The Symbiot

by Michel Weatherall

  The technique demanded gusto and prestissimo unheard of. There were secondary melodies and even tertiary darkly subterfuge rhythms. I dared not think of the demented and warped mind needed to compose such pieces. Nadia was beyond any doubt a Master Violinist. She had Zann's style and technique down but just could not perfect it…. It was only two days later that Nadia achieved perfection.

  On this night my wife, Marie, and her parents dropped me off again. Throughout the night Nadia struggled with the music. She almost had it. Marie, Henri, and Veronica showed up near 1:00 am to pick me up. Nadia was so close we convinced them to stay for tea. I turned the stove-burner on, making note to light it quickly with a match, and put the kettle on to boil.

  Marie, Henri, and Veronica sat and listened to Nadia play. Then she began the strange alien piece, but didn't falter! She was playing it! The tempo increased. Nadia's fingers flew with precision! The volume increased, became uncomfortably loud. Multiple melodies and rhythms began overlapping. And then it began.

  Nadia's eyes had a far off, distant look to them. She seemed unaware of her audience. She played faster and faster. She appeared desperately trying to keep in time with some accelerating, unheard metronome. We all sat frozen in indecisiveness. Then we heard the whistling. Faint at first but growing louder every second. It was the kettle. It had boiled, but no one moved. We were riveted to our seats by the spectacle before us. The whistling kettle seemed to strangely accent her furiously screeching viola. I noticed her fingers bleeding. It was now hard to discern whether Nadia played the music or the music played Nadia. The four of us sat in horror as we witnessed Nadia's symbiosis between human, instrument and music.

  I suddenly became faintly aware of the monotonous drone of the air conditioner. It's not that it just began to make noise but rather I just began to notice it. Was it getting louder and more bass? No, that's impossible. It became a symphony with the whistling kettle, the alien music, and that demonic bass drone. It was sheer horror but still the tempo increased. Nadia's fingers freely bled. The air conditioner became a screaming whine and then mellowed out into a sound akin to a flute.

  A frustrating tune it played. Just as you'd expect to catch it it would change into something else. The whole cacophony no longer had form or structure. There was no longer any similar melodies or harmonies. It kept mutating into something new, never to repeat itself. The music seemed to be hurtling towards some macabre climax beyond our comprehension! The music was inexorable and deafening.

  The lights in the apartment flickered; Bright. Dim. Bright. Dim, and then out completely. It was only then that I noticed that no light shone through the windows. No street lights, no moonlight, not even starlight! Nothing! Then a new sound began to stir, to rise. It came from the inky blackness outside the windows; a babbling, cackling laughing. The wind picked up suddenly and began to scream along with this insane melody. The air conditioner became reminiscent of idiot flute players. The howling demon-wind screamed its madness and the windows blew out! But still Nadia played on.

  My ears felt like someone boxed them. They were ringing from the blasting noises and music. The room was pitch black and I could see nothing. I felt deprived of all my senses. I jumped to my feet. The hell-wind whistled and howled through the flat and nearly pushed me back to my seat. The whistling kettle died down as the wind blew the stove-burner's flame out. I stumbled towards the kitchen area, blind and covering my ears. I fumbled through dishes and cups along the counter top and found the box of matches. I had to see what was happening. I held the match in my hand about to strike it against the box when I smelled the gas. My God, the gas stove was still on! I dropped and kicked the matchbox away in horror.

  I pulled at the utensil drawers and furiously rummaged through blindly. I knew Nadia kept a flashlight there. I split my fingers on a steak knife before finding it. I dashed towards the living room area as I shone the light to where I heard Nadia playing.

  There she was, still playing in the dark. Blood ran down her viola strings and sprayed off as she monstrously struck and strummed them. The whites of her eyes were a feral yellow now. Much like the white keys on an aged piano. Her eyes had lost their glimmer, their radiance, their life. They stared forward blankly, mindlessly. Her once dignified and pursed lips hung in large welts of damp glistening flesh. Drool dribbled off her lower lip and was flung about her chin with her insane playing and the wind. Her skin had a pale cadaverous hue and her beautiful hair had fallen out of its French braid but now lacked its shimmering luster. It hung limp and scraggly in clumps about her face. There was a sickening odour of pennies and salt and her body scent of rose-petals had long subsided to that of an animal musk. I stared at the sight dumbfounded and stupidly, not knowing how to react.

  Then, all at once her eyes regained a semblance of intelligence and she snapped her attention on me. The whipping about of her head caused a long string of drool to lash out around and across her cheek and in her ear. The suddenness of it made me jump and nearly drop the flashlight. Her lips peeled back over pink teeth and bleeding gums in a terrifying grimace. Her viola's strings stopped and her fingers and bow froze. But still the symphony of horror screamed its blasphemies!

