Chapter Text
It was dark, far too dark to be real. His light shined into this abyss that surrounded him, yet to no avail. No light reflected from this darkness, this evil darkness. He stayed put. Perhaps that was his best option. Staring out around himself, his eyes never seemed to adjust to the darkness. He made no sound out of fear of what might echo back to him.
“Boy, why do you hide?” he heard a mumbling voice ask in a gurgling, repulsive voice. “Why do you never listen?” it muttered, seemingly much closer than before. It was only then that he felt it, trickling down his neck like rain. It burned so much.
“Where the hell are you?” he muttered, hoping to god he would not hear a response. The burning sensation only grew hotter. It was like it was passing through him, melting his skin and muscle down to the bone. “Why do you ask when you already know?” that damned voice retorted, right into his ear. His skin practically ripped off of him. He felt a coarse arm push right through his stomach. It tore his guts apart as his bones were shattered. He couldn't scream. He couldn’t even make a sound. The pain was unbearable, yet he sat silently in that dark room.
Just as it had begun, it had ended. His eyes shot open and he sat up quickly, trying to hold back that urge to vomit. He covered his mouth with a slap and squeezed his eyes shut. A few seconds passed and the pain he felt was gone.
“That damned fuckin’ dream again. What the hell does it even mean?” he muttered behind his palm. He slowly got up out of his dingy and rickety bed. His feet nestled into the ragged carpet below him as if it were the only solid ground they had touched in years. He sat there for a while, slumped over, hands covering his face. He slowly got up, arms dropping to his side as he headed to the restroom. His feet hit the cold wood floor with a quiet thump as he walked past piles of dirty clothes that had been scattered over his dirtier apartment.
He entered his bathroom and met face-to-face with his reflection through the dirty and broken mirror. He had black hair with the sides shaved. The unshaved part of his head had been messily bleached a dirty shade of blond. He had dark eye bags underneath his eyes.
He rested his elbows on the sink. He stared at himself for a while, and then looked down at his hands. Slowly turning on the faucet, the water came out a muddy brown but cleared up quickly. He scooped up some of the running water and splashed it onto his face. “God dammit. I still can't get the damned dream outta my head. What the hell does it mean?” he asked himself, frustrated. This was not the first time he had had this dream, nor was it the last. As he recollected his thoughts, he heard his phone buzz in his shorts pockets. He checked his phone to see he had a message from an old pal named Reese. He's been there since he was 5 years old and they had been best friends since. He hadn't seen him in a while and wondered what he was up to. He had his name on his phone as “RS”. He read his text,
“Leon where tf are you, I've been waiting like 20 minutes out here did you forget????” He was so caught up in the nightmare that he had completely forgotten about his plans to meet him near the abandoned military bunker he found three weeks ago. He hadn’t wanted to explore it alone so that is why he called him. He texted him back, “Wait a minute I'll be there in a bit, there should be a restaurant nearby, go wait there I'll meet up with you.” With that message sent, he now put himself on a timer. He got dressed and was out the door within ten minutes. He quickly put on a new shirt, keeping the same shorts on, as he had only put them on yesterday, so practically they were still clean. He ran his fingers through his hair as a makeshift way of brushing it and quickly popped on his favorite jacket. It was a black leather jacket with matted-down white fur lining the inside. There were smiley face patches over the arms and hood. It was old but it was comfortable and it hadn’t torn apart yet so it was still useful. Quickly, he left the apartment and rushed to his bike. He couldn't afford a car, so he used a modified old dirtbike, but from the way that it is currently locked, it resembled more of a motorcycle you would see in one of those post-apocalyptic movies. It even had its very own engine. He hopped on and quickly tried to get the old bike running. After a few kicks, it started and he was off, heading outside of the safety of the small run-down town he lived in on the outskirts of the Red City.
He arrived at the restaurant in about ten minutes. He had avoided being pulled over twice and was speeding about 100 mph over the limit, but he made it there regardless. He saw Reese sitting at a table, straw in his mouth, although his cup was empty. He was on his phone, seemingly unbothered by the loud screeching of his bike. He had to kick the bike a few times to shut it off and headed over to him. Reese was a moderately tall man, barely above six feet tall with short dark brown hair. His eyes were blueish and the tips of his hair had been dyed. He was wearing a yellow jacket similar to his own, with the same patches. He looked up at him, seemingly shocked by his arrival. “Did he not notice me?” he thought to himself as he took the seat in front of Reese.
