《The Ithsmus of Endlessness》 Preludes, Sonatas and Nocturnes Grandma has been having strange dreams again. In her minds eye, she is watching vignettes of a spirit named Sereph who walks an endless twilight of desolation. A shrouded figure, almost like a romantic poem brought to life. Traversing the middle span of etherial nocturnes, where memories and dreams go to die. There is a majesty about it, but its so dark and nihilistic. Sometimes she dreams she is the figure, some times she is running from it. It has a tinge of a feeling she felt once in her youth. A yearning for travel, a feeling of being alone in a silent world that has no meaning. She feels like this herald of the stars has some deep prophetic message but no voice to scream the dire warning that some far out cataclysm is approaching. Like a falling star from space, or a hurling asteroid coming to vaporize the world. She feels a great kinship with this spirit but also a profound sadness, like the greatest mind of science, art and literature had to make a profound choice to save life its self and saved nothing. Existing in an echo of horror that warned no one despite screaming into eternity. Creating a resounding silent agony. Defeated this lone watcher stands to witness the end of time over and over again. As psychic winds pour over an endless desert of labyrinthian necropolises. She has no idea if Sereph is male or female, young or old. She wonders what the name means. Sans Serif is a type of script on type writers, Seraphim are horrible angels of creation, holding the terrible secrets of the universe. She sees the name scrawled in blood in her dreams. A tangible litany, evoking feelings of desolation and dread. The persisting night terror is always on some dry plane with moody colors. Planets dipping far down to our world. Vaguely European looking ruins that scream out over black vistas of void. Walking among shores of vast glassy ocean turned to dust. Empty skeletal eyes and teeth hidden under the most beautiful and vibrant funeral shroud. Some times the figure is in deep scarlet, other times grey and gold, blue as a summers day, white like a ghost or black like the rain of Hiroshima. She wonders if the silent wraith had a voice. What would it sound like? Soothing like the rain, or staccato like a victim of a death squad trying to call out to family to stay away. She feels such sadness, but its not hers. She has been having this dream for who knows how long. Its something she thinks about all day. This endless boneyard of urban decay, smothered by golden sands and a glimpse of a life half remembered and forgotten in the same moment while the world moves thousands of miles a second away. A shrouded witness to the isolation and despair at the eve of the end of time. Her work with harmful microbes discovered in the rain makes her wonder if this is some message from her self in some future of blight, where the mysteries of the universe were answered by a cruel time where the atom burned the world away? Thinking of her youth, traveling trains in the first light of dawn across Europe. Looking out over towns bombed into oblivion and abandoned in 1919. Red line ruins howling some challenge for the children of war profiteers who harnessed the power of oblivion and were foolish enough to not blow the candle out and bury the flame. She hears songs lost to time where the final pressing of the record was blown up in a carpet bombing. The singer and the listeners all under tons of rubble while the blitz of zeppelins and air raid sirens take all songs away. She thinks of San Francisco in the Summer of Love, finding turn of the century books of poetry and art, and the fire that took her youthful optimism away. Seeing the stranger out of time beckoning her. She wonders will she always be strong enough to resist the call, to look away and return to her family when every thing she every wanted feels like its inside that skeletal embrace. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. At that time she was going by the assumed name Lucrezia Voss. She remembers being in Hollywood July 16, 1969. She moved down with a couple of her girlfriends trying to hit it big as a singer. She was invited to watch the moon landing at a JPL party at a local college. She was drugged by an intelligence agent named Ballard who claimed to be KGB but after trying to drown her at the Devils Gate dam in Pasadena, was gunned down by someone he was meeting with. Leaving an FBI badge she kept to this day. She remembers walking down the art deco style Colorado Street Bridge with a bullet lodged in the back of her head. Her cracked skull giving her hallucinations, shrill sounds of phantom traffic, strobing lights and other worldly winds threatening to pick her up and blow her away. She was fading in and out of consciousness. It was late at night and walking for hours no one was helping her. Dressed like the goddess Ishtar and holding a glass torch shaped like the statue of liberties flame. She heard invasive voices in her head that felt like they were from outside. Contaminated thoughts, products of being kidnapped in a political coup among the ruins of late stage capitalism. Injected with some harmful serum telling her to jump over the railing. This was the first time she saw Sereph. The spirit was in the middle of the road beckoning her away from the edge. At this moment a grand old saloon limo from the 1940s picked her up and drove her to the hospital. She sees Sereph now in times of disarray. When the winds of change come painfully close to sweeping their little world into the maelstrom. A bullet still in her brain leeching lead so long she thought she would already be dead. Macrophages in the synovial tissue in the top of her neck locked in a war for 30 years. Somewhere in time, the mad prophet Sereph walks in empty halls of grand palaces reduced to powder. Where gilded stars and fugitive saints shamble alone, in waltz of a toxic haze. A place where even the tears of god leave a caustic stain. Moonscapes begrudging beguiled guardians under the owls blinded by nuclear winter and long shadows where children once played. Chapter 1: Fishhead Bay, South East Alaska 1991 The sky is the color of static on a dead channel, on a beat up analog TV. That was more or less the opening stanza William Gibson wrote in Neuromancer. He probably butchered the poetry of the book. But he always thought of that when he looked at the glaring white noise of perpetual overcast sky at noon. He would try to stare at the sun behind the cloud cover. Seeing flashing colored lights. His grandmother told him that was the sun tearing a hole in his retina. He couldn''t help staring into the self destructive glare. Watching putrid malaise of acrid pollution hidden behind lies of early morning mist that burns off too soon, leaving insomniac brain fog to play tricks on his eyes. His name is Enceladus Euarchontoglires. What a fucked up name. He imagines what kind of out to lunch mother would name her kids after Jovian Moons and a suborder of Mammals. His middle name includes Rats, Rabbits, Flying Squirrels and small Monkies. Its like they wanted him to be terrorized in school. He goes by E.T. or his graffiti name ZYGOTE, but girls in school call him Involuntarily Celibate Androgynous or Eugene Yuri Chong what ever the fuck probably because its in vogue to hate Russians and Chinese, so naturally he draws communist symbols on their lockers. In 5th grade to 7th these same girls used to pass him notes and try to kiss him before his sister Xenarthra Ganymede left to college and he got weird and despondent. She is 21 now and took a year off to travel. Maybe he pushed the girls away because he grew out of stupid Hair Metal, or late 80s Conscious Rap. He can give it back as good as he gets it. His friends call him E the Tagger, thats where the name ET came from. He lives with his dad after his mom left, he barely remembers her. When he was small, some kids from the neighborhood were playing with fireworks in an abandoned car. He survived and they didnt, leaving him with a nasty scar around his mouth and up the left side of his face. He hears them whisper, Mark of Cain, The Human Torch, The Morning Star. Not bad knicknames although when its not meant as a term of endearment it breeds animosity. Most of the time he is happy to not be noticed so he can get away with stuff. His left eye and voice bare the worst scars outside his soul. His oldest sister raised him, she went away and that was the end of family meals and laughter in the house. Now he just kind of exists. Too old to talk much to his younger sister Laurasiateria Callisto who is only 7 and spends all day down by beach with the grandparents home schooled. All the kids are seven years apart and he is 14 in the middle. He is alone in large drafty cabin that may as well be a tool shed. Girls his oldest sister knew called it The Junk Yard. Was the cool house back then. Smarter than average but a perpetual underachiever and self saboteur of the highest order. His parents sent him to school at the bare minimum earliest, so on average he is almost a year younger than most kids whose birthdays are well past the cut off date. He always felt unprepared for school, overwhelmed and nervous to buzzing lights and alarm bells. Smaller than every one whose voices have changed and grown muscles, he looks pretty much the same as he did in 5th grade. Its 1991 and somehow despite nuclear attack drills and constant hysteria the world hasn''t ended. Maybe it should. Always known as a Foul Mouth specializes in making the popular girls cry with sadistic pranks like throwing Ketchup and Tampons all over their desks during recess, or smearing frog guts all over their homework in their backpack, the odd floating dead cat and maggoty duck in a desk or locker does wonders to leave his enemies quivering in the principals office to tell on him. Having panic attacks until they get hugged by the nurse, until one of their boy friends beat him unconscious. Thats how he got his new adult teeth all chipped. Now he just scowls and plans to leave this bullshit town in the asshole archipelago of Alaska. He didn''t wake up for school today, his eyes hurt too much from playing Altered Beast on Sega Genesis all night. Last day he has it before he trades it back to the video store for his familiar favorite Splatterhouse 2 or maybe Chakan The Foreverman, which he hasn''t played but is supposed to be super weird. He didnt comb his long greasy hair, just kind of paws at it. Looks cool enough for the losers at school. He figured no one would notice if he showed up for lunch, slowly blending in to the flannel guised grunge kids at his school. He liked the music but he wasn''t enough of a stoner to fit in, mostly because weed costs money and he doesn''t have any. So he wears exclusively shirts he fished out of the ocean, industrial bands like KMFDM and Ministry, Maybe some Norwegian Black Metal if its clean. The damnedest things wash up on these tides. He wonders sometimes why so much cool stuff is cast off boats here. Are these the last clothing worn by some murder victim? He wears Surplus Vietnam boots his grandmothers boyfriend The Old Man gave him and baggy cargo pants, usually grey or olive green. Only thing he has actually bought for him. They don''t really live in poverty, he is just kind of forgotten about. If he doesn''t ask, he wont get it. So he gets stuff on his own to avoid hand me downs too big or small for him. Starting the day huffing turpentine made the sound of the ocean sound trippy like it was moving around him in a circle. Turpentine always made sound odd. Wind Chimes could be sweet and gentle or staccato and sickening. He stopped doing the Nitrous Oxide, Dust-off after he heard a loud pop in side his brain once. He lives in an old industrial area that had the jobs move away, so there is endless abandoned places to daze off. He spends his days day dreaming while exploring the industrial decay. The town of Fishhead Bay if you could call it a town, was like a terminal patient surviving long enough to pawn their families possessions for one last drug binge just to survive and plea forgiveness to be allowed to loot the bones of their family again and again. Becoming more and more depressing and people wished for its death. Everything around is really an abandoned Naval Base, so every thing here is too big for the small community and on the verge of rusting to pieces. The Native Village up the coast Uula Wileelu is all carved wood, totem poles and well kept fishing huts, but the city is all cement and metal. Military blight that is very likely the source of a lot of the cancer and sickness around here. Nuclear testing, dumping and chemical spills made this place too costly to stay open as a base. The walk to school cut past the falling down huts and abandoned cranes on the cliffs. He always felt this strange urge to jump off. French call that Lappel du vide / Call of the void. When you are climbing scaffolds on abandoned machinery to commit vandalism and he just imagines the wind pulling him away, falling onto wet freezing asphalt, his arms breaking beneath him, his head splattering, teeth splintering and the next day every one at school crying. What a laugh, no one gives a shit about a half Native tagger who is also the laziest Sheriff Deputies son. