by Brian Harmon
For a couple of frantic heartbeats, Brandy convulsed. Her eyes bulged. The flashlight dropped from her hand.
Albert grabbed her and pulled her back, away from the creature, terrified. What just happened? What did that thing do to her? He heard it as it slid away, a great mass of soggy, hairy coils, splashing heavily into the water, but he paid it no attention. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered at that moment except Brandy. If anything happened to her…
Brandy made a horrible sound, deep in her throat, as if she were choking to death, and then she doubled forward and retched violently and repeatedly.
Nicole, too, was by her side in an instant, her heart pounding with fright. What had those things done to her? What was that horrible stuff they shot at her? Was it toxic? Corrosive? Something else unthinkable?
Brandy retched again, this time harder than ever, her body trembling from the force of it. Then she spat a mouthful of foul bile onto the floor and gasped for air.
“What’s wrong?” Albert asked, his voice trembling. “What’s going on? Talk to me.”
Brandy tried to catch her breath and then gagged again, her whole body clenching with the force of it. Her every muscle strained against her naked skin. It seemed to go on and on, relentlessly, violently. But finally she relaxed again and gasped for air as she began clawing at her face, trying to pull away the disgusting goo that was smeared across her mouth and chin. It was somehow sticky and slippery at the same time, and she couldn’t seem to peel it off.
“Does it hurt?” Nicole asked.
Again, Brandy retched. She couldn’t stop herself. Her eyes bulged horribly with the force of her heaving.
“Albert, help her!”
“Take it easy, Baby,” Albert urged, not sure what else to do. He was mentally inventorying the contents of the first aid kit in his backpack, trying to think of what might help, but he still didn’t even know what this stuff was doing to her.
Brandy gasped for air and managed a labored, “I’m okay!” before another violent retch overcame her, this one dropping her to the floor on her hands and knees.
“Does it hurt?” Nicole asked again.
Brandy shook her head. “Just…” Her chest heaved again and she gasped for air. She was sure that if not for the fact that she hadn’t eaten anything since before they set out for Gilbert House hours and hours ago, she would have been vomiting all over the stone floor. “Oh god!” she cried. “So nasty!”
The taste in her mouth was unspeakably disgusting. It was far beyond vile, like a festering concoction of everything nasty and putrid, mixed with a strange, sickly sweet flavor that reminded her somehow of tomatoes and citrus. It clung mercilessly to her tongue, refusing to let her go no matter how hard she spat.
Albert wiped at the fluid that clung to her chin and examined it. It had a slick and slightly gooey, mucus-like texture and was a sickly brown color. It had a powerful, pungent stench and he had little trouble understanding why Brandy had become so violently sick.
Brandy coughed and then retched again, her back arching with the force of the heave. Then she collapsed onto the floor, gasping for breath.
“Is she going to be okay?” Nicole asked. The sight of her best friend in such a state scared the hell out of her.
“I think so,” Albert replied. He was kneeling over Brandy, his hand on her bare back, trying his best to sooth her. The brown fluid he’d wiped from her chin was still between his fingers. It wasn’t burning him. It wasn’t numbing his skin. It wasn’t making him feel sick—except for the way his stomach flopped over when he sniffed it. It didn’t seem to be poisonous, at least not to the touch. And somehow he didn’t expect it to be. Something this vile was likely created specifically to be vile. If it was toxic, it wouldn’t matter what it tasted like. The toxin would do its work regardless of the flavor. Brandy’s violent reaction to the mere taste of the stuff was more than adequate to ensure that they kept their distance from these things from now on.
This was likely something similar to the spray of a skunk; harmless, but overpowering. Perhaps it was how these things protected themselves from the hounds and whatever other predators might be hiding down here.
Of course, he could be wrong. He knew nothing about the creatures that lived in the temple. For all he knew, the people of the City of the Blind had spent millennia breeding these horrors so that they were as nasty as possible.
But Brandy didn’t seem to be in mortal danger.
“Oh god, that was so gross!” she gasped, rolling onto her back. There was still a smear of brown bile on her chin and cheek. A strand of it ran to the floor where she’d pressed her face to the stone a moment ago. A rope of spittle clung to her lower lip. Tears streamed from both bloodshot eyes. “That was the most disgusting—” She gagged again, as if on the very words, and had to force herself to relax.
Albert wiped tenderly at her face with his hand. “Even worse than my Salisbury steaks?” he asked.
Brandy laughed. Her body shuddered with the force of it as she was still trying to catch her breath. Albert’s Salisbury steaks was one of their private jokes. It was a dish he’d attempted to cook for them the first week they moved into their apartment. It was an utter disaster. Completely inedible. They’d been forced to order pizza instead. To this day, they still had no idea what he did wrong, but it was as funny now as it was that evening. “Nearly,” she told him when she caught her breath.
Albert laughed.
Brandy wiped her eyes dry and sat up.
Nicole slapped her gently on the arm. “You scared the shit out of me!”
Brandy slapped her right back. “I’m ever so fucking sorry. Next time you take the monster spunk in the mouth.”
“Just be more careful. Both of you.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Albert replied.