“Oi Reese, sorry to keep you waiting, he order food?” he asks him, and he responds
“Yeah, where the hell have you been?”
“I woke up like twenty minutes ago, why did he get here so early” he mutters back.
“Why did he get here so late?” he quickly retorted in a mocking tone, he chuckles to himself while sipping up the water that had melted from the ice in his cup, “So..” he starts, “About that bunke-” he cut him off “We will talk about the bunker after I’ve eaten, I skipped breakfast to get here on time y’know.” He stares blankly at him, only then did he notice the two dirty plates sitting before him,
“Did he order me food? Then eat it?” he says, staring at him. He looks away quickly at his phone, “I suppose the food can wait then.” he says, Nudging Reese on the shoulder, “Oi, wanna head to that bunker now?” he says with a mischievous smirk on his face, Reese looks up from his plate with that same look on his face,
“Why the hell wouldn’t I be?”
The two of them head out of the restaurant, not paying the tab because they both are unreasonably broke. The only way the two have been making a living all this time was to find and break into abandoned places and pawn anything that might be of value, from old uniforms to documents to even old bombs. He brings his bike along with him in case he gotta get out of there fast. For some reason he can't shake the feeling he is being watched, this is a pretty recluse area and by the looks of it, it has been abandoned for a very long time. The overgrown grass clung to his shoes as if they were warning him, but he never truly noticed it. The wind was howling, blowing his hair back, was it this windy before? Soon enough however he and Reese both arrive at the bunker, it was a large plot of concrete with a trapdoor in the middle of the field. he looks over to Reese as he slowly tries to pry open the door with his hands, it moves slightly but it's enough for him to get a good enough grip on it to fully pull the door off.
The smell, oh god that wretched smell, it was the vilest thing. It’s like it is embedded into his clothes, it reeked of death and decay as if the thing that died down there had hundreds of years to ferment and the gasses are now released. Whatever the hell it was, it is long dead, so no need to worry about it. Cautiously, they both slowly headed down into the bunker, it was dark and musty, the air was thick and wet, and it was hard to breathe. There was a black ooze dripping from the corners of the walls and dead bugs all over the floors.
He closed his eyes for a brief moment, only to open them in that dingy and dark abyss from those nightmares. He looked around, shocked and afraid, “What the HELL am I doing here?” he thought to himself. He saw it in front of him, a figure of a person, it was pointing somewhere, “What the hell..” He feels something shaking him and he shuts his eyes.
“OI! you okay??” Reese shouts practically in his face.
“W-What the hell..” he mutters quietly, looking at his surroundings, they were all back to normal.
“What the fuck just happened,” he said, agitated.
“What the hell are you talking about, you're the one who freaked out!” Reese says, shaking him harder with each word.
He pushes his hands off of him, “It’s fine, it's nothing, let's just get this over with, I have an awful feeling about this place.” he says as he starts walking ahead of Reese, he pulls a flashlight out of his jacket, it was a small flashlight but it would have to do. he finds his thoughts racing, thinking of that previous moment in that void, does this place have something to do with it? Who was that figure? Where were they pointing? Those were the most common thoughts to pop up, and he did his best to ignore them and continue moving forward. he come across his first room, scattered along desks were papers about a war that had happened nearly 200 years earlier, the history of this place was frozen in time, he and Reese must have been the first people to enter this place in nearly a century, along the walls were uniforms hung by coat racks, the ground was soggy and wet and each step he took made a splash sound. That scent was not as intense as it was when above ground, but it still lingered throughout this labyrinth.
“AY, come check this out,” Reese says, he didn't even notice him moving away from his side and into the room adjacent to the one he was standing in. he hurries over to him, wondering as to what he wants him to see, it was a pile of helmets, some with their skulls still wearing them.
“What the hell?” he said, gripping Reese’s shoulder “Who would do this?” Reese shrugs at his question.
“Well, whatever did this is probably gone or dead, this place has been abandoned for nearly a century, we ain't gotta worry,” Reese says, trying to ease the lingering fear among them both.