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. His dad Deputy Ch''k, known as Chaka Zulu by the local kids after some tv movie from the 70s. ET always thought he looks like black haired viking looter, the scowling visage of a barbarian in a brow beaten cop that feels close to defeat. Every one thinks he is slow from the motorcycle accident that killed the mother of his kids. Slow isnt the word for it, more like haunted, silent and brooding. His face is covered in scars from violence and he rarely smiles. His voice is like thunder cracking and has been accused of Roid Rage more than once by locals he got in dust ups with. Its so funny when ET gets caught carving his tag name into his desk, or using shaker pens to graffiti the school bus, or slicing up the mirror into a scribe of his crew CTC. Call the Cops he laughs to teachers while cutting school. He knows his dad is too tired to punish him. His dad will make a speech, take away some forgotten toys and be asleep in the recliner and forget all about it the next day. This is South-east Alaska. Fishhead Bay, a rotting little former military marina in the Hecate straight. Pretty much the end of the world. Besides some abandoned mines and military missiles it might as well be Canada. His ancestors never signed a treaty so there is no official Reservation. Their tribe The Windwalker band of Coastal Qallupilluit is unrecognized as part of the Tlingit, Haida or Tsimshian People. Larger Tribes that surround them, culturally similar and share words but isolated from them just like the rest of Alaska. The Inside Passage is an area of verdant hills, resplendent inlets, countless islands of trees and endless mountains and valleys, some unmapped, others that are marked as open ocean on civilian maps. This was an isolated part of America where the Military was able to keep technology unfit for the continental US. Nothing happens here but drunk driving, tagging and the occasional party out in the woods. Which he usually isn''t invited to. He isn''t one of the cool kids any more, his hangout is a network of concrete culverts under the town called Hobo Beach. A maze of steel riveted tunnels and endless cement walls intersect with the freeway and sewer till they hit the Pacific, floating trees ripped out by storms, where toilet water empties into the ocean. Perfect for cutting school to paint edgy teenage scrawls on virgin walls. He decides to take an excursion and check out his latest work. He painted a big surreal piece with some of his heroes like David Koresh, Charles Manson and Omar Gaddafi, but it was an trippy style like Max Headroom. He wanted to give a startling juxtaposition, harsh flat blacks of TV sets glowing Magenta and Cobalt, Crimson and Cyan, Neon Yellow and Nickelodeon Green. He wrote a wild style piece in white and silver, going for a chrome reflective look to letters, woven with arrows, 3D and an ink blot shading style he saw in news papers when the teacher stretches an image until it becomes unperfect. CULTURAL VANDALISM! in illegible wildstyle bellow a rogues gallery of hoodlums and boogymen done in a style that melts the brain and fucks the mind. Its not quite pretentious like Cyber Punk, more like a broken gearshift spinning out of control with your shoe laces pulling your into the machine, Zdzis?aw Beksiski in one of the TV channels from Videodrome. Snots from the big city would call it Post Modern, he would call his style Praying for the Apocalypse but not the happy biblical ending, stuck forever in the hellish slow motion of life smothering under the forced obsolescence in the end of the century. He hid some subliminal in the letters, back-masked or mirrored upside-down messages in his usual pieces read KILL THE ILLUMINATI, FUCK THE NEW WORLD ORDER or FUCK ALL PRESIDENTS, or CONSUMER CYANIDE. But hidden in there was cryptic phrases, book names in other languages, subversive authors names. His middle school art teacher used to encourage this, bringing in new music from the mainland, underground magazines, hacker manifestos, books on the New York scene, or European art or Central American dissident groups. His teachers idea was only things of value are retro. Old cars, classic rock, counterculture, blues so art had to reflect a knowledge of the gems of the past, to lampoon the Police State future of a thundering militarized government of lethal technocrats. He didn''t understand everything his art teacher said but planned to read a list of books, before one day the teacher was just gone. Maybe arrested by the threatening forces he would joke about from his old job in Silicon Valley with a high level security clearance. During the summer he filled his body with all the poison he could and went on a crime spree. Inventing new letters and language for a dying scripture of heavily inscribed diatribes on transit windows. Using Marsh Ink to burn his name into shopping centers front windows. Psychedelic new wave Jargon, commentingon how much he doesn''t give a fuck about politics or heros or villains and just wants to see the cold war end with vaporization of the whole civilized world. Let hungry dogs and zombie politicians fight over the rubble. The only reason he wants to go to school at all is to abuse the copiers. He loves to carve out obscene graphics, surround it with his Word and Crew then sneak on the ferry to hit up the poles and signs in Juneu, Ankorage, Sitka, Ketchikan. He is a habitual spray paint thief, going far afield as taking the ferry to Portland and Seattle to empty out cases where they aren''t wise to the clink clank of his pockets as he walks out with out buying any thing. When you have a pocket full of paint pens then all slide and clack at the same time, making you sound like Robocop as you make your escape. Climbing down a rusty ladder, tip toeing on a 10 foot ledge over green murky water, trying to step firmly but gracefully onto the slick moss of the tunnel is always awkward. He saw his dead cousin slip once and lay down there screaming until the fire department could get down there with a rescue line to haul him up. He always liked hanging out with his cousin, till he ODed on heroin and got found facedown in the ocean. No body had the money for a funeral so a couple of his friends ran out of a store with booze then had a wake on a moldy abandoned boat no one claimed since at least 1970. The idiots sunk the damn thing and some of them had to be rescued. Circle of life out here. Huffing the smudge of Turpentine he keeps in a baggy in the palm of his hand, looking at his work disorients him. Trying to stand up straight, the light reflecting off the water, the lazy current, water falling down cement spillways, wind catching on old pipes in a howl and darting shadows made him feel vertigo and lands smack on his ass. Cold shock of September chill. Fuck! Now he has to go to school soaking wet like a bum. He lays there for a second looking up at the light and closes his eyes. He hears heavy splashing like something big plunging into deep water. Other side of the tunnel gets deep, so in the black between here and the other end, way off in the distance he wonders if he is about to be fucked up by a swimming bear or alligator. He doesn''t really think Alligators are in Alaska, but he thought he was alone. What else could he be wrong about. Silence. He feels panic he cant explain. Gets up quick but trying to look cool, even if its a bear he doesn''t want to seem scared. Lunging to the ledge, he hears more violent slashing and what sounds like running. He tries to get to the ladder and twists his ankle almost falling. Just then a bottle is kicked down the side of the tunnel thats not submerged. Making a hollow rolling sound till it stops 10 feet from the end. Making it to the ladder he scurries up on his aching ankle. In the tunnel he can see a wild man dashing towards him. The guy looks like a feral blonde Tweeker. He is not curious in the slightest who this is or what he wants. Getting over edge, out of the cement void of storm drains back up to the street, he hears WHO THE FUCK in such a savage wino snarl he felt a twist in his guts and pins and needles in his feet. He darts away, down the street crossing to other side into a boarded up building, just in time to see a maniac with fiery blond hair and crazy blood shot eyes leap over the edge and land in a roar. Its a homeless guy, in a nasty brown trench coat, but other than that he is dressed so similar they could be doppelg?ngers. The bum has on a Nine Inch Nails Pretty Hate Machine shirt on, and old army clothes stained black with grease. Jumping around and stomping like a retard. Flailing arms and spinning around till he starts laughing like a crazy man, picking something putrid out of his nose. He crouches down shaking a spray can, writing DIE-FLY and climbing back into the cement latrine. ET thinks to himself who the fuck is that? Chapter 2: A Corrosive Cosmos of Fear aka Freshman Year ET walks by the usual stoner haunts first, the broken tables in the lunch area that are dragged way out to a cluster of trees. This is where skate boarders, druggie girls and hippies all share a little corner of the universe. He sees one small shape in a hoodie there smoking. A frail looking asian girl carving her name into the tabletop. Sensing him there she says, what the fuck are you looking at poser? He keeps walking as it starts to rain. He checks the abandoned pool room thats been half empty for years. No thunder of skateboard wheels just drips from the roof echoing in the empty room. He looks in on the old art room / woodshop that has been closed since they cut the budget. Now a pile of extra furniture and tables. Where couples go to have sex or the occasional drug deal. Just a tripped out place full of 1960s posters and band instruments that disappear one by one till all thats left has been smashed to firewood. Seeing his nemesis, skin crawlingly disgusting and self righteous Ms Draughn. Not quite a butch lesbian despite the mustache and hairy legs. More like a fashion victim who still thinks caked blue eye shadow in a distinctive drag queen type cake gives a hip mid 1960s mod house wife pastiche, she dressed in mumus with animal print and female business suit disco glamor that looked like a hippie on acid designing coloring book is attractive. She creeps him out, like she is licking her lips and thinking about pulling him into a closet to take his manhood. Her disposition is always the obsessive disciplinarian, to the point any time he sees her he tries to not make eye contact and be invisible to avoid a lecture in detention. They call her the skunk ape and queen obesity. He dodges her