“Jeremy, run, Jeremy,” a wet drowned voice called out to him from within the darkness.
“Hello?” Jeremy replied, scared.
“They are coming for you. Run now and never look back. You cannot trust Dr Marshall. You need to …” The voice fell silent as the world was filled with screams. A chorus of agony and despair. Flames erupted all around him. Jeremy stood in the centre of a ring of fire, only it didn’t burn him. It seemed to absorb the heat that had been ravaging him, drawing out his fever. Jeremy looked around and realized he could see through the flames. He concentrated and the scene came into view. Tables with bodies strapped to them. The screams belonged to those held down. There were creatures of all sizes and descriptions standing near them, probing their victims in all manner of ways. Some stood surveying their subject with the patient gaze of an art connoisseur, touching the body in such a way that the scream elicited from the subject was that of pure unadulterated pain, only to stand back and observe them once more. Others had a more hands on approach to the process, and stood with their victims’ bodies ripped open. Still alive, they screamed as their organs were prodded, moved, and squeezed, in some cases even sniffed and sampled.
Then there were the ones that were hard at work creating; fusing flesh and bone with a joyful exuberance. They were melding the human body and creating their own version life, forged in their image. Pairs, thrust together, a mixture of the erotic and the horrific. The screams ushered by these victims were orgasmic in their effect, but excruciating at the same time. Men and women joined together, man and man in many cases too. Horrific congress forced and endured. Genitals were pulled, twisted and in some cases relocated, and then meshed together with metal, even machine.
All of the victims had been shaved, every trace of hair removed from their bodies. It gave their face a strange sexless appearance which, given the nature of many of the experiments, made the entire scene even more bizarre.
A hand fell on Jeremy’s shoulder and the heat that he had felt surged through him once more. A shooting sensation, like a shot of static electricity.
“You need to get away from them, Jeremy. Don’t go back. Run and keep running. Forever.” The same wet voice spoke, only now it came from behind him. As strange as it felt for him to realize, Jeremy felt no fear. If anything, he found a strange and familiar comfort in the voice.
Turning around, Jeremy came face to face with Simon. His best friend. He knew it was Simon, even if he had no skin. There was a look in his bloodshot eyes that Jeremy would always recognize.
“Simon,” Jeremy spoke aghast as he looked his friend up and down. He was missing both legs, and his body was supported on old, splintered wooden poles. He teetered on them, while drops of putrid flesh ran down to the floor.
“Get away from this place, Jeremy. While there is still time,” Simon’s voice pleaded. “Don’t end up down here. Anja, she kno …” The voice cut off and the flames fell still. Disappearing from the ground up, meeting their descending peaks in mid-air.
The heat flared inside Jeremy’s body once more, exploding through him. An initial burst of pain was replaced by a cool, soothing wave that brought in both a sense of relief and of waking.
Jeremy felt himself rise, as if floating from the ground. Something still fluttered beneath his skin. It itched, and could not be sated, even as the world came into focus around him.
Jeremy came to and was immediately aware of two things. Both sobered his mind in an instant. He was lying down on something that was softer than the bed he had in the institute, but too hard to be considered long term sleep worth. The second was that he was not lying down voluntarily. His body was jerking, trying to rise, but something, somebody was holding him down. Hands clamped on his shoulders pressing him against the material beneath him, holding him immobile.
Something covered his mouth, flesh, soft and warm. It was smothering him. He struggled, but couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. His mouth was filled, and he could feel something squirming, tickling the sensitive skin on the roof of his mouth. It tickled its way down his throat. He could feel it probing, deeper and deeper down his gullet.
“Calm down. Breathe out,” Jeremy heard a voice whisper, and a strange calm washed over him. He fell still and the pressure on him eased. Jeremy exhaled and felt whatever it was that filled his mouth withdraw. It travelled up his throat and out through his mouth. He coughed and gagged at the sensation. His throat felt hollow when it was gone. It was the strangest sensation he had ever experienced, but it faded fast.