He got up and leave the room, heading down the hallway connecting them, it seemed like ages before a new area showed up, two more rooms, equally dirty and dark, one room, however, caught his eye, the walls inside this room looked torn apart, walls covered in scratches, and the metal door busted in, the metal bent as if something had been hitting against it with great force, this room seemed far larger than the other, he shines his light into the room, barely illuminating it, assuming it was safe he walks inside, the floor creaked and groaned, Reese follows closely behind, it was unusually dark, it seemed darker inside than it did when standing in the doorway, and the smell, it was that same smell from when the bunker was first opened, it was much stronger this time, it made he gag by just breathing it in. he step outside the room and it not only got brighter instantaneously but the scent was gone as well, “What the hell…” is the only thing he can muster up, Reese looked equally confused. But he was determined, he wanted to see what was going on in here, all of this unearned bravery. He had a feeling that whatever was in there would be worth it, so, he took a deep breath, and walked in.
Only then did it hit him, that fear he dreaded, the same feeling he got from that nightmare, but he continued, he made it this far after all. As he wandered around the seemingly endless room, scattered with century-old newspapers and old war trinkets, then he spotted it, it was far but he had a feeling that whatever it was, had the answers to his questions.
he approached it cautiously, the closer he got the more that scent filled the air, soon enough he was right in front of it, he didn't even notice how quiet it got, the only sound in the room was his breathing. It took a while for his eyes to adjust, but when they did he was horrified, it was a body, but the rest of it had been cut off above the collarbone, the skin purplish and slipping off of the carcass, the ground around it soaked with dried blood and mucus, it reeked like the death of hundreds, the walls had this black liquid pulled towards the body in the shape of hands. The arms of the body were still attached and they held onto something, it was rectangular and covered with mucus. He only closed his eyes once in its presence.
“Why do humans need to lie? Is it to save ourselves? Or to appeal to others? Maybe, we lie just for the feeling that others trust us, believe us.” That all too familiar voice said, but it didn't echo, it came from directly in front of him, it sounded like a hundred men talking all at once yet it spoke so clearly, he was in that hellish void, but only now, there was a single light. A single flickering light was all it took to illuminate the horrors in the dark, he sat at a desk, a wooden one, it was a dark oak polished with a now worn outshine. Across from him was the body, sitting in a chair straight up, the book it was holding before now laid in front of it, seemingly facing him.
“People praise me like a hero, but I am not. Why is that? Do they want something to cling to, a beacon of hope? Something to lighten the sins they have committed during those many wars? What they want is a hero, someone good in all of the bad. But I am not good,” it said in that awful voice,
“I never meant to be good, I only did what I thought was necessary, I told my story in truth, yet they filled it with lies. They made me a hero.'' although it didn't have a head, he could tell it was looking right at him,
“So answer me this, boy, why do you think people lie?” was the last thing the body gurgled out before erupting in a fountain of blood. The body seemed to collapse in on itself and fall to the floor with a sickening squelch.
He stared down at its book, and lifted the cover, scribbled on the first page were questions, questions like “Why do we kill? Why do we pity? Why do we laugh? Why do we cry?”, But the question written most is the one it was just pondering, “Why do we lie?”
he flipped to the next page, then the next, then 10 more, all of them asking the same question, “Why do we lie?” It was only after 20 or so pages did the book truly start,
“ 1/1/1709
I can't remember anything, my name, my age, my birthday, nothing. I know nothing about who I am, all I know is people want me dead, gone like I was never here.
I have to lie about all of this, but is it truly lying if I never knew? I am old, I have a real name, and I was born on a specific date. But I know none of these things. These are things that I am supposed to know, so when I try to guess and figure it out, I'm just lying, I'll find out eventually, I know I will, but right now I don't. When I figure it all out I’ll just tell all the people I've spoken to that I lied and we will all be good. I can’t stop lying, why can’t I stop lying? We need to lie to survive but what if I don’t want to lie.” The book read as if it was talking to itself, someone wrote this, was it the headless corpse? The book continues on the next page.
“I hear things in these walls, they mock me, I’ll get out of here, then they will be sorry. I need to get out of this place.”
