I hear them always. They are as constant and unknowable as infinity. They sing their song of anguish and agony. Nothing is ever truly silent anymore. They will always sing, and I will be forced to listen. It itches at my brain, waling their forgotten tales. When people think about life, they avoid the subject of death, and when it ends for it embraces the fact that we don’t last. The mortal life isn’t something you are ready to embrace and the fact that nothing lasts. We don’t last. But we do not cease. Beyond the veil lies a new life. A life of watching and waiting. When you think of what comes after death, you are uncertain. People strive to be remembered. But when they are forgotten, they will still be there. They will have become a husk of who they once were.
It is said that to think of the concept of infinity will drive one mad. There is a reason for such things. To think of everything, like infinity, could give you hope. But to know something is infinite will break you. Countless realities where the smallest changes will cause everything to go wrong. To conceive infinity is to conceive time itself; confusing and impossible. The ever-ticking clock of time will never stop. It is still being written, and the end is not yet conceived. It is as constant as the song. The choir of a mourners’ song still buzzed in my skull.
The city streets are devoid of life in the cold winter morning. Just past midnight, the sidewalk coated in slick ice and the arctic chill made my nose and fingers burn and red. Yule was only a few days away, and the streets were filled with festive lights. They give the streets a sense of warmth and security they usually lack. They try to bring joy into the desolate world. Make the city of Black Rose beautiful for the occasion. There is something uncanny about a liminal space such as this decorated in festive, happy lights. As the snow falls lazily to the earth. I look up into the endless void of the sky and can’t help pondering that the snow is like stars falling from heaven. My mother told me that in times like this, when the world doesn’t feel quite real, it’s easy to get lost in that place. Somewhere just left to reality where the spirts of the departed can wonder. Almost like a dream.
As children, we were told about fairy tales and monsters under our beds and in our closest. The blanket will keep us safe, our stuffed animals will protect us. I realised they did nothing when I was young. When a monster took my mother away. While the lights are on, nothing can harm us. While they were on, nothing could go wrong. Just hide under the blanket and think, ‘nothing can get me here.’ The monsters and intruders can’t get us while we were hidden under the blanket. What’s stopping them from ripping it away and shattering the sense of security? The blanket did nothing to protect us. Why put my trust in something as simple as cloth, so why not the light? They do nothing, they never have. Yet we still put our trust in them. The false joy in the lights and the comfort of a blanket have done nothing.
I wish I could put my faith in something as simple as a piece of fabric. Something as warm and soft can become cold and scratchy. As you grow, things change with you and not always for the better. When you’re a kid, you think the world is filled with happiness; you age and realise that what was once happiness turned to pressure and societal standards. I’ve seen the way you stare at those who are not human, the way you treat them. Throughout all of history, we’ve persecuted those who are not like us. Whether it’s because we don’t look the same or act the same or believe in the same thing, you will always find reasons to hate, when in the end, you’ll all die. If I can’t even put my faith in humanity, how can I put faith in a piece of fabric that did nothing to protect you from the monsters lurking in our closets and under our beds?
I looked to my left where Koa was walking. Shoulder to shoulder, so close to me I could feel his warmth. He was carrying his spear Aramis. It was made of Thalassic gold. The point glowed bright hot, illuminating of the street before us. He gripped the shaft so his knuckles were white. He was itching to fight something since the whole patrol had been quiet. I didn’t mind it as much. In the cold, his deep mahogany skin stood out, along with deep blue hair. The underside, behind his neck and the front portion of his hair, was like fire, or lava; sometimes the colour would leak through as if the blue was just rock. Koa had tied his hair from his face. With his scowl, he reminded me of a roman statue, the kinds I would see when I was little in the fountains around Rome. Back then, my mother would take me to the oldest parts of the city and tell me about the times of the empire. She took me to Pompeii the day she died; the city was hauntingly beautiful. I was maybe six or seven. Koa always reminded me of Rome. The warm sunny days and the haunting attributes of those statues and their carved expressions.
I wanted to grab his hand so badly, but I didn’t.
“What’s the choir saying?” Koa Asked. His voice was warm and soothing.