line of sight and sneaks into the back of the science class, where old Mr Herbert is taking a nap while showing 1970s nature videos on wildlife. ET makes it to his seat just in time for the bell to ring. His tagger buddies Enrique and Max fill him in on latest drama, who is crossing them out. What new drugs are on the scene and the fact there is a new chick into heavy metal but is stuck up. ET thinks he saw her at the tables. Mr Herbert gets a phone call and holds them back from recess for a moment of silence. A local girl Suzette and her family were killed in a head on collision. Asking for them all to make memorial cards by Monday, he says the winners will get a special gift from the principal. They all plan some crazy graffiti card, but to be honest ET doesn''t remember Suzette or have any idea why he should draw any thing for some BS pencil or calculator or any other stuff the principal gives away like educational comic books or 1980s free posters for B movies no one remembers. The three make a plan to head out to the tables to see if the new girl has any cigarettes or wants to buy some herb. Trying to be cool they sit the next table in front of her and ignore her. They saw she is doing something to the table but when she sees them looking she hisses and covers it with her hand. They do notice she has some kind of crazy Japanese t-shirt. It looks punk rock, but has some screaming faces blurred by tv static. ET busts out his black book full of his graffiti. Feeling watched he turns around and sees her standing over his shoulder. She says, whats that say? He tells her he tags Zygote but she can call him ET. She looks at it through dark sun glasses and replies. I think i crossed you out at the river, that shits weak. She walks away while Enrique and Max try to break the ice with a joke that falls flat as she has turned and put headphones in. Looking at the table behind, she has carved in DIE-EYE just like down at the river. ET is used to feeling deflated. He thinks about how hot she was and her cool t-shirt. Hopefully he can make a better impression. This town is lame and some new blood means new music and magazines to check out. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. After school the three of them decide to check out the walls at Hobo Beach. He has been hyping up the production he painted but when he gets down there he can see it was dissed. A big squiggly line goes through the piece and Decibels Invading Earth Crew scrawled in a style he never saw before, kind of angular and vicious. DIE CREW sounds cool to him. He thinks of some new meanings like Destructive Imbecile Exiled Creatures or Demonic Instigators Everywhere Crushing. They cant let the diss stand so they make a plan to come back with some buckets of house paint and just splash out the diss and make it illegible. Before that they talk about getting some beer and going out to the kick it spot out on the northern bay. Its big rock formation that looks like a skull. Kids long before them in the mid 80s dubbed South of Heaven. Named for the skull album cover of the Slayer album. Its a big open cave with a couple ledges and rope ladders. Pretty much every kid in the city considered it their clubhouse. Its on a causeway that floods with high tide so any bad weather and you are going to be spending the night, and thats ok with firewood and a rope ladder but otherwise you are going to be getting slammed into the walls by 10 foot waves with rusty nails, broken boards, crushed shopping cars and old stolen bikes poking holes in you. The walk to South of Heaven is through the wetland that makes the eye in Fish-head bay on the maps. Old dead trees and fishing huts falling into the water make it pretty desolate. Carrying beer across the causeway to the rock formation is rough, its easy to smash bottles and break bones in the wind and rain which never lets up in South East Alaska. Coming to rocks they dont see any fires inside. Some times older and tougher Natives come out here and if they dont rob you they might just spend the night punking you. Inside the big cave two big eye holes make the skull face. Inside is covered in decades of graffiti since this was part of an abandoned government radar installation, removed sometime in the 1950s. Years of paint are surrounding a central image from slayer album covers like Reign in Blood and Hell Awaits. Satanic images of goats, demons, vampires and evil proceedings. They smoke weed with their beer, drink Crazy Horse Malt liquor in 40 oz bottles, play the radio on a little silver boombox. Playing Radio stations from Vancouver and as far as Seattle. Any thing works Hip Hop, Modern Rock, Alternative, Punk, Oldies, Psychedelic. When the weed and beer run out they huff paint and talk about moving to California. Places like SF and LA have legendary graffiti scenes. They hear about places like Venice Beach, Santa Cruz, Portland, San Diego, Tijuana. They imagine buying a car and just going. Maybe learning to film music videos or getting into porn. Sounds like a dream when your head is flying on inhalants, beer and smoke. ET wakes up alone. His friends abandoned him. He sees the wind and rain picking up but he never memorized the tides. they look pretty hairy but he cant tell if they are building or getting low. Either way he sets out in the blackness. Relying on moonlight to not slip and die. By the time he is back to shore his heart drops as he sees his fathers Police Bronco waiting for him. He feels kind of happy someone would have noticed if he drowned but he also doesn''t want to deal with one of his dads bad moods. Getting in the truck his dad says, i should kick your ass but Im too tired. I dont ask much of you. No drugs or alcohol, not to hanging out in dangerous places where 13 kids have drowned since the last time we boarded it up. Is that too much to ask? ET stays quiet. He doesn''t want to breathe beer in his cop fathers cruiser so he just sulks. His dad says, You missed dinner, you want the usual? He nods and sits silent while his dad orders burgers at a drive through. Chapter 3: Morgellons fungus in the Chem-trails. On the Weekend E.T. either goes to hang out with his Grandma and Grandmas boyfriend, fishing with his Dad or out tagging. He was getting a little old to hang out with his grandparents but they were old hippies and he liked to hear their stories about Haight Ashbury, Marching on Washington DC to protest the Vietnam war and Native American Revolutionaries called AIM who took over Alcatraz. Every once in a while found old hits of LSD in their collection of paperback sci-fi novels and old college books. When he was grounded this is where he went, but he wasn''t sure if that was best use of the weekend. He kept thinking about the asian girl at school and the crazy wino in the tunnels at Hobo Beach. He groans while looking for his shoes under the bed, ET kicks the bedpost sending surging though his body like a short circuit in an electric chair. Looking at his big toe, he sees a purplish tint to his toe nail. His toe looks infected, swollen around the nail and throbbing. He grabs a pocket knife and starts poking at the angry swollen digit. It hurts like hell, but feeling compelled to drain the fluid. The skin is stiff and resisting the point of the knife. He starts lower and tries to pick off the callus protecting what ever was underneath. Pulling off a yellow callus, whats underneath is reddish and angry. Too tender to mess with. Inspecting his toe nail he sees a blue thread coming from under the nail. Pulling at it, it gives a shock of instant pain, like it was a part of his body. Looking closer he can see it looks like plastic thread or wire but it causes pain and bleeds like its part of the nail. Checking email he sees Enrique and Max CCd him on a plan to go looking for magic mushrooms by the grounded oil tanker up the coast, its not far from his grandparents property so he thinks maybe he will go grab a handful once all the hard work is done. Deciding to take a shower and tackle it later he walks through the kitchen to the back porch grab clean laundry. There is none. His dad left before ET woke up with a note that says, Stay the fuck out of trouble! So he decides to skateboard to his grandparents for the weekend despite his big toe feeling like it was ran over by a freight train. The road to the wrecked barge is not good for skating. Every time he is coasting on a cool vibe, looking at the inlet and the birds Skirrrt! The dreaded sound of the scraper bum. A rock gets lodged under the wheel and he goes flying. He tries to stick to the edge so he can land in pine needles or some soft snow that never seems to melt in the perma-shade of the mountain but this time he wasnt so lucky as he cut wide on a blind turn so he lands hard on his palms and chest. Sliding with road rash a Hells Angel would be proud of. Cussing from the sharp pain in his wrist, probably broke one of a dozen tiny bones only an asshole knows the name of. A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. It takes a second to gain the courage to get back up when you hit the ground and slide, especially on these cruddy logging roads cut out of the side of a mountain leaving 1000 shards of sharp gravel every where. He rolls on his back and just dazes on the clouds like the Japanese Samurai movie where the crazy warlord gives the kingdom to his sons, and they betray him and start a big war that kills the whole family by Kurosawa, from the mid 80s. He sees the most majestic clouds, big giant towers of white mist moving fast across the sky in the jet stream. Hearing screeching brakes and the angry voice of some tucker nearly hitting him, he rolls just in time to miss a bottle thrown at his head. Slivers of tiny glass gets in his eye as he hears Get the fuck out the road you faggot Indian! He tries to scream some obcentity but the roar of the trucks engine and velocity down the mountain makes it a moot point. He decides to walk the board the rest of the way while he tries to fish brown Budweiser glass out of his eye. Its under his eye lid and really sucks. Coming up to the abandoned barge Enrique and Max are nowhere to be seen. The place where the Mushrooms grow is inside the ship and on a little island where the other half of the tanker came to rest in a storm. Everything here is green with moss, there is a rumor that the crew is in the bowels of the ship, their bones totally covered in mushrooms. This place always gave ET the creeps. Knowing these bozos they would lie in wait to freak him out doesnt want any sudden moves with his wrist likely broken. He considered leaving until he noticed a familiar red backpack and green jacket hanging on a tree limb on the little island. That meant climbing across the empty ships rusted bulkheads and slick catwalks. ET was losing enthusiasm fast when he saw a substantial pile of gathered Psychocilocibin caps. He yells out to his friends but only a dull echo in the depths of the tanker came back. His instinct to grab a handful of shrooms and jam them in his mouth was too strong. These retards want to play hide and go seek and ghost him then thats their loss. He decides to head out and feels a feeling of sheer terror. There is no sound or obvious thing to set off his spider-sense but with out knowing why or what caused it he runs back to the road. Feeling stupid he looks back and is sure he sees bluish and green corpses staring at him from the ship. A twisted human form ducks out of sight just as he turns around. Just like a horror movie thunder cracks across the distant sky and rain breaks. Great, not the weather to cover the mile and a half to his grandmothers house. Getting his board and dashing down the road he feels like he is being watched. From the dense forrest at the sides of the road he hears sounds of fast movement parallel to him. Now he has no fear of gravel or falling. He feels like a deer about to be pounced on by hungry bears. Thats actually not far fetched, not as much as mushroom zombies from