He heard knocking all around him along with muffled breathing and something dripping. He doesn't want to turn, he knew something bad would happen if he did.
“1/15/1709
They want me gone, they tried to hurt me but now they are gone as well, I lied to them as well, and they asked me where I was going, I answered home, there was no home for me to go to, but it doesn't matter if I lied to them, they are gone now.”
“2/10/1709
Everything hurts, there's a hole in my chest yet I'm breathing, I hate breathing, I can feel my ribs push into my lungs, tearing the tissue as it fills with mucus in an attempt to seal the wound, I don't know who I am to these people but I seem important.”
“2/11/1709
They are all dead now, It doesn't matter who I am anymore, I killed them with my own hands, I forced myself to live a life of lies now, why is this exciting, why does their blood make my head rush like no other.”
Reading these makes him sick to his stomach, they are listing off their murder tally, he continues reading, but now he tries to see it from the first-person point of view, he tries to see it from this entity's eyes.
he stand there, staring blankly at the floor, it was stone bricks, he look down at his hands, they are scarred from front to back, and the arms are the same, he hears trickling water somewhere, he walks towards the sound and see a pond, how lovely, it's the water crystal clear while the grass and moss beneath it give it a nice green reflection, it was beautiful. he stares over the pond and looks at his reflection.
He has jet black hair, slicked back but with a few strands over his face, pale skin with hints of red over the cheek and nose. his eyes are a sapphire red color. There are four scars over his mouth. How long has it been since he has seen his reflection? Far too long. Something drips from his neck, a black, oily substance, it stains the beautiful water black and red.
Is it blood? I don't feel any pain. After a while, it was a beautiful dark red color, like silk. He saw eyes pop up out of the water, their pupils dilated in the sunlight, and they stared at him. Questioning him as to who he thinks he is, and who he thinks he will be.
“Who are you?” the pond asks
“I do not know,” he replies sorrowfully
“You do know, you just lie.”
“I don't even know my name, how should I know who I am?”
The pond stares back.
“I’m... I am what I want to be.”
“Correct, you are not a liar like most.”
“How do you know I am not lying?”
“Tell me this, my child, Why do we lie?”
he snaps out of his trance with those words, Reese shaking violently,
“HEY HEY WAKE UP ARE YOU ALRIGHT?” He shouted at him,
“I. I am fine,” he responds.
“No the HELL you aren't, you’ve been acting weird ever since we got here, I’ll come back here on my own and I’ll get anything valuable so we can sell it, but you will stay out of here,” He stated. he doesn't want to leave here just yet but seeing as his friend is worried then he’ll go.
As Reese’s back was turned, he hid the book in his jacket, its leather cover stained his jacket and shirt with black sludge, it burnt his skin hotter than the fire itself but he was determined, he needed to see how this life ended, what was that pond of eyes and why did it speak, who is the headless figure stalking him in his nightmares, what does this book contain that it caused him to be so drawn towards it, and what is the meaning behind “Why do we lie?”
Reese had called some friends of his to pick the two up, it took nearly 10 minutes to arrive but when they did, the sun had already set, they put his bike in the back of the truck and tied it down, and he sat in the back seat next to a pile of beer and soda cans along with week old groceries, Reese was sitting in the front, setting up the GPS. The book's leather and mucus had rubbed away a part of his shirt and he could feel its smooth and wet exterior rub against his side, it no longer burned but rather stung, but it was tolerable.
He had planned to read the rest at home; nobody would notice if he were gone for a few days, but as he opened the book, all of its contents were gone. Only blank pages stained black and burned, “What the fuck? Am I only allowed to read it at that bunker? What the hell is this, or can I only read this when that headless dude is here?” he says, frustrated with his current situation.
