“Is there anything over there?” Karen asked impatiently. “You were gone long enough.”
Was he? Surely it had only been a few minutes. “You’re probably better off seeing for yourself. I wasn’t gone long enough to take a good look.”
“Well, it seemed like it.”
Chambers shook his head. “Even if it did, that’s more likely going to be an effect of where we are rather than me being selfish, don’t you think?”
Karen was about to reply, but was interrupted by another bout of coughing from Dr. Cruttenden. They both glowered at her.
“Have you ever suffered from asthma?” Chambers was actually concerned, but somehow the words came out sounding far more callous than he had intended.
“When I was a child,” came the rasping reply. “But I grew out of it years ago.”
“Well it seems to have come back now, doesn’t it?”
“That’s not very nice,” said Karen. “She can’t help it if she can’t walk.”
“I can walk perfectly well, thank you.” Dr. Cruttenden took two steps and had to bend over to catch her breath again.
“I don’t see us getting very far with you like that,” said Chambers. “Perhaps I’d better go and look for the way out while you wait here.”
“Why should you be the one to go?” Karen looked incensed. “You’re the doctor—you should be the one to stay here now you’ve finally got an actual bloody patient to look after.”
“There’s not much I can do,” Chambers snapped. “And to be honest, I think you’d find it much more difficult getting through what’s up there than I will.”
“Why? What’s up there? It can’t be any worse than what you’ve dragged us through already.”
“I don’t need anyone to look after me,” Dr. Cruttenden interjected. “Why don’t you both go? To be honest, it would be a delight for me to have a break from both of you.”
“Fine.” Both Karen and Chambers said the word together and then glared at each other. Chambers could feel himself balling the fingers of both hands into fists.
Just as he understood what was happening.
“Anger,” he said, trying to make his voice as soft as possible. It still came out as a shout.
“Too damn right I’m angry,” said Karen. “I’ve just about had enough of you and her and this place and—”
“It’s this place.” Chambers still couldn’t stop himself from shouting, but he tried to make himself understood anyway. “It’s making us angry.”
“He’s right.” Dr. Cruttenden gave another cough and the other two flinched in annoyance. “I’m trying hard not to annoy either of you, but I seem to be making you worse, which in turn is making me furious.”
“Well, what the hell are we supposed to do?”
“We need to get out of here.” Chambers was doing his best to keep his voice soft, but it seemed hopeless. In fact, the harder he tried, the more an edge of sarcasm seemed to be creeping in. “You’d better all follow me.”
“Why? How do you all of a sudden know which way we should go?”
Chambers tried to ignore the rage in Karen’s voice. “Because the damned souls of this circle lie that way, that’s why. They’re all dead, and it looks as if they won’t harm us, but of course that doesn’t mean once we’re among them that they won’t suddenly come to life, so watch out.”
Karen gave Dr. Cruttenden a disdainful look. “There’s no way she’s going to make it.”
“Don’t worry about me,” spat the lecturer. “I’ll be right behind you every inch of the way, and if I’m not then that will be my own stupid fault, won’t it?”
Chambers extended a helping hand, but it was brushed away. He bit back the words that immediately came to him and instead made a start up the hill, turning back every now and then to make sure the others were following him.
The crucifixes were still there, and as they entered the forest of withered wood and rotting, emaciated bodies, Chambers felt a sense of hopelessness descend upon him that only exacerbated his mounting anger and frustration.
“It’ll probably get worse as we go forward,” he said to no one in particular.
“It’s probably intended to.” Dr. Cruttenden’s sarcastic reply came from somewhere behind him. “But if we stop now, we’ll end up like these things here.”
“Won’t we end up like them if we carry on?” Karen still sounded profoundly irritated, but they were starting to get used to ignoring the inflections of anger in what each of them said.
“If we’re not careful,” said Chambers, waiting for them to catch up and join him. “Let’s try looking out for each other from now on, shall we?”
They kept moving forward. Soon they were deep enough in that all they could see were crosses extending in every direction.
“Oh, that’s just great.” Karen sounded dejected now. “How are we supposed to know which way to go?”
“I think we follow the corpses.” Chambers pointed ahead of them. The bodies tied to the crosses had begun to change subtly. Each one they passed now had slightly more flesh on its bones—rotting scraps that here and there betrayed a hint of wetness, rather than the horribly desiccated specimens they had already passed.
It wasn’t long before they came to figures that were in a far less advanced state of decay, and with the sickly sweet smell of corruption to match. But that wasn’t the worst of it.
These corpses were moving.
They were still tightly bound to the crucifixes, but that didn’t stop those with some remaining strength from struggling against their bonds. The ones with eyes regarded the individuals passing between them from watery sockets, and those with vocal cords cried out—a mixtures of rasps and gasps that alerted their neighbors that there were newcomers in their midst.
Soon the part of the forest they were now in was filled with the cries of those banished to this circle of Hell. At first Chambers thought the sounds they were making were anguished, but it wasn’t long before he could hear that they were cries of fury.
“Keep going!”