a long dead oil freighter. Pulling up to his grandmas house he sees her boyfriend filling the fountain in the front yard smiling. All right you little asshole, what did you take? ET cant hide how goofy he feels, like his pores are one of those electric Tesla coils from the mall. He doesnt even want to hide that he is flying on mushrooms by now. All thought of fear are gone as the trees and wind are blazing into trails. Sound feels like its bending and his brain is alive like never before. Shrooms He says. Grandmas boyfriend puts his hand out, Did you bring any to share? ET holds out his bruised and batted hands and gets a grimace. Lets get those wounds cleaned up and you can fill us in on how school is going. Chapter 4: Rotten toes are gonna have to come off. Inside his grandparents house is pretty cozy, like a schizophrenic architect wanted to make a hippie version of the Winchester Mystery House. Every possible nook and alcove is stuffed with lofts, ladders, cabinets and secret passage ways. In the morning sunroom grandma likes to meditate in she is braiding his sister Callistos hair. While Callisto is drawing some crayon epic picture of the solar system with every imaginable detail. Grandma always wants a long hug while mumbling about psychic cats or adventures with her yoga teacher in Seattle. Beyond their little glass bubble is his uncle Mad-god... who was a pro surfer in graduate school in Oregon until the cops gave him brain damage. Now he spends his SSI checks on video games and LSD. Always in a good mood but with an intense look like a caged bear with a bee up its nose. Mad-god has a Fu Manchu mustache and perpetual odor of strong marijauna and cherry ice cream. He looks like a henchmen in an action movie but he is actually somewhat of a scientist, album cover painter and part time outlaw biker. He lowers his shades and whispers, That acid you gave me is bunk but i got some window pane that will take you over the Moon. Grandmas Boyfriend says, I heard that, keep moving hoodlum. In a joking and friendly manner. Beyond where Mad-god sits intently playing Super Mario Brothers 3, is the den where Grandmas boyfriend has his shrine to Surfing, the 60s revolution and psychedelic rock. Where most old guys have hunting taxidermy and their gun collection, this guy has crystal skulls, glass sculptures, turquoise aztec replicas, elaborate multi chambered bongs. Crazy furniture from Tibet and Nepal, Indian rugs and original pressing SF Fillmore Concert posters. Salvaged stained glass windows and skylights from a sunken ship, every kind of bizarre tribal mask and totem you could imagine nailed to every surface. Its kind of like the Vatican of druggy activism and tantric wizardry. Any time you are feeling down or stressed this place with its incense, Dr Who or Outer Limits theme music and strange stained glass reflections on the ceiling will take you to a dream world of good vibrations and trippy thoughts about space and random science facts. Despite living in abject poverty you could imagine this was a super heros domain of solitude. A safe corner of the universe where it is always warm and feels like memories come to life. If ET had to die and spend eternity somewhere it would probably be here is this house built like a Tetris stack gone wrong. While his Grandmothers boyfriend picks glass and gravel out of wounds in his hands ET tries to read a 50s post war pulp from his Grandmas priceless mid century comic collection that was probably fished out of a dumpster or sunken boat on a sandbar. As they sit down to dig crud from the wounds, Mad-god joins them. So what happened to you creep? ET recounts the story about the shrooms, the road, the derelict freighter and the uneasy feeling he had coming back. Mad-god thinks about this and in a split second is on another tangent. He asks, Do you know the real story of Super Mario? ET doesnt really care but this is his favorite uncle so he is always open to the raving lunatics wild conspiracy stories. Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon. Mad-god takes his silence as interest. There was this Japanese guy who was skateboarding around Vancouver in the early 80s. His name was Mayamoto Musashi aka Super Mario. Well any way he was hitting a trick on his skateboard and killed an old lady by accident. This got him in trouble, so because he was on something, PCP or something he got sent to the loony bin. Unfortunately this was an MKULTRA hospital. They tied him to his electric chair and cut open the top of his skull off, filled his brain with electrodes and circuits, so he could control cockroaches and other insects with his mind like dragonflies, beetles, grasshoppers and butterflies. Then sat him in front of a snowy tv screen 24 hours a day, with no bathroom breaks or food Everything was intravenous. After a while he started screaming about being lost in an abandoned underground city. The crazy thing is they were able to rip what he was seeing from his mind, endless waking dreams into a computer program and thats how the CIA created video games. This guy swore he was saving the world but really they were cooking his brain with shrooms, and the interesting thing is the shrooms they used came from here. Thats why you shouldnt do drugs, your brain isnt fully formed and you might lose it, end up homeless living in sewers eating out of trashcans. They still do this shit with subliminal on the news and commercials. Its true, look up Project Artichoke and Wandering Spirit With out a pause or time to take questions Mad-god walks off. Grandmas boyfriend says, My bullshit alarm is going off. How is school? ET just gives the standard lies about really being interested in classes, taking notes and reading. Once the standard BS is done. The subject of the phantom thread on his toe comes up and this causes some concern. Grandmas boyfriends stands up and screams for Grandma, pointing with an intensity he never saw from either of them he hears them both agree. Thats Morgellons. ET hadnt heard of it so they explain what it means. Morgellons is an inorganic parasite that grows plastic and metal from the human body. Its like an alien cancer that highjacks your immune system. People dont know if its from UFOs or military testing or pollution. But i have it too, see these green and red threads in between my fingers and the palm of my hand? Your grandma grows itchy metal splinters from the bottoms of her feet. We have to dig these plastic threads out of the corners of our eyes. Its like the Techno-organic virus that infected Cyclops and Madyline Pryors baby Nathan, when they sent him to the future. This was too much for ET, he went from alarmed and tripping out on the way the rain collects on the stained glass skylight, making the room flicker golden light with double shadows of red and blue making the whole conversation and moment feel eerie. He is too drained to stay awake and dozes off to the sounds of conspiracy theories, pseudo science and how their lives are just like an episode of the twilight zone. Last thing he remembers hearing is, We are gonna need to cut off the big toe. He didnt know if that was a mirthful joke or serious but his battery needs recharging and in moments he is off to the world of sleep. Chapter 5: “Ghost Town by the Bay” When he left his grandmas house it was raining and there was a bad vibe in the air. There were crazy booming sounds like far off construction, a steam hammer or trains coupling but not coming from any certain direction. Just cataclysmic echoes coming off the clouds out to sea. ET thought he would go check out the Graffiti Submarine out at the abandoned amusement park on the outskirts of the west side of town. There were some condos that never got finished where the kids liked to steal lumber for bike ramps, then a patch of forrest called Cleft Palate and beyond that huge over grown parking lots for a half mile until you climbed over some fallen barbed wire fences and there it was. Red Erik Raggnarsens Silly Scandanavia, this place was legendary. Every ones parents had a story about coming here as kids, it was like a cheapo version of Disneyland with all kinds of cultural rip offs. Rides based on the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and Trex all yellowing here in the mist. The steel was low quality from China, rumored to be scrapped ww2 ships. The food quality was bad and the rate of injuries and fatalities was too high for the original family to keep the place open. One corporate takeover after another, stripping down old rides for new trends like comic book characters in the 70s, bad horror movies, Japanese monsters and hair metal bands in the 80s. Painting rust wont stop stress fractures. The last big concert there was Metallica, Slayer and Maiden. If it wasnt for birds chirping and owls taking over the ruins it would have a haunting quality. Even in the submerged blight of rocket ships, roller coasters and aquariums burned down and open to the sky there was something fascinating about nature displays and antiquated science from generations long gone. You could practically hear the music of times past in this half flooded place where animatronics and rides falling in on them selves. Endless piles of half submerged lost dreams yellowing in wind battered decay. The site was prone to violent storms so it closed down sometime in the 80s. Now its a home to hobos, vandals and biker gangs. The local ruffians were called the Drunken Werewolves a bike club that was supposedly started by his fathers high school pals in the 70s had set up in a shack far yonder on the edge of civilization. Only light came from their parties on the other edge of the sprawling parking lot, almost a mile away across overgrown fields of cracked cement. This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. This place had a lot of strange stories, dinosaurs lurking among the reeds, giant crabs who pinch off swimmers feet, giant black birds from space that eat kids playing in the weeds, and a zombie disease that turns people into walking bad dreams. ET had a favorite spot, the Yellow Submarine ruins where you could walk in plexi glass tubes under the lake and there was a skateboard ramp that looked like a crime scene from A Clockwork Orange. There were heated waterslides and even a theater were they used to do hotrod shows covered in trippy 60s style artwork. Rip offs of Zap comics, Vaughn Bode cartoons and Rat Fink Monster Rods. The area had no new graffiti, but he noticed some scaffolding. He hopes they wont mess up the spot. Beyond the rides is a little fantasyland styled after European castles and medieval seafaring culture that was mostly burned down he came to a series of cement domes that used to be aquariums. The ceiling long fallen in and pine trees growing from the mossy black water. Rays of light come down from the cracked cement and rebar, dragon flies and frogs grow large here. Walking to the edge of the sea where luxury yachts and pleasure cruises once took onlookers around dioramas of great Naval battles. Looks like something from a WW2 movie with fibre glass men in crawling agony silted in scenes of Iwo Jima, The Pelopenesian War and early armor plated ships from the Civil War. Among a row of 15 foot tall fiberglass vikings that looked like they were pulled from those muffler shops that used to have the big guy out front, but now with horned helmet and spiked club instead of a spiffy mechanic outfit. Out in the gloom ET can see camp fires under the piers where the winos hang out. If you wanted some exotic drugs from the city, the train hopping bums there would get you angel dust, speed, mescaline, X or heroin. Truth is he only came here when he was down on his spirits. This place was dangerous, more than once disputes ended with a floating body or half burned set of legs with no identifying marks. This was also where grandmas and stern fathers would warn kids skipping school that this is the end of the road for the cool kids who dont do their homework