Unrelenting Terror

by P. S. Power

  “We need to find you a friend. A being powerful enough to aid you, in exchange for a bit of time using your body. I have some contacts that might be interested if approached correctly, but it will take a few days to set up. We need to hurry, without a doubt, since you already have something after you, but I don’t think we can do the actual procedure until the night of the lunar eclipse.” His grim turned on me as he said the word, then he repeated it.

  “Eclipse. That wasn’t used by accident you know. It’s a rare word in English, but one everyone knows. How many times have you heard it in the last year? Now each time you do, you become more and more ready to host a new friend. Tell me, what do you see, when you close your eyes right now? What do you feel?”

  He said it like he knew the answer, and I though he did too. I closed my eyes and saw…

  “Nothing. There’s nothing there. I, the book reader…” Had I lost it somehow? I still felt it in my hands, but…

  “You and the book are one now. There is no difference between you. What happens to you in writing is reality now. The ghosts that are coming will affect all parts of you, conscious and sub-conscious. The greater beings will be a part of you in both your forms, the active participant and the observer. This will go in and out of focus for a while, but it is a very good thing. It means that you’re truly ready to be one with another being.” He said something, a few words that didn’t show up on the screen this time at all and then he stopped being there, just blinking from existence.

  I couldn’t ask what had happened, how he’d vanished like that or what magic had been worked. My voice didn’t seem to be functioning. It could have been shock, since people didn’t normally vanish in front of me if they were real. I didn’t think so at least. Was the German guy a real person then and not a ghost or whatever? It was something I’d have to find out, since he seemed to know what he was talking about, even if I hadn’t believed him at the time. What I didn’t get was why were all these people so darned scary? It was so hard to trust anyone suddenly.

  The voice came from behind my chair. It was soft and reassuring, instead of angry or even grumpy anymore. I turned to look at the man behind me, wondering how he’d done it, only to notice the clock on the wall as I did. I had to check twice, since it was after eight already. It should have, at most, been just past seven.

  “That should do for today. I’d like you to come in at six again tomorrow evening, if that’s something you can manage in your schedule? Toni mentioned you two have a date when she gets off work. I’m sure we can be finished by then.” He reached over the back of the chair and touched my right shoulder. The hand was warm, but sent a chill down my spine. A tiny bit of apprehension started to form inside, so I took a deep breath and drove it back down before it could rise.

  I knew what I had to do. I felt certain of it now. I had to do whatever Alex wanted me too. If that meant letting myself be killed by these people, or by a demon, then so be it. I didn’t want that of course, but I’d gotten in too deep to climb out. Alex would know what to do, being already on the other side and all that.

  “That sounds good. Thank you. I should be going now. Things to do before bed and everything.” I dreaded the idea of trying to sleep in my room alone, but there was no one to take with me and I knew without having to ask that going someplace else wouldn’t help at all.

  What had happened the night before was about me, not about my house and definitely not about my bed. It wasn’t haunted. I was. I’d made the mistake of opening myself to these things, even though I’d been warned more than once on that score, and now I was in trouble that I might not be able to get out of. I didn’t know how to do it, but I had to get in touch with Alex and find out what to do. It might not work, I may have already been doomed, but I had to try. Didn’t I?

  That or just give in, let myself be taken over, or hope that Dr. Milford really could help me find a powerful supernatural friend that could protect me. I suddenly felt a great deal of trust for the man. Even if he did look freaky half the time. He hadn’t steered me wrong so far had he? I mean, I was scared a lot, sure, but he’d told me I would be. It was part of the original deal even. I couldn’t give up just because I was scared. I’d promised. As to the rest, I was there to learn about the reality of what happened after death, and to learn how to communicate with Alex. The way it was happening was a lot different than I expected, but it wasn’t the Doctor’s fault that these beings wanted me to be their… I really didn’t know what to call it. Body I guess. It just wasn’t what I’d expected. That didn’t make him bad or wrong.