“The same thing as always, a cacophony of pain and noise.”
I’ve learned the choir’s mannerisms, detecting changes in tone and volume. When danger is near, the louder they become. I felt his hand grab mine, and a jolt went through my spine.
“Your hands looked cold,” He said.
I looked at my feet and nodded. I’d forgotten my gloves back home.
“How loud?”
The choir.
“Pretty quiet, to be honest… it’s more unsettling than when they're loud.”
“So, nothing dangerous around… dammit, it wanted to fight something!”
Koa took his hand from mine.
“Koa… I know you want to fight something, but—” He put his hand over my mouth. He looked around. A sickening smile crept across his face.
“Blood,” He said, walking faster and further away from me, his warmth still lingering on my hand. I called to him to slow down, but he didn’t listen. Once he gets a sent, he going to follow it to its source. No matter where that might be. He had a nose for the stuff, being Shakli and all. At least he wasn’t in a frieze.
He walked down the main road another couple hundred meters before he turned down a side street alley. He walked until he reached two large bins outside the back of a restaurant. He’d found the source. Probably blood from the food inside. Maybe lobster or fish. The harbour wasn’t far from here, so it wasn’t a far-fetched idea.
“Koa, it’s just animal, so let’s go,” I said, walking back towards the main street.
He walked to the side of the bins and stumbled back to the wall. Something was there, and I could see fear flash across his face.
“Um… Koa? Are you… coming?”
“C-choir…” He asked. “how loud?”
I rolled my eyes. “Still quiet,” I said, walking to him. “You okay, you look si—” I couldn’t even finish the sentence, as I followed his gaze to the floor beside the bins.
I don’t remember exactly when I threw up, but I did. The acid still burning the back of my throat as my bile mixed with the blood from whatever lie next to the bins behind the restaurant. It was dire. I felt bad for whomever it was before. I didn’t even know if it was human, to begin with. It was just a pile of flesh, bones, fat, and blood. Oh, gods, there was so much blood. Crimson rivers ran through the cobblestone that served as the ground. There were clumps of hair and scraps of fabric scattered carelessly around the carnage. Were they once workers in the restaurant, throwing out scraps from the dinner rush that night?
From the pile, its soul tried to escape the mound that was now its body. It was stuck in purgatory. The mound of flesh itself twisted and turned, twitched, and squirmed. As it tried to scream, the sound of tearing wet meat, the kind you hear in a nature documentary when the lion finally catches its prey filled the air.
I scrambled to my feet, grabbed Koa’s hand, and started running. From behind us, I heard slapping meat echoing throughout the still night air. It was closing the gap I’d tried to make.
There was a stench to it. Like rotting, rancid meat. It was acrid and mixed with the bitter smoke of the city and the salty sea breeze.
When I could finally see those holiday lights, I felt overwhelming joy and safety for the first time since I was a little kid. We skidded to a halt in the centre of the road. I thought we were in the clear that it wouldn’t follow us into the bright lights.
The sound of wet meat slapping the floor ripped me from the sense of security I thought I’d felt in the twinkle of those festive lights of warm white, red, green, yellow, orange, and blue. But I was ripped back into reality when the sound crept closer. I dared to glance at the thing that hit the ground.
The mound was bigger than before. It was an amalgamation of people, their souls stuck and crawling for freedom. It was just meat and bones. When it moved, muscles and tendons snapped and mend at once. It had tendrils that pulled it forwards as an octopus would. Blood pooled wherever it went, leaving a trail as a snail would. The choir remained quiet as if the threat wasn’t there. I would have conceded to the fact I was losing my mind if Koa hadn’t put his hand on my shoulder.
He saw it, and it made him afraid.
It moved in a jerky motion like it couldn’t quite figure out how to move in unison just yet, or like it was trying to tear itself apart. I didn’t doubt it was. That sour smell was overpowering now. Putrid meat, with the scent of smog and sea salt. I felt more bile rise in my throat.