  Her fingertips were shredded down to the bone. A single drop of blood seeped from a finger and slowly ran down the viola's string. I watched in frozen horror as it slowly ran down the viola's string to reach towards the instrument's bridge. Dark black obscenities not meant for a sane man's eyes danced and howled in the surrounding blackness. I was too terrified to turn the flashlight; I didn't want to see what these things were. And as the drop of blood neared the viola's bridge I became aware of the arrival of something not of this earth.

  Although I could not see it in the Stygian blackness around me and I dared not turn the light. I simply sensed it. A vile shadow darker than the surrounding gloom. There it was; amorphous, churning, gurgling in its infective madness.

  It had come.

  Just like the non-visible waves beyond the visual range of light called radio waves, this musical extension that I looked for functioned the same; it transferred a message, a summoning to something outside. Just like the discovery of X-rays beyond the visual spectrum of light, this range of music allowed one to see the underlying structures, the hidden truths of reality. Then Nadia screamed out "Mwl'fgah pywfg fhtagn Gh'tyaf nglyf lghyal!"

  I dropped the flashlight and let it smash on the floor, half out of fear, half out of reluctance to see those things.

  The air conditioner wailed far beyond what modern machinery could or should. It sputtered, coughed and sparked. It was shorting out. It all began to have a dreamlike quality to it. I was becoming dizzy from the fumes of the gas stove.

  Then it dawned on me; the air conditioner was short-circuiting! Sparking! I reached behind me and grabbed Veronica's wrist. There wasn't enough time to find the other three in this chaotic cacophony of hell and darkness. I ran for all I was worth. How I found the door in this ebony nightmare I do not recall but I knocked it to wooden splinters breaking my shoulder as I did so.

  I ran like a bat out of hell towards the stairwell, my good arm still clenching my mother-in-law's wrist. I don't remember if she ran behind me or if I dragged her. At this point my mind was quite unhinged and I fled like a blubbering lunatic.

  I felt the bone fragments in my smashed shoulder grinding and cutting into my muscle but I could not register it as pain.

  I was nearly six feet away from the stairwell banister when I heard the unmistakable sound of gas igniting;

  Whoof.

  The explosion sent me plunging down the centre of the stairwell crashing onto the marble tiled lobby floor, four stories below. It was at this point that I mercifully lost consciousness.

  * * *

  Through this ordeal I had suffered a few broken ribs, a minor concussion, and a sprained ankle, not to mention my broken shoulder. Veronica was hurtled down the flight of stairs. She suffered minor cuts and bruises and second degree burns to her back. />
  As for Henri, Nadia and my wife, Marie… I don’t know.

  The explosion took the top two floors off the entire building. After the investigations were complete there was no trace of the three to be found. The police report states that the three bodies were incinerated in the blast. But they didn't even find charred bones… nothing!

  I believe that whatever this thing was, it took them with it as it fled the explosion. Dear God, I hope the police are correct!

  As for the actual police investigation, I did not tell them everything. I told them of the smell of gas and Veronica and myself barely escaping with our lives.

  I realized that when the German Embassy had said that Nadia's father, Otto Zann, was living in an asylum was not a misunderstanding or mistranslation. I believe that he is in an asylum and I believe that Otto knows something of this horror, if not having actually witnessing the like of which himself. It was this reason why I lied to the police officers; I didn't want to be locked up as a lunatic.

  * * *

  After the police investigations were finished and I had healed enough to return with Veronica to Montreal we left Oxford, England. Upon returning Veronica moved in with me.

  ...I just finished smashing my grand piano to pieces and am watching it with my musical notes burn in the fireplace...

  Lorne S. Gibbons

  September 29, 1987

  Chapter II: The Music of Lorne S. Gibbons: The Testimony of Veronica L. Francois

  (Translated to English from Mrs. Francois' native French.)

  Feb. 16, 1992

  My name is Veronica Louise Francois. I survived the Horror of Mackenzie Street. Of the explosion that occurred nearly four and a half years ago in Oxford, England little new has occurred. The police investigation has been closed. The investigation of the incident at Nadia de LaFountaine's flat revealed little.

  The investigators themselves were puzzled as to the location of the remains of the bodies of Marie Gibbons, Nadia and Henri Francois, my husband. Although the official report states that their bodies were incinerated, I believe this was only due to a lack of a better explanation. To conclude, the investigators could not - officially - solve the bodies' disappearances.

  My son-in-law, Lorne, was in the hospital during most of it and slipped between worlds of consciousness and coma. The police had attempted to talk to Lorne on a number of occasions, but were not overly successful. During one of his interviews he mumbled something about 'the black horror from outside' and fell into a frightened seizure. Luckily, the police took this statement as being the ramblings of a man still in shock and nightmaring.

