facts to base it upon. As we get older though, the monster
s of our imagination are dispelled and replaced by the demons of reality. The goblins and gremlins are swapped out for situational specters of emotion, formless and shapeless but very real. To compare the two can often create a deeper despair…one feels as if they have a fighting chance against a monster, but how does one combat insecurity, strife or regret? We are the creators of these shadowy adversaries, but who are we in a battle against: them or us?

  Generally speaking, society has protected and insulated itself, but often we find that the darkness that frightens us is not from without, but from within…the darkness that lies inside all of us. But, what is darkness? Darkness, in and of itself does not exist; darkness is the absence of light. This is a statement, that in one fashion or another, has been the backbone of many an argument. Again, what is darkness if it is only something that we perceive as such? Can one man’s darkness be another man’s light? By day the argument is easy to ignore or gloss over as rays of sunlight banish all thoughts of our inner demons. All of these things come out when the sun goes down.

  In Dark Tales from Elder Regions: New York, those inner shadows are explored. Set in the nooks and crannies of New York City, each tale in this volume reveals a particular kind of darkness that can only be identified once the light of examination is cast upon it. From the alleyways of Manhattan to abandoned ruins in Staten Island, you will embark on a timeless journey—but it is not one navigated via a subway map, but rather with a spiritual map. Each story will reveal more about the enduring question: Why do we fear the dark? The answer: because it forces us to look inward and see ourselves as we really are: flawed and corrupt, desperate and covetous, victims of our own nature. In the shadows lie every dark impulse and thought that we claim not to possess, but that often drive our every action. Unpalatable as it is to think of, a conclusion can be made by this introspection. It will be difficult to realize and even more difficult to accept. But once the denial wears off, we are left with a stark truth. We are the darkness.

  But do not despair, for all is not lost. For every dark night there is a dawn…at least we hope. Darkness and the fear of it is ultimately the acknowledgement of something missing within ourselves. If we can admit that, then there is the possibility that it can be righted. The void can be filled.

  As a student of philosophy and psychology, for years I have wrestled with this concept. As Sartre put it, “Hell is other people…” which would imply that we too are devils from an outside perspective. Understanding that duality as well as knowing that much of what cripples us mentally is of our own design is the first step in mastering our fears and banishing the darkness. The preceding narratives demonstrate this catharsis postmortem. By exposing our foibles and failings to the light, they are thereby left behind and the fear they inflict is overcome. With this final perspective, we can conclude, We are the darkness and the light.

  —Brian J. Cano

  Staten Island, New York

  October 2014

  About the Authors

  Anthony S. Burdge, an independent scholar, was first introduced to the existence of Secondary Worlds via the work of J.R.R Tolkien at an early age. Since taking that first journey out of Bag End with Bilbo, he has traveled with the Doctor, hitchhiked with Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect, been a crew member aboard the USS Enterprise, walked under an eldritch moon toward R’yleh and entered the realms of the Sandman many times. In addition to his academic articles on various topics ranging from Mythopoeic fiction to local lore and legend, Anthony is grateful to be a part of collections such as The J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia, Translating Tolkien, Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature, You and WHO 2, plus working with authors across the planet for the Mythological Dimensions series, The Mythological Dimensions of Doctor Who and The Mythological Dimensions of Neil Gaiman. Anthony co-wrote his first collection of fiction, The Friendly Horror & Other Weird Tales. Anthony is a Hoopy Frood blogging on this and that on Comfy Chair at comfychairzine.blogspot.com.

  Jessica Burke is teacher by trade and a self-professed Geek by nature. She’s an avid bibliophile, self-taught herbalist, a fan of cats, songs about Cthulhu, Doctor Who rock, and sushi. Jessica has published on a range of topics from J.R.R. Tolkien to Beowulf to Doctor Who. Currently Jessica warps fragile Freshmen minds at the College of Staten Island. With Anthony, she co-edited The Mythological Dimensions of Doctor Who and The Mythological Dimensions of Neil Gaiman, co-wrote The Friendly Horror & Other Weird Tales, and is co-founder of Myth Ink Books.

  Growing up in Staten Island, New York, Brian J. Cano often took note of abandoned buildings recessed within the woods near his home during Sunday drives with his parents. Those places called to him, sparking his imagination and his curiosity. Alone or with friends, Brian began exploring the old and abandoned buildings, despite the countless rumors of what may have happened within their walls. This curiosity inspired Brian in his own work as a filmmaker, writer, and Lead Investigator for Staten Island’s own paranormal investigation and urban exploration group SCARED! Brian served as Tech Specialist on Sci-Fi’s Haunted Collector. He co-directed John Zaffis: The World Within and Haunted Snug Harbor produced by CORE FILMS INC.