Jeremy jumped to his feet. Exhausted and running on instinct. His body trembled and the world was a rough sea of instability, but his eyes locked on his captor, and everything fell still.
Nurse Anja stood before him. She was naked from the waist up. Her large breasts denied gravity while her nipples defied nature. They extended from her breasts as long thin serpents, their bodies not scaled but wet, dripping a strange clear fluid with gel-like consistency. Their heads, the tips of the nipples, were all teeth. Upper and lower jaws that snapped at the air. Jeremy stood dumbfounded as they retracted, disappearing into her bosom until the heads were settled back inside their places. With their mouths closed, a strange transformation took place and once again they became flesh. Erect and tight, they seemed to stare at Jeremy, even after Anja re-buttoned her shirt, poking through the thin fabric.
Jeremy felt sick. His head spun. He turned to run, but Anja was ahead of him, her eyes wet with tears. She raised her hands and held them out to Jeremy. “Please, Jeremy, let me explain,” she pleaded, as if begging for mercy.
Lost in a blind panic, Jeremy turned away from her and managed to find the strength to move his legs. Jeremy’s intention was to move away, to create some distance so his mind could process everything it had seen. Still haunted by the images of his dream, the addition of Anja’s snake nipples was almost too much for his overloaded brain to handle.
Anja moved fast, and was standing before Jeremy in an instant. It was as if she had appeared out of thin air. Her shirt was only half buttoned and her left breast was still exposed. Her nipple had changed, the toothed tip extended slightly, as if aroused by the scent of the meat it had been allowed to sample a few moments before.
Anja reached out and Jeremy jerked his body in response. He jumped backwards knocking over a vase of fresh flowers.
“Jeremy, please. I’m trying to help you.” Anja had positioned herself between Jeremy and the door. Upon noticing the way Jeremy’s eyes continually returned to her exposed flesh, she made a clear display of covering herself up and fully buttoning the shirt.
“But … but … you are one of them,” Jeremy stammered, the words tumbling awkwardly from his mouth.
“Yes,” Anja answered, pausing for a few moments, allowing her admittance to sink in. “It is not what you think,” she spoke again, picking her words slowly and carefully.
“No, I saw it, you were trying to kill me … with … with those things.” Jeremy pointed and Anja’s breasts and took another step backwards. The flowers squelched under his feet.
While Jeremy retreated, Anja remained still, allowing him all the distance he needed. “No, no, Jeremy, you don’t understand. I was trying to save you.” Anja took a step forward; a small one, testing the water. Jeremy flinched, but held his ground. “Back at the institute, they had you drugged, and I helped you then, didn’t I?” Anja looked at Jeremy, who nodded slowly.
“I guess, I mean, yes, you helped me,” he admitted.
“Then why would I help clear your head, help you escape, bring you to my home and then kill you?” Anja took another step forward, bolder this time. Once again, Jeremy stood firm.
Jeremy opened his mouth to speak, but had no idea what to say. He stood a moment, flapping his mouth like a fish out of water. “Why … What were you doing then? Why were you … with those … things?” He pointed over to her breasts once more, fearful that something would burst through the thin fabric and take a bite from his indicating digit.
“You had been bitten by something. On your calf. I was removing the poison from your body. That is something I, we can do.”
“We?”
“My kind,” Anja answered with a straight face. Her eyes were wide, she was laying herself bare, and not just in the physical sense of the word.
Jeremy said nothing. He couldn’t. Seeing Anja standing there, her delicate features so open. Jeremy looked at her and forgot everything he had seen. He was lost in her beauty. The anger left him when he realized that beneath it all, he saw fear in her eyes. The one place even Jeremy knew true emotion could not be hidden. He saw a look of terror in her eyes. The mist of confusion that clouded his mind was thick, and even in the clearing light of acceptance, many unanswered questions remained, with new ones sprouting to join the queue.
“You’re telling the truth, aren’t you?” Jeremy posed rhetorically.