and get disenrolled from the tribe. Smelling a camp fire ET went down to see who was down here hanging out. There was an old bum named Whistler who was always down to hike to buy beer for the change. A crazy Vietnam vet named Monkey and his wife Lucinda who were from another tribe on the Canada side and always hiding out when they were on the lamb. A couple young kids his age who were off to them selves and not friendly. Greeting all the bums he noticed one set of crazy eyes off into the shadows, who uproariously laughed with a growly voice but did not introduce him self. Whistler had some vodka and weed he was willing to share and ET handed him a pocket full of half smoked cigarette butts in return. ET felt comfortable here. He would listen to stories about the hippie days and Vietnam, about conspiracy theories or the latest surveillance the harbor patrol had in helicopters. These winos always had great music on cassette tapes, industrial and punk bands form the Seattle scene. ET felt a lot cooler down here. These toothless bums werent judging any body, but sometimes their rotten teeth and cold sores gave him pause drinking after them. He never worried about having his throat slit or his backpack stolen if he fell asleep here. For some reason over the camp fire he saw all the winos as Rhinopithecus Tibetan snubnosed monkies, giant hungry centipedes and smiling alligators. The weed must have been laced. Chapter 6: Wake up Chavala! ET woke up cold and damp. He was shivering and was revolted to feel hands ruffling inside his pockets. He was too terrified to move but managed to make a squeak that was answered by a heavy plastic radio smashing him in the mouth and eye socket over and over until he was out cold again. He remembers feeling more offended about the boom box tape cassette breaking, landing pieces of broken plastic in his mouth than when they crushed his nose. Covering him in magnetic tape and pieces of the turning spindle. He had a half memory of the rude asian girl from school and the crazy blonde wino in the industrial shirt being the ones doing it. He remembered evil grins and cold eyes willing to stab him to death if he made any fuss but he couldnt. Like a black silk curtain leaching his spirit from reality, he passed out. He remembers feeling hot and like he was being whipped but was so deep in a black dreamless sleep he couldnt make sense of it. ETs whole body felt scalded, his injuries boiled with intensity. Muscles twisting violently in charlie horses but also so cold. His nose and lips felt frozen with an undercurrent of strangled blood vessels screaming for some respite to the cruel night. His eyes echoed blows with phantom shapes of ghosts and taunting devils only those hit hard in the eye know about. Waking again to the warm sun in his eyes but something was wrong! He couldnt breathe out of his nose and his eyes were totally swollen shut. He could feel his teeth ache and a biting cold when he breathed. His arm might be broken and his shoes where gone. Leaving his toes so cold they felt broken. His tongue found chipped teeth, the inside of his cheek was busted open almost to the outside of his face, which was likely broken under the pulsating swelling his could feel pieces of bone floating around his cheek bone and eye socket. His ribs cracked when he tried to breathe and his mouth felt like it was full of frozen sand and broken glass, shocking his whole body every time he tried to take a breath. He tried to cry out for help but couldnt. His broken nose felt like it was on fire and raw throat swollen shut and so dry it felt like ripping a bandaid off every time her took a painful breath and choke up a gout of thick purple phlegm. Furiously picking at the dried blood on his eyes and nose he was able to gasp air. He tried to open his mouth but he couldnt, his jaw was broken and when he could finally peek to see who was there, all the old winos had abandoned him. Not their fight he guesses. He feels so humiliated. This was the safe place, where he build tree houses and caught strange insects as a kid. Now he was assaulted on his own turf by some out some out of towners. His first clear thought was revenge. He wanted to get a gun and catch these fucks out in the ferns. Puncturing their skulls like watermelons, popping their eyes and lungs. Leaving their bodies to turn black and burst in the brackish water. Trying to crawl he felt unimaginable pain in his feet like they had been poked with nails. ET wiggled like a worm trying to get away from the blackness of the incoming tide, already sending cold waves of splashes over him. Sending more pain up his spine and back of his head. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. ET makes it to his knees, resting his forehead on the wet soil. He feels wet like he pissed and shit him self. Totally soaked, shivering and likely in shock he managed to make it back to the amusement park where it was paved. He was fading in and out of consciousness, shivering, whimpering, growling. Pounding the freezing mud with his fists, trying to pull him self forward on sharp grass and thorny bushes. Trying his hardest to not start screaming and bawling. He found a big iron bar and used it to pull him self up in a sitting position. He thought back to the middle of the night. Somebody was rummaging through his pockets, a female voice seemed to be giving directions and giggling. They had pulled his pants down, stole his shoes and took every thing of value, some pictures, coins, his school ID. The way his clothes were falling off him was like they had set him on fire with vodka. His skin was shades of pink and purple you only see in a fish store or a burn ward. Coming to a fun house mirror he sees in horror they had carved graffiti into his chest and back. DIE-EYE-FLY in cruel stripes of an x-acto knife. On his cheek were big slice marks and one dug deep into his nose. He cried and couldnt believe how they had disrespected him. He always acted cool, knew all the sick bands and foreign video games. He had no idea why they would do this to him. It was like something college kids did, burning bums, beating up nerds or bashing fags. He had no reason to have a target on his back. They just did it because they could. He was too fucked up to defend him self from midnight marauders. Making it to the entrance he found a bike with 2 flat tires he used like a crutch to limp back into town. He couldnt sit on the seat, he had a sharp pain in his tailbone and his balls felt like they had been hit over and over with a tire iron or poked with needles. He had jarred his back, just walking was too much, he had to hunch over like a 90 year old with a cane. When he got to the deserted part of town he collapsed again. He knew with head injuries you werent supposed to sleep but he was willing to risk it. Part of him didnt want to wake up. All afternoon loud sounds like sonic booms from fighter jets, car alarms and screams invaded his dreams. He was lying on a sidewalk in an industrial area long past its use to any one. Waking up again to the rain. There was a shrill metal on metal sound like a rusted shut industrial fan highjacked by a storm, screaming mercy as the blades slide like a star football player forced to play one more game on a broken foot. Like nails on a chalk board every tin sign banging, chain swinging and train horn in the distance made him feel like he was having an aneurysm. He felt watched, looking around he sees an owl glaring at him. Making sounds that sound like Fuck You. The wind was picking up and all around him the sounds of cranes leaning on rusted girders, sheet metal tearing free in the wind, old doors slamming on boats and broken windows howled. Hellish moans coming from broken factory windows made his skin crawl. This whole town was known for unseasonal weather. He was alone among the debris of the military industrial complex. Shipyards and steel mills falling down in condemned miles of endless lonely roads and urban havens for wild animals. He was moving in autopilot. Despite ungodly pain everywhere he made it home just to find he was locked out. Now his knee and ankles felt dislocated from walking on a sprain, secondary stress on tired bones. His dry face had new tears running down scabs and throbbing welts. No one was home and he had no idea what time or what day it was. There was no Hide-A-Key but he knew the back windows were open. He tried climbing on an old washing machine near the gate and with only one good arm and both legs too weak to brace his weight, he fell down again really hurting him self. He was too tired to scream. He just laid on his face, rocks poking his eyes, cold blood pooling around his face. He tried to open his eyes to the smell of acrid smoke and a orange glow in the windows and like a nefarious ghost he sees the crazy bum and asian girl from school open the gate. They were robbing his house! He passed out again and awoke to police lights and his father carrying him to his bed. He thinks he hears voices of his grandmother singing to him while wiping down his face with a warm cloth. He wanted to spend time with her but he was too exhausted. Panicked Screams from Hell #13 Mexican Reprint of French Horror Comic Today was the great culling. The native people had heard of this. It was a game where all the tribes of a region are invited to the lip of a great volcano, sometimes it was a forrest, or a endless desert and made to hold hands around a massive indentations. The local scholars and winos would have different versions of what would happen. Some times it was to be mounted on thousands of cement crosses on a vast emptied sea floor, and the game was to survive an atom bombing. Others said it was a hunt where the elite of the world would chase down naked native children from horseback wearing masks of predators like bears, foxes and wolves in a great northern Canadian forrest. Still others talked of journeys to inverted places that did not seem real, where the sky and earth were colors that could not be real, hues and shapes foreign to any sober mind and the people would be chased by strange crafts and moving plants bellow a star field that was so beautiful it cracked up the mind. Todays outing was different. The people whispered this must be the tropics as the ground was so green and lush. Was this Hawaii or maybe even Ireland? It was hard to know. There was an indentation like a vast bowl you could believe was an ancient magma crater, but covered in the most squishy moss and the air was full of mist in the morning light. Every where in low areas were cradles of mist and rainbows as slow wind moved the low cloud over this place. The game was as follows. A great multitude of peoples from all over the Earth were standing around this depression. There were poor people, and fabulously rich people in the hundreds all standing around. Animals were unleashed an one of the participants would awake in the center of the bowl. The area was uneven, crags of lava rock would jut up a few feet all over, old pieces of tree stumps and rises would create areas where the participant could find shelter as animals were sent in to hunt them. Sometimes it was massive crabs the size of cars, or others bulls or even great thunderbirds. The goal was not explained but the game had begun. In his case it was abnormally large rabbits. ET saw them in the distance, only revealing a black eye from behind cover, others were ignoring him, licking their paws and cleaning their faces or scratching their ears. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. Among the moss and grasses here were old cars totally covered in furry green plant growth. Mid 60s Chevys and Buicks, old GMC trucks and cars whose antiquity he couldnt name falling into rusted despair. He searched the cars quickly as the animals moved in from hundreds of meters away. Finding old tools, rusted tools but among the debris on the floors of green carpets he found a shiny small revolver like the ones on cop shows. One rabbit seemed more aggressive. ET scoured the landscape for something to fight with. A tree branch he found crumbled to rot when he struck it against a rock. Falls apart full of bug larva and worms. He spotted a place full of bottles but he would not make it before the rabbit got to him. He almost died of fright as this rabbit who was speeding towards him leaped into the air and disappeared into a hole in the ground he had not seen in front of him, leaving behind a bottle of orange soda. He hears gasps and angry hisses from the edges of the crater where all the people had lined up. He realized it was now his turn. Grabbing up the bottles he surveyed the edges of the depression. Among the smiling Native people, or faces of what looked like sick or dying soldiers, he saw some famous people. He saw the president George Bush with several of his pals in suits giving hard looks, he saw the Queen of England and angry looking Police. He realized now was his turn to be the hunter or at least to hurl bottles at the people around the crater to select the next player. Walking up about 20 feet from the ruling class participants he hurled a couple bottles, one hit the ground and cast broken glass all around their feet. Another hit a man in the chest beside president Bush, and another hit a man with a creepy smile right across the face, wounding him. As the game was not over he remembered the revolver and suddenly felt such a hostility to these rulers of society. Taking the revolver out he decided to pop at least one of these craven swine he had only seen on TV. Just as he was selecting someone to gun down and coming up with blanks. None of the other people were seeming important enough, he hesitated to shoot the president or the queen so he looked for a angry face or somebody worth shooting and now these people were crying, looking away and squirming. The loud speakers were turned on and the game was over. It felt rigged. He knew every other time some Native people were gored, eaten alive and this time right when he had one and was able to pick someone important from the world they sent every one back to the buses they arrived on. He sees far off private planes and limos taking the important white people away. He sees a couple faces he missed now, same bad energy as before. Then he awakens at school, feeling like his eyes were going to pop from the late afternoon light. The bell rang and as he got his books he heard screams and shooting. Men in black tactical gear and masks who looked like police or army were gunning students and teachers down across the quad. He sees a helicopter above with president Herbert Walker Bush leaning out giving orders on a megaphone and just as they locked eyes he sees the creepy man with the white naval uniform peak out covering one eye with white bandages. The craven politicians point at him and ski masked swat cops with machine guns took aim. Chapter 7: “You let your little asshole friends rob the house and they turned on you?” It must be a couple days later. His eyes are flashing white and black in his sleep and he can hear violence in his room. His dad is there carrying out the tv, ripping down posters, smashing the video game system into the wall. ETs heart sank. His dad was his hero when he was little. Like having Tarzan or the Incredible Hulk as a father. A big guy who could easily bench press 450 with no spotter and only slows down from a torn shoulder joint and bad back. His dad looked like a caveman, intense eyes but since his mother left the sly whit and joker personality was gone, now all he got was the sullen and vacant cop who came home to drink in the dark and occasionally yell about chores. He couldnt respond to accusations and a long winded rant about stealing graffiti pens, breaking into buildings and smelling like weed. ET just played dead while his father bagged up his clothes, crumpled up his best art and smashed his priceless collection of one of a kind DOS games and secret bootleg Japanese arcade ROMs he kept in glass boxes. He could hear the tell tales sound of his large comic collection being thrown out the window into the back yard burn pile. He catches a glimpse of his terrarium full of lizard bones showering down on him as it was thrown against the wall. After some silence and sounds of his fathers Police Bronco roaring to life and peeling out on the gravel driveway ET opens his eyes and sees light traveling across the roof of his bedroom. Sitting up slowly and painfully he sees his little sister standing there. What the fuck happened to you? She is careful to pronounce every syllable distinctly since cussing is not something he gets to do often. ET tries to speak but stops when a horrible pain in his eardrum stops him. Callisto says, Dad says you are moving out and to be gone by the time his shift is over. Then she skips off to play with dolls in the adjacent seasonal creek that has jumped the banks into their yard. ET feels that coldness in his soul again, like rejection, depression and exile all in one. He imagines thats the feeling a framed man feels on the way to the electric chair. Unfairly nailed to a cross. Feeling the insults and threats from former friends. Watching sneers and polite old ladies snarling curses while the warden reads the death warrant. He imagines what the electric chair feels like, probably similar to false accusations when they make your sinuses hurt, your brain feels like it rolled down a hill in a motorcycle accident, breaking every bone in your body in a tumbling rag doll motion. Once he got offered a full ride scholarship to art school in the big city by a substitute teacher who had connections to Marvel comics and left to start a small imprint. His dad didnt feel like taking him to the comic convention for the meeting. Now he doesnt even like monster magazines or superheroes, if he does art its in aerosol so his parents get a bill. Two hour ferry ride on the weekend wasnt worth securing his future in his dream job. Thats grief. The world always cheers the death of an innocent man if the news tells them to. His room is trashed. Every thing he loves lies in ruins and at that moment to vows to never return here again. He looks at his art work wet and stomped on, his music thrown against the wall until the floor was covered with a carpet of pieces of broken cassettes and splintered vinyl. All his graffiti magazines and books personally mailed to him by taggers from all over the world. Issues of Graffiti TV on vhs, Can Control, Urban Autograff from Scandinavia lay shredded across the floor. His original Euro Star Wars magazines, rarer than the normal sized Marvel comic. His foreign Motorista Fantasma, Ghost Rider comics from Chile. His prized Vampirella comics from Spain. He got the first 15 issues out of a pawn shop that was going out of business for 50 cents each. He didnt eat the school lunch for a month to save up for that. An entire run of Heavy Metal comics from 1977-now. Given to him by Max and Enrique. His dad left them in buckets outside, ruined in a 7 day rainstorm while he was away with his mothers side in Ketchikan. He doesnt even know why. He has a familiar hate for his father brewing for years, every time he could have taken his side he betrayed him. Attacking the things he holds dear, his artwork, his prized possessions. Things that cant be replaced. Symbolic things that can never be reconciled. Maybe his parents taught him emotional terrorism and toxic stress as a parenting tactic. ET is sure his dad has long term PTSD from his own parents. Maybe they all do. Growing up around a dopers and bullies who have no hobbies besides domestic violence and drinking. Two settings, neglect or rage. Micromanagement of imagined infractions or abject disinterest in achivements. There is something almost comforting in being reminded of someones true colors. That narcissistic whim they will take every thing you love and put it out on the street. When confronted with proof of your innocence, not even a apology. So many times he got blamed. Once the family car got stolen and his dad canceled his summer totem carving internship with elders from all over the coast. Humiliating him as the local car thief to the elder Chief who died before the next season. It wasnt even true, the neighbor borrowed the car because he kept a key when he sold it to them. His dad was too proud to be wrong so he invented some BS about grades after cancelling MTV and sending him to live in the tool shed up the mountain like a refugee. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. ET remembers all the times his dad really went out of his way to ruin the only things that gave him any joy. Chases off his best friend because he wasnt part of the tribes Eastern Orthodox church, his dad doesnt like Catholics and told the kid so to his face. When ET wrote his own code for a dungeon crawler his dad poured a beer in the circuit board which he claimed was an accident. He wonders if its even his real dad? His mother was so interesting and full of life. ET imagines she had an affair with someone cooler, a radio DJ or a gallery painter, a savage Native warrior who was shot down by corrupt police. ET hates cops, their whole job is to fuck things up for people with no other way to express them selves than smoking weed in the park past curfew or no where else to go when its raining. Busting the homeless for breaking and entering because they were freezing to death in the elements and found an abandoned building to sleep in. More and more he imagines plunging the edge of a sharp shovel into his fathers face while sleeping, breaking every bone in his body. Cutting through bone and cartilage with rusty steal. Throwing a heavy cement roofing tile on his fathers head while on the bench press. Carving his head like a pumpkin, putting a syringe of boiling sewage in his eyes, pouring draino into his nose while asleep, attaching jumper cables to his broken jaw. Just the thought of kicking his dads teeth out while incapacitated makes him feel warm. Rage is the best drug, but like any heavy opioid it kills the user before the dealer. ET vows when he is full grown he will teach his father every thing he knows about violence. Lunging into the hall way he tries to take big steps since walking is traumatic. Getting into the bathroom, he cant stand to piss so he falls onto the toilet and missed. Landing on his broken eye socket next to the toilet, beside a foul plunger, a smashed wine glass, helmets of action figures, mold and balls of hair lie in pools of yellow. Trying to get back up he gets some help from Callisto who appeared like an angel to help him onto the toilet and giggles as she slowly closes the door with gleeful eyes disappearing as the latch clicks. He thinks to him self if he should commit suicide and burn the house down but he doesnt want to hurt his baby sister. Maybe when she is away on the weekend. That would teach his father for blaming him for his own beating. He felt persecuted, like a witch hunt. Like he was always suspect no 1 when any thing serious went wrong. Trying to get dressed was hard. Putting on jeans and shoes with his injuries took 30 minutes of howling and working up the courage to put pressure on his feet. Lifting his shirt and checking his wounds in the mirror. ET sees how badly he body is carved up. He isnt quite disfigured but he looks like he lost a war. Getting a garbage bag of his stuff he sees a nasty note his dad left he blows his nose on it with out reading it, leaving a shocking amount of blood on it like a scarlet beating heart had come running out his nose. As he gets down the drive way he thinks of all the things he should look for and try to save but walking away is too hard and walking back impossible. Its a beautiful day, big gusts of wind make the redwoods, conifers and evergreens sway. Golden light, milky blue skies and fat puffy clouds greet him as he gets on the main road. The wind at his back feels like it is with him in solidarity, urging him on to find his