  Toni was gone when I went out and the man lingered in his office, either to do something, like take notes on our session, or just to give me time to get out of there without being watched directly. That or so he’d be there when Daniel came. I passed him in the parking lot, getting a friendly wave when he got close enough to see me in the dim light.

  “Hey! I’m planning another get together next weekend, this time in the guest house, not the crypt. Can I count on you to show up? Please? We didn’t get a chance to chat a lot last time, but I swear this one will be a lot more low-key. Better food too, I promise.” He looked hopeful, but like he expected me to just say no.

  Like I had anything better to do?

  “What night is it on? I’ll need to know what time too, and get directions. Dr. Milford drove last time.” It was true, even if that didn’t mention the trance I’d been in at the time. I was still in one as far as that went. It just wasn’t as deep. I was finally learning to tell the difference. As long as no one said the trigger word to me, I’d be fine. If they did it would send me deeper than ever before. It was just how the whole thing worked, I guessed. I could feel it in a way, like I was balanced on the edge of a cliff and one mention of the right word would send me over into the deepest part of myself. A place that I wasn't certain I could resist what anyone told me to do. It was a little scary, but I also knew that fear wouldn't stop it from happening. Just the opposite in fact. It would make it even harder for me to resist anything.

  “Not a problem. Here…” He handed over a card with his number on it, printed very nicely, and then raked the fingers of his right hand through his hair.

  “I was thinking we’d start at ten in the evening, on Saturday. Call for directions, though that has my address if you have GPS. The eclipse doesn’t start until Ten-fifty or so though, so we should have plenty of time to set up the cameras and all that. There’s a family legend that says that the spirits of the dead will be at their strongest then, during the eclipse, hence not holding the party in the crypt. That was a little intense last time, wasn’t it? I'd really thought I'd caught Jerald pranking me, but whatever he'd done was too good for me to figure out. Well, that or it was all real.” He patted my left shoulder a little awkwardly and walked into the building, smiling happily enough. The contact reminded me of what Dr. Milford had done earlier.

  I was able to feel myself falling into the deepest part of myself, even as I saw the world in my mind, filtered through the words on the page. Just hearing the word eclipse had done it, like I'd figured it would. On the good side I could still think and understand things, but I was still sinking into myself regardless. That just couldn't be helped.

  It bothered me a little that I couldn’t remember what had happened, but the visual effect was pretty simple to figure out now that I thought about it, him vanishing from in front of me like that. Milford had used the deep mental state I was in to make me forget what he’d said, causing me to think I’d lost time. The giant German had probably done something similar. If he was actually a person at all.

  The word eclipse had sent me into a deep trance again, it felt for a few seconds like a wave of focus and depth had washed over me, so much so I didn’t even feel annoyed. Just ready to do whatever I had to. If I could be made to forget things like that I probably didn't have free will left at all. I knew I wanted to have it, the idea of losing it was hard to swallow, but I really couldn't remember what Milford h
ad told me during that lost hour, no matter how hard I tried.

  Could I find out what Dr. Milford had said by simply going back and reading it on the screen in my head? It was all in my subconscious mind, wasn’t it? Not that I had any clue how to do that directly, but it sounded plausible. I didn’t really have time to worry about things like that at the moment. I needed to get home and see if I could connect with Alex again. If not I had to get ready for whatever would happen when I tried to go to sleep. Really, I’d have to face that anyway, I knew. The idea didn’t thrill me, unless abject terror was going to be counted as a thrill from now on. In that case I was set, probably for the rest of my life. Still, more information wouldn’t hurt, if I could find the time in the next few days and figure out some way to make it work. Going back to read about what had been said. That sounded like a wonderful idea to me, the words of the story calling my attention, trying to force me to dig out their secrets.