“You need to trust me, Jeremy. I almost lost you back at the institute. One more dose of their drugs and your mind would have been gone. Then it would only be a matter of time before–”
“Before I became another one of their first-floor experiments,” Jeremy interrupted. His flesh crawled at the thought of becoming a permanent resident of that room.
Anja’s face paled and she wrapped her arms around herself when Jeremy mentioned the first floor. “How do you know about that?” she asked, surprised.
“I saw them, when I escaped. I saw what they did to those people,” Jeremy stammered, not liking having to allow his mind to recall the sights and sounds it had seen. “Why are they doing that?” Jeremy asked, hoping Anja would have an answer.
“Oh, Jeremy, I fear that the depravity of that place descends to a place that you cannot even comprehend.” It was Anja’s turn to shiver. “But I was talking about something else. I was talking about their underground laboratory. The experiments they are doing in transverse …” Anja caught her words. “Now is not the time to go into too much detail. You need to rest.”
“Who are they, Anja? Who Is Doctor Marshall really and what does he want with me?” Jeremy asked, with fear and confusion seasoning his words.
Anja took a deep breath, but did not answer immediately. Instead, she turned back toward the living room and guided Jeremy to it. Jeremy made no attempt to flee, even when the pathway to the door was clear. He needed answers, and Anja could give them to him.
There were two arm chairs and a small oval coffee table set between them. Jeremy sat in the farthest chair and allowed his eyes to look around the room. It was the first time he had paid it any attention. The main thing was that the place was filled with flowers. Fresh cut flowers of ever shape, colour and variety. From arrangements to bunches, no two the same. It was a kaleidoscope of colour, and the aroma they hung in the room was heady and inexplicably glorious.
“You like my flowers?” Anja asked, having noticed the way Jeremy’s eyes darted around the room, seeming to pause on each vase before moving on. “They are beautiful, are they not? Just like me. I made myself beautiful, would you agree?”
Jeremy was thrown by the question, but realized that Anja was looking for validation. Not of her beauty on a shallow level, but of her disguise, as he saw it. She was searching for confirmation that she had assimilated.
“Yes,” Jeremy answered in a whisper. “Yes, you are.” His words came stronger.
“Good. I like beautiful things.”
Anja beamed with pride and in the light of the room, with the eyes of someone who could see through the perceived and view the reality, he saw it. He saw the truth. Anja’s face, her body. It was all a lie. He could see the edges of her mask, the joins in the skin that brought the covering together.
“I know that beauty is highly valued in this world. So I take every effort to make myself pretty when I come here. So people would like me.” Anja paused, looking around the room. “I made myself beautiful and surrounded myself with pretty things, but still, I never really feel it.” Anja sighed and Jeremy could feel her melancholy. A heavy but not uncomfortable silence settled over the room.
“What are you?” Jeremy asked after a while. It was an inevitable question.
“We are everything. We are creators. We are what was before and we are what will still be after.” Anja looked straight at Jeremy as she spoke, and he noticed that she didn’t blink. He had never seen her blink. In all of the exchanges they had had, Anja had never once blinked. Jeremy found it equally strange that he had noticed such a thing, stored it in his mind for future contemplation. If I saw, how many others did too? Jeremy asked himself, allowing his mind to run on a tangent for a little while.
“Why did you eat Simon?” The question blurted out, as emotion bubbled to the surface, like blood from a cat scratch. Jeremy had never even thought about it having been Anja that killed Simon, but then he remembered his vision. Simon had said her name, just before he disappeared. What if he was saying not to trust her?
Anja did not recoil from the question, it was as if she had expected it, and the implied accusations. She was silent for a few moments, and Jeremy’s mind sprang into overdrive, assuming that her silence was for the worst, and she was merely thinking through the best method of delivery.
“I read your file, Jeremy,” she began. “You said that your friend cut himself, right? The wound, it bled a lot. Am I right?” Anja’s face changed, a darkness washed over her features. The mention of blood growing a hunger inside her. One she had fought hard to get under control.
