Red Rain (The Circle Book 3)

by Lee Isserow

  Their master's reach was going to expand exponentially that night, as similar groupings moved through the Thames and Meghna and Nile.

  The creature that crawled upon the land in Brooklyn stretched its limbs and arced its back. It had never seen anywhere so full of light before, and the sliver of individuality that coursed through its system wanted to explore and discover this place, to learn what it had to offer.

  The docks that it walked through were empty, but floodlights still shined from above, casting great shadows around it. Never had it seen such things, having been born and raised in the darkness of the ocean's depths, and it played with them, trying to catch the dark lines that moved as it moved―as if the shadows were some kind of spectre that mimicked and mocked it.

  When it got tired of that game, it continued its exploration, coming to a great set of gates that blocked it from the rest of the land and light. It narrowed its eyes and snorted from each of its mouths in turn, then pushed itself against the bars of the gates. Its body shifted, the muscle mass distorting to allow it passage through to the world of man. The rain made the bars slick and it slipped through, losing its balance on the other side and collapsing to the ground. Shaken, but not injured, it returned to its walking position, just as it had learned from its kin, and it ventured out into this new place.

  It knew that this was against the orders that had been whispered in the back of its mind, but it did not believe it was disobeying that much. After all, it was going to hide underground eventually. . . it just wanted to explore a little first.

  It walked towards the lights, seeking to discover what delights might live amongst them. The closer it got, the more it became enamoured with this place. The world of man was so bright and had so much that was new. And the lights were not just static, they moved, there were two such lights moving directly towards it right then and there.

  A scream cut through the quiet night, a deep and guttural cry the likes of which it had never heard before. It cocked its head in curiosity, and wondered if this was the declaration of friendship, or and attack. As a stranger to the land, it could very well be friendly. . . But his master had warned him of the world of man, told it of their propensity for violence and destruction. It decided to err on the side of caution and raised its shoulders, cementing its limbs to the ground beneath it. If this were an attack it would be ready.

  The scream sounded out again, the lights closing in, and with an almighty crunch, they impacted with its body. It felt pain, but the muscles under its skin had been prepared for an assault, and were resilient to the buff from the shiny beast.

  The cries from the attacker continue to shout out, and the creature shook off the attack. This world of man was exactly what its master had warned it would be. A place of mindless violence, of pain. They had attempted to hurt it without even so much as a second-guess as to whether it might be friend or foe.

  It slunk off from the wreck, finding the nearest sewer grating and contorting its body to slip inside and hide under the ground, just as its master had wished for it to do in the first place. Its curiosity had lead to it trusting its master all the more. Those that dwelled on the land above were clearly as destructive as it had been told, and it was not going to veer from the collective ever again.

  The car's horn continued to sound out, a desperate cry in the night for help. But no help would come, not until help was no longer needed. Blood dripped from the bodies shred in the wreck. It pooled under the mess of metal and glass. And as it did so, a hard rain continued to fall, washing the blood away.

  But to those who could see what mundanes could not, the blood might well have been gone, and yet somehow it remained. Such things could only be witnessed by peering through to layers of perception that were hidden from the view of most. That night, the streets of New York, and the streets of every city which was host to the creatures from the deep, were still stained red. The Natural World was doing all it could to warn those that lived in it, to rally them in light of what was to come. To alert one and all before it was too late. . . that soon blood was to shed. And there would be much bloodshed, more than it had witnessed in aeons, before the world was safe once again.

  8

  The trail of slime

  As the sun rose over Manhattan, the city was already a buzz of activity as commuters were rushed through the gaping mouths of subway tunnels to their myriad destinations.

  That morning, it was not the subways that would be cause for concern. Reports came across the desk of the Bureau of Water and Sewer Operations, informing them that there was a minor overflow on Union Square. A team was immediately dispatched to investigate―after all, earlier in the year there had been explosions there, sometime in spring, from a combination of a sewage issue and some faulty transformers. Three manholes had exploded, three fires took three hours to put out, and glass from the windows of the surrounding buildings rained down upon the street like a glittering, razor-sharp rain. If those the wielded power in New York had any magickal blood in them, or even the slightest interest in numerology, they might have considered the concurrence of threes a portent.

  However, they did not, and nine months later two sewage workers found themselves descending into the bowels of the city, walking through the contents of the bowels of the city, in search of the reason for the minor flooding up above.

  The curious thing, they both thought, was that the water levels were not even close to being high enough to cause a flood. They found the grate in question, and made sure that it was not blocked, for in any other case such as this, that was the simplest explantation. But as they came upon the grate, it was clear that there was no blockage, as the light of day shone straight through from up above, with not even the slightest hint of an obstruction. However, what was curious was the substance that seemed to be surrounding the grate, some kind of slime, the likes of which neither of the workers had ever seen before.

