First scene complete
Finally finished that scene. Phew! Not that I dislike it, but the creating ideas part always feels more fun than the actually purposing them into actual reading. I mean, I wouldn’t want to read an outline of a story and try to get the gist of it either, but when it comes to thinking stuff up it’s always more interesting, especially with the themes you can try and implement along with new characters, new ideas, story direction &c. So here’s some more, the finishing of that first lengthy scene. Here’s to more stuff.
And of course, I thoroughly enjoy criticism, both the good and bad.
Somebody kicked the door, the sound jarring Davis from the terrified coming to terms with the reality of the situation and evidently setting off the monster as well. It roared back to life from its otherwise slumbering state, probably as annoyed as Davis was by the sound. This annoyance, this shift of thought brought other ideas to mind, namely: if this monster was so big and bad why was it confined in this place? It could easily fly out on whatever it uses to fly, it could be out terrorizing schoolyards across Kentucky, yet it wasn’t. The realization hit as another kick series of kicks to the door, this thing was a boogey monster, something that inhabits dark spaces in the fears of children, naturally it’d be nocturnal and, assuming the fears of a child follow some sort of rational basis, naturally light must have some effect on it.
He wasn’t quite willing to try that second theory out, mainly because the only source of natural light in here was from the windows above, and they were only enough to create some ambient lighting. With ambient lighting seeming to do nothing to it he figured a mighty blast of light from, say, a flashlight would be along the lines of a playful punch to its side and a chiding of “Here I am, come eat me”. But the nocturnal bit helped as it gave him further hope that his sneaking past it should be slightly more doable. Not really less suicidal of a plan, but it raised the chances of survival so that the rational part of his mind, the part not drowned in fear and morbid interest, told him that the idea just might work. The alarm would still sound, there was no doubting that, but he’d be out in the open, plenty of direction to run.
That survival instinct kicked in as well, that selfish desire to maintain one’s safety above the safety of others. The dark thought of it going after his surprised co-workers surfaced, accenting his plan with animalistic opportunity. He was younger; he had the foreknowledge that this wasn’t any mountain lion, that this was one hundred percent mythic; he would be in his car by the time this thing ventured out and it’d be guts deep in someone’s torso as he drove down the interstate. At least, that’s what his mind was telling him to do, and again under the provision that this thing wasn’t allergic to light, that it just avoided it. The thought of him running out the door, alarm ringing, it chasing him through the toxic murk into the staff area (hell, it might just be too big to even get in there) and out the door. Its rear claws or talons or whatever using their breaking functions as it tries to stop its momentum from bringing it out into the sunshine but it’s too late, it is dust or charred skeleton or…whatever.
There was another loud kick to the door, Davis didn’t mind it and apparently neither did the monster. It gave another growl in the kick’s direction, but it was more akin to someone cursing the 4am garbage truck than a growl of rage. Hey, I’m trying to sleep here! Best instance or worst instance, he could feel his heart rate start to climb as the thoughts started to take shape in the memory of his muscles. The act of consciously thinking about walking as opposed to letting natural function take precedence was like learning all over again. He’d have to make sure each step didn’t fall on something noisy; he still had to avoid the poison-laden puddles as well. Standing up on the platform he made his way to the side with the ladder, the side facing the staff room with the conveniently open room.
Walking with light steps his legs felt heavier than he’d like. He wished he had remembered how he made his way down from that steel perch above him, how he’d climbed over metal and wooden boxes without making enough sound to bother the beast. Was it too enrapt with its bedtime meal than to notice something climbing down, or did it simply not care that he was there? David fought the urge to fall back into the stupor of thought, another loud bang against the wall helping him focus on the present. Peering over the edge and holding onto the railing, leaning slightly on his arms he saw a clean path to the staff room, the earth was wet with chemicals but a ruined pair of shoes would be the least of his worries. He turned his back and focused on keeping the tremors of fear from overtaking him. Up here he had the façade of safety; down there, soon to be down here, all bets were off.
His focused state of mind worked his nerves again; the fear hit a sort of auto-pilot, the fight-or-flight giving him the poise-and-agility he needed. While in his mind the variety of ways the beast would eat him played reel after reel grisly death scenes, his body was displaying its preternatural sneak system, those other baser instincts that came from stalking prey. Davis didn’t notice his feet sinking into the mud or how his muscles adjusted to the slightly shifting sludge, his mind was on the thing he needed to avoid waking. When the lighting shifted, when he could no longer see what was ahead of him due to the darkness of the unlit staff room did he realize what he had accomplished.