  I had the opportunity to talk with Lorne when he first became conscious - that is, functionally conscious - before the police could. Both Lorne and I agreed not to tell them what really happened. Heaven only knows what truly occurred at Nadia's flat that night. We knew they wouldn't believe us and Lorne showed a profound fear of being locked-up in an asylum. Once investigations were over, and the police concluded the incident was accidental, we returned to Montreal and moved in together.

  It was extremely difficult without Henri. I had never imagined life without him, but he was gone. Even my daughter was taken away from me. It's a terrible thing to outlive your children. It should have been me to die first, not Marie.

  But I did gain a son, or so the saying goes, and Lorne was all that I had left. We talked and tried to help one another, but I found myself doing most of the talking and crying and Lorne quietly listening. Where I released my pain and sorrow, Lorne would not. His battle over the loss of his wife was fought within. I knew he believed I'd think less of him to see him cry, but he couldn't have been further from the truth. I believe we lived together for the company, for I cannot even contemplate what living alone would be like. We were not financially wanting nor needing. Neither of us needed to work. Lorne however chose to keep his job. I believe to fill up his spare time and keep his mind off Marie's death. Certainly solitude is dangerous for active minds. When we are alone for a long time, we people space with phantoms. Too much time with not enough to occupy it is not a good thing, especially in Lorne's case.

  Lorne needed his job to forget the horror. Myself on the other hand, cannot explain what happened and am more than happy to leave it forgotten. Sometimes the most merciful thing in the world is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.

  I am content with simply remaining ignorant of what truly happened on the night of the horror of Mackenzie Street. Lorne, however, eventually chose not to.

  He did return to his job, as I have said. He needed something mundane and common to get his mind off of what actually happened. His peace of mind however was to be short-lived. He seemed quite recuperated and worked hard. He was offered two promotions but declined both. His wife’s death had utterly crushed his ambition. Other than that, everything was as good as could be expected.

  I thought he had recovered until he came home one evening in a panic. “Veronica, Veronica!” he said, “Things are coming for me!”

  “What things?” I replied.

  “M-my boss, decided to get central air conditioning last month!” He was actually sweating with fear. “I couldn’t talk him out of it. Now - every day - it hums to me! It hums that same piece!”

  It was at this point that I believe the insanity began. Lorne complained about being distracted constantly by the air conditioner. He tried on a number of circumstances to persuade his employer to get rid of it but to no avail. He eventually attempted to sabotage it and was caught. This was when he lost his job.

  After being fired, Lorne spend much of his time indoors. Whenever we went out he simply refused to enter buildings or common areas that were air-conditioned. He had an irrational fear of these devices. His excursions out became further and further apart until he simply would not leave the house.

  During those following two weeks I found Lorne opening up to me. He would talk about how he missed Marie. He had never before talked about her since her death. It was always I who talked and wept. But Lorne never cried. He would say how much he missed her and at times contemplate on how to get her back! He wouldn’t accept her death, poor lad.

  It was then that he started talking about how Marie and Henri weren’t dead. As time went by he became more and more convinced that they were still alive. He also became more and more convinced that It was coming after him. It being whatever that thing was in Nadia’s flat.

  Shortly afterwards he purchased a pistol. During this one exceptional trip out of the house, he was accosted, he said, by a vagrant who asked for any spare change Lorne might offer. When Lorne said no, the beggar thanked him anyway and walked away, whistling a strange tune, a tune of Erich Zann!

  He kept the pistol loaded at all times much to my fear. He said he needed it just in case It was to come after him. Although Lorne and myself both knew that if that thing from Nadia’s flat on the night of the horror were to come, a pistol would be of very little use. I felt that Lorne carried it for the same reasons a frightened man whistled in the dark. It was a security blanket, nothing more. He carried it on his person at all times, even when he slept.

  It was at this time that I sought out professional help for him. The psychologist said that we should go on an extensive vacation, or a tour. I decided to go to Europe with Lorne. It took a great deal to convince him to come. I had first to overcome his fear of leaving the house and then to leave behind his pistol. But eventually he submitted and agreed.

  The tour did wonders for him. He quickly got over his fear of air conditioners and even allowed himself to become wrapped up in the beauty of ancient Europe. There were only two incidents that were somewhat disturbing on the whole trip. The first being when travelling from Austria to Switzerland to do some skiing. Lorne loved it. It was when I suggested going to see the ancient University of Heidelberg, Germany that all of his paranoia returned. He was almost in tears in his conviction that Heidelberg, Germany held unknown dangers for him. He spoke of the asylum
and of some Otto Zann. Although I had great hopes of seeing the Heidelberg University I agreed not to go simply due to the utter horror it caused Lorne.