  Both decided it was nothing to worry about, after all, it appeared to be mostly isolated to the grate and the wall beneath it―hardly the same thing that they recalled happening in Florida the year previous, where the entire coast found itself beset upon by toxic blooms of algae sludge. The same thing happened in San Francisco, and Chicago. One of them recalled something he read from Leeds, England, where an entire river became luminous green in some kind of misguided attempt by the council to track pollution. But this wasn't the same as any of the examples of sludge and slime they could recall. This barely had a colour to it, it was thick and goopy, but practically transparent. There was the slightest hint of grey to it, and it was shiny, leading them to agree that the closest thing they could compare it to―if such a comparison would be necessary when it came to paperwork―was the thin film of goop that a slug or snail leaves behind as it traverses a flowerbed.

  There had been plenty of memos across their desks in the past to keep an eye out for such things living in the sewers, it would be a paperwork nightmare for their department if the sewage system became the adopted habitat for any critter or creature―outside of the rats, of course. The last thing they needed was enviro-freaks declaring that no new work could be done under the city, in case it disrupted the life-cycle of some new or rare poop-consuming species.

  The procedure for this kind of thing was clear. They got on the radio and reported that they were investigating a possible “Four double-two forty-eight twenty-eight”, which was the numeric code their boss had come up with for the potential of discovering a new habitat. It was not a great code, as it had come into being as he literally looked at the letters under the numbers on his phone, and turned the word 'habitat' into numerals. Any worker that went into the sewers was tasked with remember that number, along with a host of others for various scenarios. “Four sixty-six three five three double-seven” when they came upon a homeless encampment, which happened more often than any of them would have expected. And of course, there was the absolutely pointless “two fifty-five forty-four two eight six seven”, for when one came upon an alli
gator. Their boss assured them that when he was their age, he not only found an alligator in the sewers, but physically fought it, and beat it to death with a wrench. Nobody at the Bureau of Water and Sewer Operations believed his story, and yet whenever there was the opportunity to tell it, boy did he tell it with bells on, acting out all the parts―both his own and the alligator's.

  The two men made sure to turn the radio off before they went any further, for if they did come upon a new species, an open channel would mean they would have to admit its existence―and if there happened to be an eco-warrior listening in, they could find themselves in all kinds of legal trouble if they took the necessary actions to 'dissuade' the species from living in the sewers. . .

  The trail of slime continued farther than either of them would have expected. It moved from the walls down to the shallow waters they walked in, and seemed to retain the texture rather than dissipate in the stream, as they expected any normal sewer slime to do. It was curious indeed. They shone their flashlights ahead of them, wondering how long and how far they would have to continue to pursue the damn slime trail. And that was when they caught their first sight of the thing that had made the darkness beneath the streets its home.

  Their flashlights made shadows behind it, but did not seem to truly illuminate the thing itself, as if its skin swallowed the light up. It appeared to sniff the air, and several eyelids clicked open, each containing an orb that glowed yellow and green. They all shot to stare directly at the men, and a guttural growl echoed through the underground chamber towards them. The sound felt as though it gained volume as it bounced off the brick, and made the water they stood in ripple. Behind the beast, tentacles came to life, swirling slowly back and forth.

  Hesitantly, the two men took small steps back from the creature. Both were terrified, but both also assumed that to show it fear, to burst into a run, would mean certain death. Moving slowly, however, felt―at least in that moment―as if it might barely register to the myriad-eyed fiend.

  And perhaps, they might have been right, had they not been standing in water. Water was the thing's natural medium, and the vibrations of their attempt at subtle movement travelled through it.

  It opened mouths, bore sharp teeth that glittered in the torch light. Each was a black diamond that sent fractals of light dancing around the tunnels.

  The men turned to run, but before they could even get one foot in front of the other, the beast had launched itself through the air towards them. This is the first time it had jumped, its first leap, and it fell short. But the creature knew it was going to fall short, and had shot its tentacles out ahead of it. They wound their way around the men's legs and pulled them from under them. Both men fell into the shallow water below, their faces meeting with the stone, bones smashing against the brickwork. The blood trickled along with the current towards the creature that had snared them, and it got its first scent of the delicious juices contained within its pray. It shot out tongues from its mouth, two from some, three from others, and lapped at the sanguine delights that drifted on the waters towards them. Its skin tingled with excitement, it had never tasted such a thing before. It sent the experience to each of its brethren, and could feel their excitement too. Its whole family was invested in devouring these two specimens of those that lived above.

  It stalked towards them, mouths leading the way, slurping at the waters as they got closer and closer. The men tried to pull themselves away, but the grip on their legs was too tight. They tried to pull themselves out of the shallow river of waste, but the damn thing was already upon them. One pulled their head from the water and turned to face his colleague, only to see a thick, slimy tentacle laid upon his head,forcing his friend to gag and drown on the filth beneath the surface.