Brandy spread her knees apart and looked down at her body, groaning. The cold, brown goo was splattered across her lower belly and right leg and had oozed down between her thighs.
“Let’s get going,” Nicole pleaded. “I don’t like it in here.”
“We should keep moving,” Albert agreed. He didn’t like remaining anywhere too long. He stood up and helped Brandy to her feet. “Are you okay?”
“I think so.”
“Can you go on?”
Brandy nodded. She wiped at the mass of brown goo on her belly and attempted to fling it from her fingers, but it was stubbornly reluctant to let go. She groaned and fought back another retch. “Just go,” she said as fresh tears sprang to her eyes. “I’m coming.”
Nicole started walking. She turned down the next passage that led away from the reservoir, happy to put those nasty creatures behind them once again.
Chapter 24
Wayne found Wendell Gilbert without any trouble. The old man was right where he and the others had left him. Unlike Beverly’s body, Wendell’s filled him with no emotions whatsoever. It could have been a discarded mannequin for all that it mattered to him. For one thing, he had never met the man. He’d been dead for decades. Secondly, it was this man’s insane obsession that had ultimately destroyed Beverly. If he had never built that hellish dormitory, perhaps she would not have ended up entombed in that bleak pit.
They moved on, past the body and into the empty room that lay beyond. Wayne thought nothing of this chamber. He was far more concerned with the area beyond it. There were hounds there. They’d even heard one when he and the others came through here earlier that night. He didn’t know what he’d do if they arrived at the drop-off and discovered one of the creatures waiting for them. This was, after all, the only path to the City of the Blind that he knew. He doubted they would get very far if they strayed from it.
As he stepped into the mouth of the next tunnel, Wayne suddenly realized that he was alone. Pulled from his thoughts, he stopped and turned around.
Olivia was standing just inside the chamber across from him, staring up at the dark ceiling above her, an expression of fearful puzzlement on her face.
Andrea was standing next to her, her flashlight scanning the stone above them, trying to find whatever it was that had captured her attention.
“What’s wrong?” Wayne asked.
Olivia shook her head. “I don’t know. I thought I heard something up there.”
“Something like what?”
Olivia stared up into the darkness for a moment, listening, but whatever she thought she heard had fallen silent. “Like chains,” she replied at last. She lowered her eyes and looked at him, her expression uneasy. “It was like chains rattling.”
“That’s really creepy,” Andrea said.
“Come on,” Wayne told them. Suddenly this room frightened him. In his mind’s eye, he saw Wendell Gilbert’s corpse lying in the tunnel with no visible wounds. The Sentinel Queen said that he was killed by the same sort of thing that killed Beverly, some kind of horrific creature that could only be seen by those with strong, psychic minds. He still remembered the look of utter and maddening terror in her eyes as she staggered backward to her death.
Andrea saw the concern on Wayne’s face. “What is it?”
“Just come on.”
Olivia and Andrea crossed the room without incident and the three of them entered the next passage together.
“You’re like Albert and Brandy,” Wayne said.
“What?” Olivia had no idea what he was talking about.
“You’re psychic. Not a lot. Not like Beverly was, or Wendell Gilbert, but a little.”
“No I’m not,” Olivia said.
“I think you are,” he insisted. “Albert felt something in there when he passed through it, too. He stopped and looked up at the ceiling, just exactly like you did just now. He said it felt creepy.”
“I don’t believe in psychics,” Olivia said. “It’s all a con, like magic.”
“So it’s easier to believe in parallel universes full of zombies and groping trees?”
Olivia opened her mouth, but then closed it again. She had never thought of herself as psychic. Not in the least, but what did she know about the universe? If something like Gilbert House could exist, why couldn’t she have a faint sixth sense?
“Come on,” Wayne said. “When we get to the city, we’ll talk to the Sentinel Queen. Maybe she’ll have some answers for you.” She sure as hell better have some for me, he thought, remembering the accusations of the old man.
Farther down this tunnel was the small drop-off that Albert had compared to a cattle guard earlier that evening. It was walls like these, he remembered, that kept the hounds from roaming the entire temple. Wayne hopped down into the lower part and listened. When nothing greeted his ears but silence, he helped Olivia and Andrea down and the three of them hurried on.
Wayne remembered the bridge that crossed over the maze where his underwear had been hung and that the noises from below were much quieter than the first time he crossed it. That meant only one thing to him: that there were not as many hounds in the maze as there had been before. If that was the case, then where, exactly, had they gone? He had no doubt that this area was connected to that chamber somehow, and he, Albert, Brandy and Nicole had all tracked their scent through this tunnel mere hours ago.
But no hounds awaited them as they stepped out onto the bridge and over the dark chasm.
“Unbelievable!” Andrea sighed. “How big is this place?”
Olivia gazed down into the infinite darkness below. It was like nothing she had ever seen before, a veritable abyss.
“Enormous,” said Wayne. He had not stopped walking. He had seen it all before. And he didn’t care to dwell on the insurmountable size of the task before him.
But Andrea and Olivia lingered for a moment, transfixed by the awesome sight. How could this place be so big? It didn’t seem possible.