It jumped at me as I slipped on the ice. Latching onto my leg. As I tumbled to the floor, I hit the road with a loud crack. My head flooded with pain and my whole body tensed with agony. The choir endured in their pestering quiet. I couldn’t even hear their sorrowful melody anymore. I tilted my head back and stared into that void of space and as the snow fell that they were like stars falling from the heavens.
I looked at the lights of the city and took solace because, in my mortal life, they would be the last thing I would ever see. I wasn’t blind to the fact that I was dying, here on the cold dirty floor. A fitting death for me, I suppose.
In the cold and bitter surrounded by warmth. In times like these, people would plea for their lives, beg for mercy, cry out to a god who wouldn’t save them, as if by doing this their lives would be spared. I cried yes, those warm silent tears as my life was ending. Would I see my mother again, beyond the veil? I cried not out of fear nor because I thought it unfair, for deep in my heart I knew this was fair.
I was going to die, and I was at peace with that. I chose the be here thus my death is no fault but my own. To plea would be a waste of time, for this would not understand me, nor hear me over its own screams. As the sharp pain dulled into a throb and I shut down, I wished I listened to my mother’s stories. I wished I trusted a blanket could protect me from monsters.
The world sharpened around me, and the pain went from a dull throb to sharp and searing as I was pulled to my feet and rushed through the ice and snow away from the writhing mound. Koa pulled me along as we ran, trying to keep me standing and running on the slick ice that coated the pavement. He didn’t let me go. It would have been simpler for him to leave me. It would have been smarter. Leaving me to join the mound. He didn’t let me go until we reached what looked like a small apartment complex. He took me to the front door, and we walked in. He took me up an elevator to the top floor and rushed to the door and took me inside.
I couldn’t take in much of my surroundings, but I could see roman era shields, swords, and spears along with tapa cloths with different gods and animals on them. Herbs were hung to dry, and more grew in the window garden. He led me down to a hallway down next to the kitchen into a bathroom and sat me on the lip of the bathtub.
“Sorry…” I murmured as he rummaged around for a first aid kit. “I should have paid more attention.”
Koa didn’t respond. He only left the room and returned soon after with an icepack from the kitchen. Had he not heard me? He stepped over the lip of the bath and started working on my head wound.
He murmured to himself as he worked. Far too quiet for me to hear. He pressed a wet cloth to my wound, applying pressure. A new wave of pain washed over me as he did so, and the world blurred. I became lightheaded and fell back onto Koa’s shoulder. He grabbed my hand and squeezed it. I winced. He kept the cloth there for 20 minutes before removing it and placing the now red cloth in his bathroom sink. He prepped bandages and something that looked like purple goo; and started tending to my injury.
“Are you okay?” I asked as he applied more pressure to my scalp, as if holding it together. He laughed. It was subtle and sounded sound. More like a huff of breath.
“I’m not the one bleeding from my head…”
“You’ve been, quiet. I was worried that you—”
“I’m fine!” he snapped.
I could feel my shoulders tense, and if Koa noticed, he didn’t care. I stayed quiet after that. He held my skin in place for a while before applying the bandage. He looked dazed as he walked through the apartment and sat me on the couch.
“Sorry,” He whispered, “I shouldn’t have yelled. I stressed you were bleeding and… fuck.”
Koa put his head in his hands. I didn’t move. I didn’t dare. He put his head on my shoulder. I took a breath and grabbed his hand lacing our fingers together.
I’d never been to Koa’s apartment. He didn’t talk about his personal life much. I knew he had two brothers, and he was the middle child, but I didn’t know their names. He didn’t talk about his dad much, but he seemed close to his mother… maybe his father was dead, I don’t know.
His gaze became soft and kinder. Koa, helped to my feet, and helped me walk to a new room I assumed it was his bedroom. I was correct.
There was a double bed, with dark blue sheets with gold geometric patterns; there were dark wood nightstands and a wardrobe. Koa picked me up. Although he didn’t need to; and placed me on his bed.
“In the morning we’ll head to the den,” Koa whispered, and rested his head on his pillow, I followed in suit letting sleep claim me, the writhing mound showed it’s self in my nightmares, screaming a sound of wet tearing meat.
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