“Yes. Yes, he cut his hand. It was an accident,” Jeremy added, feeling the continual need to prove his innocence. “It happened just before …” Jeremy’s words trailed off as pieces of the puzzle floated around in his head, attempting to connect themselves.
“The two of you, you were both virgins, correct?” The blunt way in which the question was posed caught Jeremy off-guard.
“I’m sorry, what?” he asked, sure he had misheard. A flush of heat was spreading over his face.
“Virgins. Were you both sexually innocent. Your blood is pure, the blood of the young. It spilled to the floor in a place where the walls that separate our worlds are weak. The aroma of your life force would have been too powerful for them to resist.” There was a whimsical note to Anja’s voice as if she were recalling the good old days.
“Um …” Jeremy floundered for the right response to give. The question was awkward, even after everything he had been through and seen. It was made worse by the beguiling beauty of the woman sitting opposite him, asking the question. Instead of giving an answer, Jeremy looked at the floor.
“It’s ok, Jeremy,” Anja added suddenly, as if the awkwardness of the question finally dawned on her. “You do not need to answer. I can tell a lot about a person. Your innocence is the easiest to see out of all your secrets.”
“What do they want?” Jeremy asked, pleased to steer the conversation away from his sexual practices.
“They want to exist, as they did before.” The answer was spoken in a matter-of-fact tone as if it should have been obvious.
“But they do exist. I watched one of them eat my best friend,” Jeremy snapped. Catching himself, he took a breath and regained his composure. “I saw them at the institute too. You know I did. And you … you clearly exist,” Jeremy stumbled, his thoughts coming thick and fast. Nothing made sense to him, yet he accepted it almost without question.
“We survive, yes, we exist underground. In a space between the worlds. Those that wish to cause trouble are kept fat by loyal followers, like Dr Marshall once was. He supplies them with what they need, and for many this is enough. But in some, the desire to rise and claim the human world is too great. To be kept fed by creatures viewed as insignificant in the spectrum of existence is an insult. Some are my kin. My brothers. They are dangerous, angry, and desperate.” Anja sat in her armchair and waited. She was not finished with her explanation, she had yet to truly begin, but wanted to allow Jeremy time to comprehend the magnitude of what he had stumbled across.
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nbsp; Sitting patiently, Anja waited, and watched as Jeremy processed the information, expressions forming and falling from his face, as questions bloomed in his mind and danced on his lips.
“So they … you, live underground?” Jeremy asked, still trying to wrap his head around the basic logistics of what he had been told.
“In a way, yes.” Anja nodded. She saw and understood the confusion on Jeremy’s face.
“You mean like in the sewers and stuff, or like deep in the earth?” It sounded corny, like a line from a second rate horror novel, but it was the only logical sentence Jeremy could form.
“No, it’s not like that. Your concept of existence is very flat. You are alive, and part of this world, or you are dead; no longer part of existence. In the true reality, nothing is as simple as black and white. Life and death exist on many platforms, across many plains. I come from a world that is beneath yours. It exists within the boundaries of your existence, but on a level that cannot be seen. There are many worlds beneath us, an infinite number. Each exists on an independent field. There are places, points of near contact, where the walls that separate us are thin. These are places where the worlds can meet, and it could be possible for the strong to make the jump from one to the other.” Anja spoke slowly, not in an attempt to patronize Jeremy or belittle the intelligence of the human race, but rather to allow her explanation to be heard clearly.
“So you are saying that these creatures … no offense … can move through our world and there are people here who know this. Let me guess, there is some sort of conspiracy that keeps it all covered up?” Part of Jeremy smiled at the notion of the level of deceit that existed in the world.
“Yes, but we are not all here to cause trouble.” Anja wore an expression of mild pain at the sharp edge that came off Jeremy’s previous comment.
“I never meant to mean that,” he stammered, “but monsters ate my friend because we were in the wrong place at the wrong time. That is what it boils down to. Right?” Jeremy found a strange comfort in the logic that everything happening to him was as a result of simply bad luck.
Evil Beneath Us Page 11