Finally, they pulled their eyes away and followed Wayne into the next stretch of empty tunnel. Ahead of them were the four passageways and the sentinel statue that invited them to choose a path.
Wayne paused. For a moment, panic welled up inside him as he realized that he couldn’t quite remember which one Albert had chosen before.
“Wayne?” Olivia watched him, concerned, as he shined his light into one passage and then another.
“I’m okay.” He remembered the knife. That was what they were looking for. He searched the floor, but it wasn’t there. He moved on to the next passage and still could not find it.
“Wayne, what’s wrong?”
“It’s nothing. I’m just…” He moved to the next passageway, sweeping the floor with his light. “I’m not seeing it…”
“Not seeing what? What’s wrong?”
“Are we lost?” asked Andrea. The dread in her voice was unmistakable.
Desperate to find it before something caught their scent, he almost turned away and missed it, but then he saw it there, lying on the floor, almost too far away for his light to reach. “This way,” he sighed. “Hurry.”
He took several steps and then abruptly stopped and cocked his head, listening.
“What is it?” Andrea asked.
Wayne shook his head. “Thought I heard something.”
“What kind of something?” asked Olivia, her voice tense.
Wayne did not answer. He stood there, holding his breath, listening. Again, he thought he heard it, a soft clicking noise. It was coming from somewhere behind them.
He motioned Olivia and Andrea to go ahead of him and then took a few steps back the way he’d come, still listening. After a few seconds, it came again. He was sure he heard it this time, a sound like something hard tapping against the stone.
The sound made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.
Then there was only silence.
“What is it?” Andrea asked. Wayne could hear the fear in her voice and did not blame her for that.
It was time to go.
He turned and gestured at Olivia and Andrea to keep going, not daring to raise his voice for fear that the man with no eyes might have been lying when he said the hounds were deaf. When they turned and started forward, he shined his light back the way they came and listened for a moment longer.
There was another soft click from somewhere nearby, barely audible over the loud pounding of his heart, and then a sudden explosion of violent noise erupted from one of the other passageways, as loud and terrifying as a chainsaw. It was a ferocious sound, a noise with which he was perfectly familiar by now, but still utterly incapable of describing.
It was a hound.
And it was startlingly close.
Wayne turned and dashed toward the girls, screaming at them to run. Shrieking with terror, they sprinted ahead of him, rushing toward the end of the tunnel and the wall that would allow them to climb out of harm’s way.
How far did this passage go? He couldn’t quite remember.
Behind him, he could hear the thing tearing after them, the terrible noise rapidly growing louder and louder.
The girls were faster than him. The distance between them slowly grew as they all ran for their lives toward the safety of the next passage. Darkness parted before Andrea’s darting flashlight beam and revealed only more darkness, as if they were going nowhere at all.
The hound drew closer and closer, its hellish roar growing louder with each desperate second that passed. It was a dreadful feeling, knowing that it was back there and rushing toward him. He did not even know what it was, and yet it was only moments from rending his flesh with its teeth or claws or whatever it might use to slaughter its prey.
At the very least, he supposed the girls would likely be able to escape. By now, they should be able to find their way to the City of the Blind. They might still be able to catch up to Albert and warn him about the things the old man told him.
But he wasn’t ready to stop running and turn to face whatever was there. Perhaps if he had known what it was that chased him he could have more bravely faced his fate, but not knowing what horror was bearing down on him was intolerable. He pumped his legs as hard as h
e could and tried not to scream at the sound of the loudly approaching doom behind him.
When Andrea finally reached the wall at the end of the passage, she grabbed the ledge and swung herself neatly up and out of peril. Even in spite of his fear, Wayne was impressed with her litheness. Olivia, on the other hand, was not nearly as graceful. In her rush, she did not try to swing herself over the ledge but instead attempted to pull herself straight up. Perhaps it was the weariness she must have been feeling, the lack of both food and sleep for the past two days, but she was only able to lift herself a couple of feet off the floor, her bare toes sliding across the smooth stone of the wall as she desperately tried to push herself upward.
She cried out, her voice overtaken by sheer horror, and Andrea turned and seized her arms. But Andrea was not strong enough to lift her into the upper passage with her. She screamed for her to climb and Olivia begged her to pull her up, to get her out before it was too late. She could hear the hound racing toward them and the thought of not being able to climb to safety in time filled her with icy panic. She did not want to die like this. Not after all she’d been through.
At last, as the furious sound of the hound grew deafening, Wayne caught up to Olivia and tossed his flashlight up into the next tunnel. Both hands free, he grabbed Olivia, gripping each of her legs just above her knees and heaving her upward with all his strength.
She squealed as she was lifted, surprised by his ungentle touch, but desperately grateful to be shoved from death’s outstretched hand.
Behind him, the roar of the hound was thunderous. The thing was damn fast. It was right behind him.
He grabbed the ledge and swung his leg up into the higher tunnel. Had he been there thirteen months ago when Albert and Brandy had their first encounter with a hound, he might have laughed at the similarities between the events of then and now. Albert had also investigated something odd in the tunnels, had also drawn the attention of a hound and yelled for his companion to run. He had even paused before climbing to safety to give Brandy an urgent and ungentle hand.
