At the terror in each sip and each sup
Will you partake of that last offered cup?
Or disappear into the Potters ground
When the man comes around
Johnny Cash
I Am the Darkness of the night that no light can pierce
I am the Cold that surrounds the grave
I am the Wolf that stalks the child’s crib
I was the Monster in the Closet
The Beast hiding under your bed
The Eyes that sought you out while you slept alone
I am always there
And will be till the End of Days
Ororo bolted from her bed as the scream in her throat choked away into a hard sob. A cold sweat beaded on her forehead and she breathed raggedly. She reached over to her nightstand and swallowed down what was left of the glass of wine and breathed out long and full.
“Damn dreams,” she said as she rose from her bed and went into her bathroom. It had been a long time since her last one. A time where she was finally getting the much sought after sleep she had been pursuing. She flipped on the light and fetched a small bottle from the cabinet. Ororo hated pills with a passion, and she hated it even more when she realized she wouldn’t be getting any sleep without them.
It had been almost two weeks since the incident in the diner. A very long two weeks that was starting to take its toll on her already spent energy. Nate had a mild concussion from the blow he took to his head, but other than that he had been fine. Jubes was still a bit shaken, but the girl was born with piss and nitro in her veins; it would fade fast.
Ororo was the one worse for wear. A near rape was one of those life-changing moments that any person, male or female, is likely to come away from with some mental scarring. She was at least thankful that she was able to say NEAR rape.
Of course, there was Essex around to just add more crap onto her already full pile. She couldn’t forget that strange smile on his face when he said he would see that she would get home ok every night when she closed up, and that he would have a deputy or himself there every morning she opened.
It was a perverse mockery of a kind gesture.
She had thanked him for the offer but promised that she would be fine. Actually, she had already procured Nate’s help for an escort in the late evening. He had been all too happy to oblige.
Ororo lay back down on the bed and pulled the covers tightly over herself. It had been cold lately, a cutting wind had been blowing in from the north and the heater in the house was just not doing anything to help the situation.
As she waited for the pills to kick in, her thoughts went back to the dreams she had started having again. She tried her able best to keep them to herself; Jubes sure didn’t need to know she was having them again.
She had started having them a few days after her father’s funeral.
They were always different.
Except for the darkness.
That cold and crushing blackness that haunted her sleep.
The casket of her father sat before her in some of them.
And she would have to watch as his corpse screamed as the darkness descended upon it and devoured it with hidden fangs.
Other times, she was alone in a empty room with the sound of heavy footfalls echoing in the halls outside the door, and her father’s screams telling her to run. She would huddle in the corner as the door splintered before her very eyes, and then the cold and the sable darkness would rush in and swallow her whole.
Enough girl, she scolded herself.
She laid back and hugged one of her pillows tightly to her chest before finally falling away into a restless sleep.
Arkham Heights
Richard Fisk downed a large shot of whiskey in a single gulp and wiped away the drops on his lips. The two whores he had been with lay in a beaten and twisted mass on his bed. He was sure one of them was dead from the abuse he had given her. A thin dribble of blood leaked out her nose as she lay there, her bare chest never rising.
He had been angry, He needed a release. The day had not been a good one. Wilson Fisk, his hell-be-damned father, had called again this morning. He was checking up on his beloved baby boy. It had been almost six months since he had to come to this little backwater hick town at his father’s request. The heat in New York was still too much for him to come back to the business there, he had been told.
“Fucking bullshit,” he cursed as he downed another shot of liquor. The Manneti family had a contract out on him after a deal had gone south, and now the blame fell upon his narrow shoulders.
Taking the majority of his crew with him, Richard left the city and came to this little hole of hell that his father pretty much had in his back pocket. He was doing what little business he could, most of the places here were already supplying protection to his father, and the mine pretty much ran itself.
Essex was helping him with his drug trade. He and his deputies had a firm grip on the populace, so no one ever asked any questions.
There was a large shipment on the way from Jersey that Essex was supposed to pick up from a pair of mooks.
And that was when it all went down the crapper.
Laughton and Mac were bringing in a few Keys of prime goods for both Fisk’s business and personal use. Needless to say, when he woke up the other day with the news of both his men and his product missing, he was fit to be tied.
He had been drinking since then and had Essex bring in a couple of hookers from the next town over. He had been brutal with them, taking out his aggression and anger. He would have the deputies clear out the corpse and dump the other one back in an alleyway somewhere.
He had told his father this morning of the incident. The smug bastard had berated him for his lack of foresight. Mac and Laughton were a pair of merciless killers, he said; what did you expect to happen when you show the sheep to the wolves?
It had gone on for about an hour before Wilson Fisk had finally decided that he would send in a pair of Troubleshooters, guys that settled things at their bosses’ whim. Richard had protested that his men could handle the situation, that they would find the product and whoever took it, and then show them the business end of a blowtorch.
But as always, his father won out in the end.
So in a week a pair of his father’s best would be at his door and telling him how things should be done. Richard knew this was just another way for his father to keep an eye on him and to make sure things are done the way Big Boss Fisk wants them to be done.
Taking one more long pull, this time straight from the bottle, he pulled his robe around him and walked from his bedroom. He left the already cold corpse and the other hooker in a macabre embrace.
The Miskatonic overlook:
The town lay down there in all of its complacent glory, the younglings all content in the blindness that would forever encompass their eyes.
His work was here, though.
His job was laid out before him.
There would be blood in the coming days.
There would be pain.
And on the air, he thought he smelled that familiar stench.
In the corner of his eye he could see them. Their little twisted bodies crawling through the shadows like snakes in a pit. Their yellow eyes like distant fires in dark wilderness. The gleam of their razor-filled mouths shining in the moonlight.
He sneered at them and they scattered in the darkness.
A crow called in the distance and he tilted his head toward it. He reached into the jacket pocket and pulled out a single match that he used to light the end of the cigar hanging form his mouth. He blew out the smoke in a long puff; the cigar scent did nothing to cover the odor that still hung in the air.
He turned and walked back toward the motorcycle that stood but a few feet away. They were surrounding him now. He could see them in the darkness, smell their stench and could see the hate that burned in their squinting yellow eyes. They would spit and curse and mock him from the distance that they had, but they would come no closer. They dared not to.
A crow fluttered into his view and landed on the handlebars of the bike. It stretched its wings out and cocked its head to the side. He gave it a hard look before ever so slightly nodding. The crow took back to the air and gave its lonely call that had a strange echo in the empty and still night.
He watched it fly until the night melted it away into the darkness. He kicked the starter and thundered away from the lookout. He never once turned and saw them come out of the shadows and scream and swear at him as they let their stench drift through the air.
It was the smell of brimstone.
And in the coming days, it would grow ever the stronger.