  Staten Island born and bred, Frank Collia now lives in Tampa where he writes author bios in the third person and continues his vigilant quest for good pizza. His short fiction has been featured in Dead Worlds 4, Bigfoot Terror Tales Vol. 1, and What Has Two Heads, Ten Eyes, and Terrifying Table Manners?

  Warren Frey is a writer and journalist based in Vancouver, British Columbia. During the day, he shoots video and writes stories for a trade newspaper, but by night he spins flights of fantasy and horror armed only with a Macbook Air. He’s probably best known in fan circles as one of the three hosts of Radio Free Skaro, one of the most popular Doctor Who podcasts on the web. This is his first published work of fiction.

  Actress, playwright and author Leanna Renee Hieber is the award-winning, bestselling author of Gothic Victorian Fantasy novels for adults and teens. Her Strangely Beautiful saga won 3 Prism awards for excellence in the genre of Fantasy Romance, hit Barnes & Noble’s and Borders bestseller lists, and garnered numerous regional genre awards. This currently out of print series will reissue in new and revised editions from Tor/Forge by 2015. The Strangely Beautiful saga is also being adapted into a musical theatre production. Leanna’s Magic Most Foul saga began with Darker Still, an Indie Next List pick and a Scholastic Book Club “Highly Recommended” title. The trilogy is now complete. Her new Gaslamp Fantasy saga, The Eterna Files, is now available for pre-order from Tor/Forge with a February 2015 release. Her short fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies, including Queen Victoria’s Book of Spells (Tor), and Willful Impropriety (Running Press). A proud member of performers unions Actors Equity and SAG-AFTRA, she works often in film and television on shows like Boardwalk Empire. A perky Goth girl with more corsets than is reasonable, Leanna enjoys long walks through graveyards in full Victorian regalia and pursuing any theatrical project that interests her. She lives in New York City with her husband and their beloved rescued lab rabbit. Visit Leanna at leannareneehieber.com and connect with her via twitter.com/leannarenee and facebook.com/lrhieber

  Andrea Janes is the author of the short story collection Boroughs of the Dead: New York City Ghost Stories, and Glamour, a young adult paranormal novel, as well as several other short horror stories. Her short story “The Last Wagon in the Train” (Black Book of Horror Volume Ten, Mortbury Press) was recently granted an honorable mention in the Best Horror of the Year 2013. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, and when not writing horror fiction, she runs a boutique tour company, Boroughs of the Dead: Macabre New York City Walking Tours, which she founded in 2013.

  Gordon Linzner is the author of three novels and dozens of short stories appearing in such places as The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Rod Serling’s Twilight Zone Magazine. He is also founder and former publisher (now editor emeritus) of Space and Time Magazine, which has published continuously since 1966.

  Chr
istopher Mancuso is an accomplished screenwriter from Staten Island, New York. To date, he has penned over twenty feature length and short screenplays of different genres. Many of his shorts have been produced by Lake Films and have played in numerous film festivals. Most recently two of his stories were published in Braaaains II: A Zombie Anthology by Dark Moon Press. Aside from his work as a fiction writer, he is the co-director, co-editor, and Lead Investigator of SCARED! an award winning series of independently produced paranormal investigation and urban exploration documentaries. He has also co-directed the documentaries John Zaffis: The World Within and Haunted Snug Harbor produced by CORE FILMS INC. A veteran in the field, Chris has spent the last twelve years as a paranormal investigator, hunting things that go bump in the night. His work in the paranormal field has aided in some of his fictional stories and screenplays. Chris and his teammate, Brian J. Cano, lecture about the paranormal at conventions and colleges around the nation. Currently, Chris is working on his own collection of shorts fiction, The Darker Side of Me, to be released in 2015.

  Jordan Mapes is a recent graduate of the University of Nebraska MFA in Writing program. Recently, she has had work appear in EAB Publishing's summer 2014 issue of Midnight Circus: Invasion and Occupation. Jordan works as a copywriter in Omaha, Nebraska where she lives with her chihuahua, Phin. Visit Jordan at www.jordanmapes.com

  David Neilsen is a slightly unhinged individual who has written a number of mildly disturbing short stories as well as an upcoming YA supernatural adventure. Before lurking in the darker recesses of the New York metropolitan area, he spent ten years begging in Hollywood, culminating in a television pilot optioned to 20th Century FOX and the straight-to-DVD feature film, The Eliminator (go on and rent it, he dares you). A classically-trained actor, David can often be found roaming Westchester County and nearby environs working as a storyteller, specializing in the twisted and macabre. His one-man show, H.P. Lovecraft’s Call of Cthulhu, has sent audience members into madness throughout greater New England and he would dearly love to bring it to your neck of the woods and drive you utterly insane as well. David’s chapbook Lovely Island is available via Myth Ink Books. Attend David’s party at neilsenparty.wordpress.com/