  The drive home felt distinctly odd, distant and remote from what I was trying to really do. At least until I had to swerve to miss an old man in the hooded cloak who tried to cross in front of me without looking. He was all in sepia tones, so it didn’t take long for me to realize he wasn’t a real person. I still slammed on the brakes, the tires screeching on the pavement as the vehicles behind me did the same thing trying not to hit me. Then they honked. I didn’t blame them but it was mortifying, because I had to look like a freak. Still, I couldn’t risk hitting things like that. What if it had just been someone trying out their Halloween costume a little early? Five months too soon, but it could happen. Trying to explain to the police that I’d figured they weren’t real because of all the ghosts I'd seen lately probably wouldn’t go over too well.

  I drove the rest of the way home carefully, ready to brake and swerve if I had to, but other than a strange dark patch hanging in the air near the old cemetery, I didn’t see anything too strange. I parked in the garage and just sat for a while, in the dark.

  “What the hell am I doing? Ghosts? Three months ago I didn’t even believe in them, now I’m seeing them in the road. They really are all over the place.” I felt watched as I got out of the car and went inside, feeling tired and more than a little scared to be alone. It was the dark, I knew. It was there, all around me, hiding the things that wanted to hurt me. To eat my life energy. To do worse things than just that. Light didn’t make the darkness go away, it just covered it up. Hiding things that could easily do whatever they wanted to someone like me. Of all the things I hated, feeling weak was one of the worst. Everything lately kept hammering that lesson home with a vengeance. I was just human and that meant I was pretty much lunch for anything that wanted to bother chowing down.

  I tugged at the waist of my slacks just a bit, remembering too clearly the feeling of my underwear being pulled down, being helpless, pinned face down and unable to do anything about it as something was trying to work its way inside me. The idea that that could happen again that night left me uneasy, but the fact was, that could and probably did, regularly happen to a lot of people. Especially the ones that had opened up to things normally ignored by everyone else. People into the occult and even religion. Horror movies and novels too no doubt. If what Milford had said was correct, then not having anything to protect you pretty much meant that anything that wanted to could have you. Only the ignorance of the regular person helped to hide them, left them too boring to bother with. I was a little fuzzy on the idea, but tried not to dwell on it. I didn't want to call up anything else after all. I knew I couldn't really help it though. The harder I fought not to do it, the more it would happen. It was the way the mind worked.

  I needed to get something to eat. Maybe a drink of that wine I didn’t like. I needed something to help take the edge off, because one way or the other, I had to deal with this mess. Of course being drunk wasn’t going to help me if I was attacked in the middle of the night and had to run away again.

  I knew that I should do what the doctor told me, since it was what I'd promised, but the idea of just lying down and taking it while something raped me wasn’t my idea of fun, or of personal growth. Sure, I could survive it, but that didn’t mean it was going to be my go to move.

  First I needed to take care of dinner. I heated up some soup and ate it with saltines. It wasn’t exactly gourmet, but I didn’t really feel like eating at all, so it was going to have to do the trick. Then I washed up, noticing that something was behind me again. I did an about face to look after the first few seconds, expecting there to be nothing there at all, like usual. When I turned I was pushed back against the counter hard, my left hand smacking the edge with a sickening crack. I could feel the hands against my chest, shoving with a lot more force than anything non-physical had hit me so far.

  There was nothing there though. I could still feel where the palms had been, but now there was nothing. Just the pain in my hand and the knowledge it could happen again at any time, and nothing I did would stop it. I felt powerless in the face of these things. Worse, I knew it was going to keep happening until I fixed the problem. Until I got help from something stronger than I was. First though, I needed to try and get in contact with Alex. I’d felt close several times in the last few days, but so far I hadn’t actually managed even a simple conversation. What could I do to make that happen?

  I moved to the living room and debated lighting a candle. It would help set the mood and give me a little light in what was otherwise pretty dark space, but I could just imagine the thing being thrown across the room at me or the fire getting out of control. I didn’t want to be hit or hurt directly, but burning to death didn’t sound like fun either, so I decided to let go of that idea and just turned the lights off. It was a mistake I realized instantly.