Karen had stopped and was regarding the semi-rotten body of a young woman. Most of her curled blonde hair was still present, apart from the gash that had opened up the right-hand side of her skull. Whatever blow she had been dealt had taken her right eye as well. The left, however, remained and was regarding Karen with utter hatred.
“Why are they like that?” Karen was moving again, but she could not take her eyes from the angry dead.
“My guess would be it’s all part of their eternal torment.” Chambers wanted to spit the words at her, and it was taking a Herculean effort not to. “They’re so angry that if they weren’t tied up, they would tear each other into so many pieces that no one and nothing would be able to put them back together again. This way they’re just out of reach of each other, which just makes it all the worse.”
“It also emphasizes why we have to try to remain calm.” Dr. Cruttenden was just managing to keep up. She was stumbling along, wheezing as she went, and Chambers and Karen were going as slowly as they could to allow her to stay with them. “I very much suspect that if we were to become as angry with each other as they appear to be, we would also find ourselves lashed to one of those things.”
“But the first ones we saw weren’t angry.” Karen was obviously struggling not to rant as well. “They were just . . . dead.”
“Perhaps the curse of this circle is for you to boil away with anger until there is literally nothing left.” Dr. Cruttenden coughed and the other two frowned, but they covered it up before she could see. “Then, for all we know, they get moved back to the front of the line to start the whole thing over again.”
“You mean where we’re heading now?”
Chambers nodded. “Let’s hope so.”
They had been steadily climbing a gradual incline and were now reaching the top. Chambers had expected to see more of the same on the other side, but when they reached the topmost row of crosses it also turned out to be the las
t.
Beyond, beneath a sky the color of blood, lay a vast pit.
More than a hundred steps carved into wet black earth led down into it, and, on the far side, a similar flight led out.
On each of the steps down was a writhing human being, lashed to a wooden crucifix. With frightening regularity a bell rang—a loud, dull monotone that Chambers was surprised they had not heard before—and the figures all moved one step up. The one on the very top step took up the space that had opened up for it at the brow of the hill and, in its angered writhings, began to tear itself to pieces as it strained against the ropes.
On the far side of the pit, each step also bore a human figure, but these were the withered skeletal creatures that Chambers had first encountered. Temporarily relieved of their burdens, these fragile wisps of humanity were tottering down the steps with the same monotonous regularity, and in response to the same urgent tolling.
It was when they reached the bottom of the pit that their transformation occurred. Gradually, as they progressed haltingly across the blackened floor of earth, the mummified remains of the souls damned to the Circle of Anger for all eternity grew flesh on their bones and then skin to cover it. Hair regrew, eyes and teeth were restored, and by the time they were close to the steps leading up to where Chambers and the others were currently standing, they looked almost human again.
Then the crucifixes were applied.
In the same way as the bodies actually progressed once they were bound up, it was impossible to see how this was done. One minute the soul resembled a healthy human being, the next they were a screaming, furious creature bound to a wooden cross and being moved slowly but surely up the wet steps to begin another round of anguished torment.
“What do we do now?”
Chambers had no idea. He hoped Dr. Cruttenden did, but she was shrugging as she caught her breath.
“Well, we haven’t found the way out yet, so I’m guessing it should be just over there.”
Karen pointed to the far side of the pit. “Past all those people?”
“Yes.”
“All those people who are so filled with anger they want to tear each other apart?”
“Yes.”
“And will probably tear us apart if we go anywhere near them?”
Chambers wrestled with the almost overwhelming urge to tell Karen to shut up. In the end he managed it by admitting to himself that she did have a point. The steps that led into the pit were barely wide enough for a single of the damned souls to stand, and the incline was steep. Even without being assaulted, the climb down was going to be difficult.
But there was nothing else they could do.
“I’ll go first,” he said. “Dr. Cruttenden should go second so we can watch out for her, and I need you to bring up the rear.”
“You know what I want to say to that, don’t you?”
“Yes.” Chambers permitted himself a smile and hoped Karen wouldn’t take it the wrong way. “And you know it’s not you but this place that’s making you feel that way.”
“Oh fucking hell, let’s get on with it, then.”
Chambers put his foot on the top step. It sank slightly into the wet earth and something that looked like blood pooled around his shoe. When he withdrew it, the ground made a sucking noise that reminded him of a bloated maggot feeding.
“What are you waiting for?”
Chambers looked over at Karen, who had moved Dr. Cruttenden in front of her. “Just be careful as you go—the ground’s very soft.”
It was dangerous as well. To avoid falling into the abyss below they had to keep away from the edge, but not so far away that they came into contact with the angry dead, who snapped and snarled at the intruders in their midst.
“As long as we keep away from the teeth we should be fine,” Dr. Cruttenden said, to no one in particular.
Chambers was relieved to hear she was still close behind him. The steps were too narrow for him to turn around and check the others were okay. He called to Karen and was rewarded with an exasperated response that reassured him she was still with them too.
Then Dr. Cruttenden slipped.
If she hadn’t grabbed at his shoulder with her right hand, Chambers would never have known she was falling. They were about halfway down the flight of sodden steps and suddenly he felt himself being tugged backward. He turned to face the creature that was lashing at him, his features only inches from the dead thing’s own, and then turned again to see what had happened.