way in the world. Still a black cloud looms on his thoughts. How powerless and betrayed he feels. Like he is always playing the fool, the whipping boy, the scape goat. Even in pain and emotional sorrow its hard to stay in a black mood when every corner of his place has majestic views of endless inlets, mountains, creeks, woodlands and blazing sun rays reflecting off gently breaking waves. The air is sweet with pine tree sap, crisp cold sprites of rain and warm glowing sun. Coming to the tribal headquarters, an old Indian trading post and gas station turned into an artist swap meet. It was built at a crossroads outside of town near where the other major highway to the mainland was wiped out by a severe storm. Unpredictable geological activity was rampant here, fault lines, rockslides and high waves shut it down. A disused and forgotten link to elsewhere. The hills and coastline around here were dotted by abandoned tunnels and cement bridges falling apart like ruins from a nuclear war. The trading post was guarded by dozens of ancient large totem poles, looming nearly 100 feet and grey from age and the elements. Huge leaning carvings of grizzlies, wolves, whales and great thunderbirds greet him. The Chief sits there with an amused smile, his bear cowl sitting on his lap as he scrubs the glass eyes with spit. The Chief is a large man like Arnold Swartzeneggar in his hey day. Dwarfs ETs father and any one else. Sitting there on a tree stump beside the road, taking a break from chainsaw art and listening to the wind chimes. His voice is deep and fearsome like a great forrest spirit of the earth bellowing from a cave. He was always extra warm and cool with ET, giving him this involved Vietnam era soul brother secret handshake with convoluted backhand slaps and snaps. Scrubbing his hair, curling into a boxers stance, play fighting with him as a greeting. Hey Astroman! Want to tell me what happened? The Chief says while opening a ginger ale with a pocket knife and handing it over. ET wants to say something but points to his jaw and cant even muster a mumble. The Chief says Thats alright, I heard all about it. Sounds like you are staying with me until you can go back to school. We can go hunting and fishing and maybe we can make an example out of some bad people. ET feels tears in his eyes and the Chiefs big hands twist a dowl into a carved raven head totem and he says You will be alright ET gives in to tears, Chief pretends not to notice and finds a cool radio station with a new band called Nirvana. Chapter 8: “The Madness of the Silos” The Chief lives on the former site of a hippie commune that was an experimental farm back in the 60s. When he came back from the Vietnam war he moved in and started growing pot and magic mushrooms. The property has a long history of logging, fish farms, mining and substantial quarry on the edge of Surveillance Mountain. This was the saving grace since a couple of the commune leaders were actually members of radical underground revolutionary groups tied to the Weather Underground, Black Panthers, Brotherhood of Eternal Love and AIM. The Chief was in jail for pot bust trying to drive through Canada with 800 pounds of high grade smoke, and got sent away for 5 years that he did 3 and half on. Meanwhile the FBI came and busted the place as a training camp for Irish and Palestinian Revolutionary communists, creating a ghost town that he moved into when coming home. The place had a couple Aquarian age names like Golden Lantern Farm of Mystical Mountain Light and finally Geodesia based on the multiple stained glass domes and trippy architecture that the Chief uses now as chicken coups and duck ponds. The place had hundreds of koi ponds, rustic churches and little underground grow houses all falling into them selves and covered in miles of blackberry vine thorns. ET was still down on his spirits but could limp around much better with a cane. Since the assault he had trouble sleeping at all. The night was full of little sounds that tore into his state of mind. He tried to sleep as the Chief loaded up enough beer and liquor for 2 week trip into the unknown. ET looked at the leaning sheet metal windmill in the yard, the antique iron yard chairs with a gothic floral pattern, the real living and screeching peacock colony and the sky above. The air had a weight and stillness that felt hostile. The Chief seemed to not notice the blackening of the clouds, the wind picking up or the far off lighting. Loading up camping gear for some hunting and fishing they headed out in the Chiefs 1970 GMC K2500 Super Custom Pick Up towards the wilderness. The road into the mountains was dizzying, great mist shrouded cliffs, waterfalls emptying into vast chasms and a sea of trees that disappeared into deep black shadows. They had left around the blue hues of early dawn and around 3 they came into a meadow bathed in golden light. The sounds of water rushing and wind in the trees gave this place an almost spiritual light. Waist high grass with swaying seed made ET go info a fit of sneezing so much so he was useless to help the Chief unload the car. Knowing the kid was borderline crippled the Chief has brought an antique tricycle for ET if the walking becomes too difficult. ET feigns outrage but before they leave the meadow he is leaning over in on one knee and kicking him self along like a skateboard on the wide dirt path. Every once in a while he gets carried away and wipes out on his face. Arriving at the fish camp ET sees a slow and deep stretch of river but can hear some violent rapids around the bend where the Dead Indian creek comes down from Northstar falls bellow the headwaters of Tempest Mountain. ET slid down to the bank with a cooler full of beer where the Chief is fly fishing. ET has managed to get into a sunlit pool close enough to throw the Chief beers and listen to his stories about Indian mummies found in a mine shaft near here, of phantom tidal waves that come in the night and only disturb certain homesteads, of a place where the seafloor is empty and an endless lightning storm brings the dead of ghost ships walking among the living who do not honor the land. ET loves these stories about the fragile edges of reality that seem to bend here under the weight of tribal lore. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. The Chief is cool to hang out with, he knows ET is opening one for him self ever other beer he throws to the Chief, who when catching him only gives a wise knowing look at doesnt say a word. After going through a 12 pack, ET is sent back up to the truck to fetch another cooler, of which they had substantively more full of booze than food. ET now alone feels something off about the meadow. He hears a sound like a great bird screaming in the trees but sees nothing. Every time ET gets his mind back on opening the truck and dragging down a heavy cooler something else unsettles him. Sounds of great boulders being kicked down a rock face, sinister snapping branches into the blackness of the tree-line or skeletal figures in his peripheral vision that disappear when he turns his head. He feels like if he can stay still enough these figures gain more and more detail, missing noses, white eyes, black skin and exposed muscle. But he knows this is either due to head trauma or some secondary cause like infrasound that vibrates the ear and eye by some auditory distortion that it create hallucinations. Still the feeling of being stalked by malevolent spirits is present as he drags down the heavy cooler that is breaking under its own weight and starts to drag it backwards like a crab. Now he hears running in the grass. Could be rabbits or a fox, but his imagination sees burned children with hallow eye sockets, starving and looking at him as a last meal, of witches or shape shifters waiting for him to turn his back to scurry up to him and stab him to death with sharpened bones or pieces of rusty metal. Making it to the final rise before the creek he sees the Chief coming back up. What took you so long? ET tries to mumble some bullshit but the Chief walks on to set up camp. Alone again ET decides to look in the cooler and sees bags of cranberries, nuts, sodas and a bottle of whiskey. Feeling like he needs to steady his nerves he takes a big pull only to lower the bottle and see the Chief now annoyed snatch it back and say. Not what we are here for, last thing i need to to contribute to your delinquency. The Chief grabs the cooler and heads back into the grass to set up camp. ET kind of startled, breathed in some of the whiskey and is choking on his hands and knees to the point of pissing him self. Which wasnt entirely a bad thing since he was soaked from the creek and shivering as the sun passed behind the trees. At camp the Chief is jovial, making huge slices of salmon on what looks like pieces of a metal shopping cart, slobbered in chilli powder, pickled onions and some secret sauces wrapped in tin foil. The Chief mentions some girls might stop by if the weather holds up. ET wonders what kind of bar flies or starving hookers would drive all the way out here to hang out with him and the Chief. After a while the Chiefs eyes glaze over from his pungent marijuana and drinking all day, he absentmindedly passes the weed and the whiskey. He was cool about it, no lectures or tests of manhood just minding his cooking fire and laughing at his own jokes. The Chief had so many stories that feel off, about an Indian man accused of being a witch and burned alive in the last witch trial in America. ET asks to hear the one about his mothers sister who could shape shift into a bunny and one day was taken away by a hawk and eaten. Stories about ruins of forgotten buildings where burn victims skulk away from people deep in the woods where stairs, doorways and chimneys give the forrest an evil feeling of a place existing between realities. Mumbling about tribes of unwelcome Indians who lived here, black eyes in the wind and giant owls who grant wishes for offerings the Chief falls asleep sitting up, waking in night terrors chasing phantoms off in the dull northern lights. The Chief gets weird when he is drunk sometimes, whispering curses too low to hear, crying and yelling. Talking about people who died in Vietnam or people he had to kill, then he gets quiet and stares off into the horizon. ET asks about any strange things that exist in these woods and the Chief says There used to be some missile silos out here. Doomsday bunkers where they used to do military tests. A network of intercontinental missiles was abandoned here in the 80s when some virus broke out. They hired locals to seal up the place with the bodies still inside. ET doesnt tell him about the strange things he has been seeing. They make a plan to check out the head waters above the Northstar Falls but the Chief wont agree to take ET up to see the missile silos. Listening to owls and the sound of distant thunder they skip finishing the half built tent and sleep beside the fire. Chapter 9: Dreams in the Witch House ET had to piss in a dream about being sick in bed during an air raid evacuation. He was panicking as the emergency broadcast system interrupted some weird show with deformed people living in a cave, worshipping a bum as jesus. ET looked out his window to see a Goliath black tidal wave racing over the surface of the town, but it wasnt his town and the sky was not the blue hue of constant storm cloud riddled Alaska. It was looked like Bhagdad or Gaza in silhouette behind a huge glowing atom cloud. The blinding fireball and the racing water were framed by large cinderblock towers reduced to dust as his eye lids melted in an orange glow of his retnas burned off in the 10,000 degree sun touching down on the earth. Somewhere he knew this was a dream and all around him the sounds of the real world merged with the dream. Sounds of wind, rain, alarms and yelling. Just then he was slapped to his senses by the Chief. Wake up Enceladus, we got hit by the storm! The half built