  The black wrapped around me as I walked to the sofa and sat, smothering me. I could almost feel it curling around me, stealing the very air from my lungs. A sense of presence filled the room, but it was foreboding and bleak, as if all hope had left the place the second the dark came. Fear clawed at me as I tried to calm myself, struggling for breath. Without thinking I decided to see if I could put myself in a deep enough mental state to be of use. I knew from experience that it wouldn’t keep me from being afraid, but maybe it would let me focus enough to get my point across to Alex? The trigger word was incredibly effective when others used it, and I’d done it myself before a couple of times now, so it was worth a shot.

  “Eclipse.” I said it out loud, the words suddenly on the screen before me in the dark. It didn’t make the presence go away, but I could ignore it for a while, as long as it didn’t hurt me too much.

  “Eclipse.”

  I worked my way deeper, trying to use all the power of my mind to imagine the world being clear and without substance. A void so empty it would stop even being nothing when focused on. Nothing except the image in my mind and the weight in my hands. That, and like it or not, the fact that I could feel something touching my left shoulder. It was gentle, at first, then grew firmer, a pressure that I thought might become pain in a few moments it was so urgent in tone. It didn’t though. I just felt the hand on me and looking down could see it glowing in the air, ever so softly. It looked pale and dead. I reached over to it with my right, seeing if I could touch it, not wanting to at all. It looked bloated and wasn’t connected to anything at the wrist. It wasn’t like a severed member, it was more like the wrist that should be there vanished in a hazy fog. Or as if something was reaching through a curtain I just couldn’t see.

  To my surprise I made contact, which caused me to jerk my hand back instantly, scared. It felt dead and cold, instead of warm and alive. Not what I expected at all. It felt physical and real. A real dead hand on my shoulder, grasping it lightly. There was a sudden scent in the air that I hadn’t gotten in months, even living in the same house that we’d both shared. Alex’s god awful dark roast coffee. The scent was soothing to me, though I’d never developed a taste for it. I liked coffee, just not that stuff. It was too bitter. I imagined the fla
vor of it on my tongue, slightly unpleasant, making my mouth water just a bit.

  “Alex?” I sounded far away, even to myself. Like I wasn’t really part of what was happening, just watching it from a distance.

  A soft voice spoke inside my head. It wasn’t my voice, but it had a real quality to it, like my ears had picked it up somehow. It didn't seem to just be in my head, but I knew it was.

  “Get away from me.” It said, the words made clear when I saw them on the screen that seemed to almost hover in front of me.

  It didn’t make sense. Why would Alex, or anything else for that matter, want me to get away from them? Maybe I’d just misunderstood, it was hard to hear what was being said after all. I tried to listen, staying as relaxed as possible with what seemed like a dead hand on my shoulder, but nothing else came.

  “Um, if this is Alex, could you squeeze my shoulder a couple of times so I can be sure of it?” I didn’t know if it would work, but after a few seconds I felt the pressure going up a lot. Once. Then again. Finally a third time.

  “Alex! Thank god, can you talk to me? I need to talk to you so much. I don’t know if you understand… but I think I might be in trouble... What should I do?”

  There was nothing for a long time. The hand faded, which was frankly a relief, and I thought for a minute that Alex had gone. Then, without warning I heard the old familiar voice, nearly as loud as if we were in the same room and both totally alive. It had an odd echoing quality to it which made it a little spooky, but it was the right voice. The one I wanted to hear.

  “You have to help me.”

  It was a simple statement. Plain and unemotional.

  “What? I… What can I do for you?” I felt my skin crawl for some reason. Something deep inside my instinctual brain was trying to tell me that there was danger near, but I knew I couldn’t run. Or fight. What could I do?

  “Help me. Please. There are too many of them… I’m not strong enough to stop them.” The fear came across in waves. The voice itself wasn’t in my ears though, but in my head. That was the way of things with ghosts I was coming to understand, what allowed the average person to ignore them, to ignore the even worse things that could and did plague people all the time, poking and prodding, even torturing almost everyone, without them even being aware.