Dr. Cruttenden was hanging from the free edge of the steps. The only thing preventing her from falling was the grasp of Karen’s right hand, but that was beginning to slip.
Chambers got down on his hands and knees, his fingers sinking into the blood-soaked soil as the chill fluid seeped through the legs of his trousers. He reached out for Dr. Cruttenden’s flailing left hand, but she wouldn’t, or couldn’t, keep it still.
“Try and grab my hand!”
Her response was a barrage of beleaguered coughing. And then, “I am trying, you know! But I can’t!”
Chambers leaned out further. He could feel the slippery soil beneath him starting to encourage him over the edge.
“Try harder!”
Karen reached out with her free hand. Just as she did so, the soil she was resting on gave way and she, too, tumbled over the edge.
Just as Chambers managed to grab Dr. Cruttenden’s hand.
Now the two women were swinging in space, their only attachment to land being Dr. Cruttenden’s left hand that was grasped by Chambers’s right, and their combined weight was quickly pulling him over the edge.
“Try and dig your feet in!” he cried as they swung back and forth. “The soil should be soft enough for you to climb up!”
He felt their combined weight swing beneath him once more as his body continued to slide toward the edge. Then they stopped, and he heard Karen’s voice coming from what sounded like far below.
“It’s so soft I can barely get a hold!”
She was obviously trying, and she obviously failed as Chambers felt himself pulled further over the edge. Now half his own body was hanging in the air as he held on desperately with his left hand and did his best to anchor his pelvis with his hip muscles.
“Climb up over Dr. Cruttenden, then!”
“But that could pull you over too!”
Chambers licked his lips. The situation looked hopeless either way. “If you don’t hurry that will happen anyway,” he cried. “You may as well try, while I’ve still got a hold up here.”
There was silence as he presumed Karen to be contemplating his words. Then he felt a pull and braced himself again. A protesting “Ow!” from Dr. Cruttenden suggested Karen was following his advice.
But she had to hurry. Despite all his effort, he could feel himself sliding, inch by inch, over the edge. He took a deep breath to tell her to hurry up, but at the same moment he slid forward and the wind was knocked from him.
“Nearly there!” came Karen’s voice from below. It was true. He could see her now, clambering over the distressed lecturer.
“Be careful!” he cried as she reached for his arm. “I’m nearly over!”
Rather than go slowly, Karen took that as her cue to climb faster. She grabbed his arm and pushed herself up and onto the ledge just as Chambers slid over.
Almost.
Karen had hold of his right leg, and somehow her grasp felt firm enough that he was able to encourage Dr. Cruttenden to do what Karen had just done.
“I can’t possibly,” she said. “I simply haven’t the strength.”
“You’re going to have to!” he shouted. “If you don’t, we’ll all go!”
It seemed like an age, but eventually Dr. Cruttenden pulled herself up a little, which in turn allowed Chambers to get a better hold on her.
God only knew how Karen was managing to prevent herself from falling, but everything stayed steady as Dr. Cruttenden levered herself up over Chambers and back onto the step. Then between th
em, the two women pulled Chambers up.
“How the hell did you not slip?” he said, once he had regained his breath.
“With a little help from one of our friends here.” Karen was pointing to the writhing figure behind her, then she pointed to a large tear in her sleeve that had been put there by the thing’s teeth. “Mind you, I was worried the cotton was going to give out.”
“I think I’ll just say I owe you one, and leave it at that.” Chambers smiled. It broadened as he realized he felt no anger at all. The emotion had left him like a cloud lifting.
“Yes,” said Dr. Cruttenden, wiping the worst of the mud from her clothes. “I feel it too. I suspect our little act of cooperation has proved we’re not meant for this circle, and consequently the forces that have been trying to keep us here have given up.”
The crucified dead hadn’t given up, though. They continued in their efforts to snap at the three of them as Karen, Chambers, and Dr. Cruttenden made their way to the bottom of the pit. The ground there was much firmer, and they paused for a rest before making their way across.
Karen eyed the line of the dead that stretched across the base of the pit. They seemed to acquire their crucifixes somewhere in the center, but it was difficult to see exactly where.
“I’m guessing it’s best if we just keep well away from them?” she said.
Chambers shrugged. “I suppose so. We’ll have to deal with them when we go up the other side anyway.”
“What if the way out is in the center?” Dr. Cruttenden’s breathing problems seemed to have rectified themselves at the same time as their anger had faded. “If we miss it, we’ll just end up going all the way around again until we find it.”
Karen looked back the way they had come. “I don’t fancy having to come down those steps again.”
“Me neither.” Now Chambers’s eyes were following the line of the dead as they found themselves bound to their crucifixes and had to hobble to the first step up to the next stage of their torment. “I suppose as long as we keep our distance, we should be okay.”
Once they had rested, they set off. The dead seemed less interested in them now, and far more concerned with each other and their own predicament. The ground, so wet and slippery when they had started, became increasingly dry as they made their way to the center of the pit.
The Lovecraft Squad Page 28