Other than the darkness up ahead, he first noticed his feet were burning. Not on fire, but the cold tingling sensation that comes from chemicals— not meant for dermal contact— coming into contact with the layers of skin on the bottom of his feet. They didn’t have many chemicals that could cause enough harm through being on the skin; those sorts of things require expensive polymer suits of special makes and quality. While this wasn’t kiddy stuff (you don’t want to bathe in it) you’re going to get some discomfort, some blisters if the concentration is strong enough, your basic low-grade chemical burn. Your lungs? Well if some of that unpleasantness made it to your lungs then you had issues. Your skin, while seemingly delicate, has adapted to having all sorts of things being poured on it. When these chemicals reach your lungs, even in low concentrations, you’re looking at edema; you’re looking at something seemingly so petty as breathing in some fumes turning into a glance in death’s general vicinity.
The heavy feeling in his legs returned, he had full control of them and he hated it. Grabbing the doorjamb for support he swung around the other side of the wall into the darkness; inside, only the light jutting from the rooftop window ambience. His eyes adjusting, he could see the room in faint grey outlines, relieved that the room was seemingly intact. Either the monster couldn’t fit in through the door or the room had little importance to it. The expected red glow from the exit sign was gone and the stupid realization hit him that he had his phone with him, as if he were carrying some sort of bomb set to explode the instant someone attempted to call him; then the sinking feeling that they should have called him, why hadn’t they tried to call him?
Intuition struck again as the typical electronics in the break room: the ruddy clock on the microwave, the hum of the refrigerator, the red glow of the exit sign, those familiar illuminations from when he would be the first to come in and turn on the lights, those were all not working. Reaching for the phone in his front pocket he half expected it to ring the instant he brought it out of the dampening veil of his grey denim, but as he predicted his phone was quite dead, or as dead as he’d risk experimenting with. Coupling these with the fact that the chemical monitoring devices weren’t working, in spite of the tenderizing experience of the toxic mud, made him realize that perhaps the beast had an effect on electronics. Which made sense, it lived in the dark, and it should have some imagined defenses such as the ability to remain in the dark. The kid that dreamed this thing was pretty clever, Davis reasoned, pretty smart but pretty dead.
Grabbling his way across the wall, groping along the chipped white paint that covered their refuge from work, his refuge from some horror, he made his way to the exit, his eyes adjusted to the twilight darkness of the room. Resting his palms across the bar that held him from his freedom, his heart raced as he imagined the freedom from his hell of a morning shift. Confident in whichever spells or fields or the litany of other unexplainable things that killed electronics, confident that it would stop the monster from bounding after him after tearing the door frame from the wall between them at the wailing sound of the alarm, confident that the door itself was real and not just some painted on novelty, confident in all of that he pushed.
The weight on the bar it was light, still well oiled in spite of its non-use. There was a slight squeak, but it was only as intense to cause his heart to leap in his chest, afraid not of the noise but that it would be the start of another, larger sound. But as he guessed, the alarm didn’t go off. He felt the gravel behind the door give way to the sweeping motion of the exit moving over it, a soft hushed hold metered by his footsteps coming down onto the ground and into the light. Not risking anything he opened it as far enough so that his body could slide through. In a slither he was on the other side and could feel the suns rays beat down on him in all their clichéd glory.
Furtively closing behind him he rested his back on the exterior wall and sank to the ground. Through the fogging plastic of the gas mask he saw his feet shoes discolored by the chemicals and only thought how his feet would look. The light itself was taking some getting used to, combined with the closeness of the mask and the post-adrenal rush the nausea massaged his chest like a python wrapping itself around his upper digestives. He pulled his mask off seconds before he felt his mouth water, twice those seconds before he was dry heaving on the side of the building. He felt somewhat thankful that he was late; he was going to catch a short breakfast during a break. His mind then raced to the half eaten bodies starting to enter decay and he retched even harder, his stomach muscles pulling overtime. By the time he was finished he could hear a car pull up on the other side of the building. Maddy was here.
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