  Tears fell down his cheeks as he turned to the creature and found an eye looming over him, a swirl of yellow and green, a vortex that spun wildly in a hungry gaze. He tried to scream, but before even the slightest sound could escape, his lips were torn open, mouth filled, teeth knocked down his throat, as a slimy, salty-tasting tentacle ploughed into his face. He couldn't breathe, but he could feel his lungs aching as the tentacle slithered deeper down his mouth, wriggling and moving inside him. He swallowed―even though he didn't want to swallow―and could feel his teeth cutting through his oesophagus.

  He watched in horror as the tentacle lifted up from his friend's head, and seemed to change in shape and texture. It seemed to become more solid, lost its slimy sheen, and slammed into his colleague's chest. He had never heard such a sound, a crack that was many cracks, the squish of flesh being punctured by hard shards of bone. It was a nightmare, pure and simple. But his nightmare was not to end so swiftly.

  The tendril in his mouth shifted shape too, he could feel it, becoming thinner and yet stronger, he could almost breathe around it. Then, he felt an ungodly pain, a tearing somewhere beyond his jaw, meat being ripped apart. He tasted the blood―but was not sure how he was able to taste it―given that the creature had just pulled the tongue from his mouth. The blood gushed down his chin, and poured down his throat, and he found that he could no longer find it in himself to be able to even attempt to scream. What he was experiencing was beyond screaming, beyond fear, beyond shock or horror.

  He watched with wide, panicked eyes as the beast devoured his tongue, passing it from mouth to mouth, as if it wanted to taste it with each of them. Although the mouths appeared to be circular, and have no corners, he still felt as though it were smiling, relishing its feast.

  Each of its brethren tasted what it tasted. And each of its brethren savoured every morsel. They saw what their kin saw, each adopting the same lascivious look it had in each of their myriad eyes. All of their mouths watered, all of their teeth gnashed and glimmered in the scant reflections of their hidden places. And they each let out satisfied growls and gasps as their avatar in New York descended upon its meal.

  9

  A solitary wanderer

  THE OUTER REALMS

  For centuries, Shaman did nothing but traverse the abyss. He kept his thoughts silent, his intent focussed on the distance, so as not to expend any unnecessary energy. He journeyed across the great expanse of the infinite void, propelling himself through the darkness towards the glimmer of a star that he prayed would have the answers he was looking for.

  In his travels, he encountered no others, a solitary wanderer in a place where isolation was the least of the worries that could drive one mad. Finally, he came to the star that he hoped would have what he sought, and discovered that it, like the others, was no star at all. The glimmer was but a cloud that surrounded the spectre he had been hunting, and as he passed through the gaseous glows, its true nature was revealed.

  An inky black mist wafted towards him, surrounding him, consuming him. The void beyond was no longer visible, he could no longer see the glimmers of the great Old Ones that lived such distances from one another in the abyss. He was at the mercy of the one he came to visit. And it held him in a strong grasp of midnight black.

  “Young thing,” the cloud roared, in a tongue that had no true words, a mixture of vibrations and growls that shook through Kahgo's body, as if each was an earthquake, and he was the focal point. “Why do you dare pervert the court of Aiueb Gnshal with your presence?”

  “I beseech you, oh great Aiueb Gnshal. I have travelled vast distances in order to access The Eyes Between Worlds, and beg that you grant me this small mercy.”

  Seven pulsing orbs clicked open one by one, each with a sickly smack. At first, they were far from him, and glowed a bright and luminous yellow that shone out in the darkness, spotlighting him in the black mist. Shaman glanced from one to the next, and they began to move, shifting through the cloud of the beast's body to surround him in every direction. Five to his sides, one above and one below. He was being watched from all angles, observed, judged.

  Smaller wisps of darkness began to appear beyond the glow of the eyes, they flitted around the impossible mass of the ancient, formless deit
y.

  “Who are you to ask such favours? I know of you, Sha'ma N'doda'k'rgo. . . I know of your father, the traitor Khal'kru, who so readily abandoned his kin for the Natural World. . . I have no interest in rewarding the offspring of those that would choose a lesser species over their own.”

  “You know who I am, great Aiueb Gnshal, and so you know I am one that has ties to the Natural World. . .” Kahgo knew there was no lie he could offer the Old One that it could not see through. Its gifts were many, and its observation was accurate and true. All he could do was offer the damn thing a deal, and hope it would never wish to act upon it. “I offer you an accord, to act as an anchor for your arrival, should you wish to traverse one day.”

  “You would sacrifice your realm for a mere glimpse of it?”

  Kahgo swallowed hard, and nodded. “I would sacrifice everything.”

  The cloud of darkness contorted and thrashed around him as it ruminated. Across its vast surface, lesser spirits danced through its grand mass. Their movements changed, becoming more excited and jerky as they listened to their master's thoughts. It appeared as though whatever conclusion it was coming to was making them agitated, and they whispered with hushed tones on the wind, offering their god thoughts and advice on the deal that had been put forward.

  The eyes blinked, and pulled farther back from Shaman. “Very well, son of Khal'kru`. We shall allow you access to that which you seek. . . Not for the offer that you have presented, but for the amusement that will follow. . .”

  “I do not understand?”