The walls around him seem to move and warp, he is startled by this when he remembers The Pond of Eyes, that thing he saw while in the abyss trance. He quickly clogged the sink and turned it on, but nothing happened, maybe it's only for bigger bodies of water? So he runs a bath as quickly as possible, and the water flows down splashing yet it's still to no avail, “FUCK! What am I doing wrong here? Goddamnit THINK” he shouts, bashing his palms against his head, it clicks. “Clearwater, but it turns blood red, do I need to give it blood or something?” he hadn't even realized what he was doing, he ran into his kitchen and found a knife, it was dull but it should work well enough, he rushes back to the bathroom and takes off his jacket and hold his hand over the water and drag the dull blade across his skin, it stung like hell as the knife cuts away his skin, tearing open and trickling blood, he eventually hit a vain and cut through it, the blood started to gush out of his newly sliced wrist into the water below, the eyes he had previously seen in the vision slowly emerged from the bloodied water to stare back at him, as if knowing how it would end they sunk back into the water. His vision was hazy and his arm felt numb from pain, the walls slowly started to revert to normal and he dropped down onto his knees.
“Was it worth it?”
The water bubbled and boiled and water rushed up like a fountain. He was soaking wet from the bloody bathwater. The headless figure emerged from the water and sat at his height with its knees to its chest and arms wrapped around them.
“You seek truths, but you won’t get them here,” the entity spoke
“It was worth a shot,” he says, oblivious to the fact he was speaking with the same entity as the one in the bunker. Eventually, the heaviness of his eyelids took over and he lost consciousness.
He woke up in a hospital bed Reese had come over just to make sure he was okay and found him in the bathroom covered in blood with a cut wrist.
He was so caught up in finding out the mysteries in that damned book that he put it over his own life, he gazed at his arm, covered in bandages, and he rested his head back down on the pillow and gaze thoughtlessly at the ceiling.
“Leon, c’mon man, listen to me, please, if you ever needd help or anything please, just tell me, I'm here for you, man, I just want to make sure you are safe. I care a lot.” Reese spoke softly with sincerity in his voice.
“I'm fine Reese, It's not something you should concern yourself with.”
“It is man! You could have died there, especially with that water around the wound, he could have bled out! Ever since we went to that bunker, man, you've been acting so weird, I just want to make sure you are safe.”
“It's fine Reese, I'm fine, thank you for worrying for me. But I want to be left alone for right now.” With those words, the confrontation was over, he left the hospital a day later and returned home, his phone flooded with messages from Reese, he open the messages but don’t respond, he wasn't in the mood to talk to him right now, he fumbles around with his keys trying to get the one for his apartment, as he unlocks the door, however, the scent he was ever so familiar with flooded his brain, he opens the door to see it, the entity, sitting by a small coffee table in the middle of his room, with that damned book sitting on the middle of it.
“Sit with me, boy. Let's continue the story.” It spoke charismatically,
As if he were in yet another trance he listened. Sitting across from the being.
“That boy, your friend, he's trouble” it gurgled
“What do you mean, he has done nothing wrong” he respond, confused
“He interrupts us, isn't he annoyed at these?”
“Yeah a little bit, but he's a good friend and he doesn't know.”
“We do not want you near him, he's a threat to you.”
“A threat? He saved my life back there.” He was taken aback by this entity's statements.
“Open the book.” It spoke
He was deep in thought at the time and was startled by its sudden interruption of silence, and blindly did as he was told. He was shocked by what he saw, the pages had words again, the entity reached over and opened to the page he was on last, and he read the logs once again.
“3/3/1709
I hear the sirens blare and the explosions in the distance, why do the people on the radio say to ‘remain calm.’ Unless you have a military base in your garden you will not be surviving a nuke so close. As I write this I fear the pain I will feel. Perhaps as my ashes get blown away this book shall too.”
“?/?/????
Why have I survived? I could feel my skin melt and burn as the nuke collided with the earth, but why do I still live? I was holding on to this book when the bomb went off, perhaps that is why it was not destroyed. It has writing in it already, it has no name, however. I am not sure if it is mine, I’ve been asleep for so long. I hope it is not too late to find my real name. For now, I wait for signs of human life, I do not want to be alone.”
“1/1/1800
I've come to fear myself. Why have I lived for so long? Was it the result of the hole in my chest? Recently, however, I have come across a group of travelers who found me in this bunker. They are gone now but I do appreciate their kindness. I have learned that it has been nearly 100 years since that bomb dropped, a miracle how quickly time flies.”
he touches the words on the paper, and they feel odd, it's as if he could see what they described without even looking at the word itself, he uses this to his advantage and tries to see through the eyes of this mysterious person. He closes his eyes and breathes in, he feels weightless.