tent is totally inundated with water, the forrest floor is gone under several inches of rushing black rain water. The trees are snapping in violent wind and all around shrill wind cutting through the howling sound somewhere in between a supersonic jet and the sound a broomstick makes when swung as a weapon. Whooph like a kung fu movie. The sky cracks with lightning and the rain is hitting their skin with a belligerence that actually feels like being slapped across the face with each of hundreds of beads a second. They are taking a real beating but the good news is the chief has brought several flash lights you get free for turning in Camel cigarettes and Budweiser coupons. A little TV-Boombox-Spotlight he is holding lets ET feel some security. ET has some kind of yellow flashing sea rescue flasher strapped around his forehead so in the rage of wind they almost look like a slow moving helicopter to each other. They left their sleeping bags and tried to run by the wind had g-forces strong enough to throw you off the trail and into the darkness dozens of feet away if you rise more than a crawl on all fours. Whole trees are ripped from the roots and spinning down the hill like giant circular saw blades, ripping through the forrest. In the blackness of the night the flashlight can only illuminate a few feet as the rain and splashing water has created obstacles to its beam. The darkness of the storm has taken its own shape, a hostile foe that wanted to tear them limb from limb and leave their body parts strewn down cliffs and fields of crags. The way down was impossible, the Chief is yelling but ET cant make out a single word. Both of them are ripped violently off the trail into the darkness and with sheer will to live were able to crawl back. The wind is coming off the sea, up the mountain but has changed direction to hit them sideways. Abruptly they change direction from going downhill towards the truck. Instead they are going with the wind back up the hill at a gradual grade where the trees are so dense they need to crawl over stumps and under roots. Finding a hallow under a mighty 1000 year old Western Red Cedar they come face to face with a panicked family of deer not wanting to share their hiding place. The mother deer bit ET on the back of his shoulder and the baby was bleating a warning for them to go. Just then a bear the size of a Volkswagen beetle tore into the opposite side of the root cellar and seizes on the mother deer who makes the most awful sound of being eaten alive while the bear snapped its spine at the hip. The Chief grabs ET by the neck and tears him into the underbrush. The glow of cheap beer and cigarette company TV static, flashing yellow lights and blinking flashlight beams enrages the bear whose pounding footsteps they can hear crushing downed trees and snapping at their heels. Coming to a cement retaining wall they lose the electronics, they are swept up in a rushing drainage culvert that batters the fuck out of them. The Chief must have snapped on some neon rope around each other since it has popped over ETs shoulder and is choking the life out of his neck while he feels like he is drowning in man made rapids. ET totally obvious to what he was doing grabbed the baby deer who is now thrashing in his arms. Last thing ET remembers before his face smashed into a cement door frame is the baby deer seeming to go limp from inhaling water. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. ET wakes up to the Chief pressing on his chest as if he drowned. Thankfully it is either half hearted CPR or just pretending to show him someone would notice if he was dying. ET comes to his senses in a little square room. Its colder than outside but there is a small fire building in a coffee can inches from his head. The baby deer is awake and alive stumbling around the room, its hooves echoing into unseen recesses. ETs eyes hurt, his ears feel full of water and his throat feels like he is coming down with a cold. They are in a cement bunker, around the sides are olive green computer screens and radar alarms long abandoned. The Chief is singing some old song from the 50s and is busying him self with snapping branches and small logs that blew in with them. The steel door is ringing with the raging storm battering it with broken trees. Its a surreal moment, being in some kind of military facility in the woods. Everything covered in graffiti and signs of decades of teenage vandalism. The Chief tells ET to watch out for tree spiders and to check his arms and legs for any breaks. The Chief is cleaning his nails with a buck knife and has hungry eyes following the baby deer is it slips and bows sideways on unsure footing. ET stops him from killing the thing right there and the baby deer instinctively huddles up with ET for protection. The fire getting low and the room full of smoke as wet wood burns dirty. The Chief decides to open the heavy metal door and like a nightmare the massive bear as found them, letting out a fearsome roar and charging its head into the room as the Chief struggles to slam the door a couple times on its snout. The door slams shut with an echo that pops ETs ears. The fire in the coffee can is flickering out and they sit in total darkness for a while. The floor is a mix of freezing cold cement and sharp metal grates. ET can hear his heart beating in his ears and the scared breathing of the deer fawn. In the darkness the Chief is crawling around the perimeter of the room with a flickering lighter, not totally engaging the flame to conserve butane, just enough for the flint to give a hint if something in the dark is about to poke him in the eye or any crawling centipede is lying in wait to make a meal of his fingers. A couple time the Chief cries out when started by one that he uses his shoe to swat. Miraculously there is an old time wood stove in here and even more auspicious it is totally full of dry logs, so much so the Chief has to empty it out by 2 thirds to get a fire raging. Beside it is a high pile of news papers and magazines from the 1950s. With no effort at all the stove roars to life and gives the space some much needed warmth and rich golden light. Looking around the bunker ET sees something that must be an optical illusion. Sitting on chairs totally covered in spider webs are the skeletons of radar men who must have staffed this installation. The Chief thinks this is great, making jokes and swatting the corpses on the shoulder like old pals. ET is creeped out, unable to look away from the moldy eye sockets and gleaming white teeth. Its a strange thing to wonder what causes the Army to abandon this place and leave these guys here to whither for decades in this dark and musty hole in the side of a mountain. Everything here is covered in so much dust that breathing is a struggle to not chock on horrible spider debris, old webs rolled into balls of splinters and desiccated insects, things like hairballs and creepy things you touch in the dark and snap you hand back better not to ponder what kind of horrible thing you just crunched with your hand like dry rat bones or leaves full of flesh eating fungus. By morning a dull grey light comes in through thick glass slits embedded with wire inside the glass. The quality of light leaves much to be desired and just makes it harder to see as this stormy darkness of daylight tries to duel the wood stove for supremacy, leaving an optical stain to their battered and dehydrated eyes. They must have been in there more than a day or two before they awoke to sounds of birds singing and ravishing warm light came in the blast windows. The Chief had filled the dark days down here with stories of his usual lore. Cannibal tribes the South Pacific, mushrooms that turn people into zombies, witches who live in these woods. ET was not really listening, he was instead trying to remember his dream about tidal waves and nuclear horizons for a comic book he was planning to draw. In the light of day there were no more skeletons and he decided to not bring it up. Several times when talking to the Chief he would go to endless lengths ET didnt see something he clearly remembered like the Chief sneaking girls into the house when he was supposed to be baby sitting, or occasions ET saw him stealing something or beating a drifter to death and cutting up the body in front of him. The Chief had this funny smile like, go ahead and tell, i will just stop talking to you and Im the only one who gives a shit. ET starts to think the Chief burned the soldiers bodies in the stove and ate the baby deer but as the door is flung open ET sees the fawn dart into the blinding morning light. Chapter 10: Smoke on the water, fire in the sky The Chief didnt want to turn back. He felt that the storm breaking was going to make hunting and fishing even better. Walking back to the Bronco they see the devastation of the storm. It was brutal to the trees and infrastructure of the forest service trails washed away, tunnels choked with dead trees and bridges torn from their footings. Driving deeper into the hills the Chief was drinking coffee and Whiskey sweetened with cream and honey he found in the ranger station that was abandoned during the night. ET found a whole stack of Deaths Head II and the new Ghost Rider comic books that he knicked. Arriving at the base of a trail into the woods, they see a couple abandoned cars that looked like they were being scrapped in slow motion by passers by. All the way up the mountain they got a good streak of Modern Roc which was already on its way out. The top 40 button hole between Post Punk, Hair Metal and what ever New Wave was. Basically safe bands that still had some streetcred for intellectuals tired of Post Punk before the Grunge / Alternative wave washed away bands like Bad Religion, Rem and U2. ET always felt like these bands were for mousy substitute teachers and edgy librarians but still had some good songs. He was more into Nirvana, Sound Garden and Alice in Chains if he was going to sit through radio on a road trip. He loved the classic rock and thrash metal the Chief had on cassettes but no matter how much you love Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and Billy Squire there was only so much you could take. There was also a ZZ Top tape somewhere lost on the floor. He remembered his mom loved college radio bands from the early 80s like The Cure, Joy Division and The Smiths but those made him sad. Something about the gothic vibe that turned him off. It was hot on chicks but his life was dark enough with out putting on makeup and sulking in churchyards. He was always looking for something unusual to listen to and wasnt above Summer of Love, Motown or modern R&B if the vibe took his mind away from his shitty life. He tried to get the Chief to listen to Mr Bungle and Ministry but he couldnt make it through a whole song with out ranting about yuppie scum and their bogus music from radio stations in the big city. He had some deep seated contempt for people he saw as trying too hard to be cool. The chief did like a lot of cool stuff, beyond Hendrix, Pink Floyd and Ted Nugget he also had some secret stuff from Deep Purple, Jethro Tull, Uriah Heep and Roky Erickson that was on the play list for sure. Progressive and Hard Rock had its moments. ACDC, Motorhead and Frank Zappa were more his dads speed so on the outside edges of whats cool. This backcountry was called Twilit-Glass Mountains. Was an odd name but has something to do with natural rock deposits that look like the night sky. Deer and Elk had good populations and the foraging for berries, nuts and mushrooms made this a native favorite for vision quests and hunting trips. Leaving the tent they plan a shorter trip to see if the good spots where taken before unloading the gear. Following the trail along the ridge for a few miles they soak up the warmth of the early morning light. Seeing the usual camps along the Snake Tooth river full of garbage and messy camps, they move deeper into the woods. Maybe they dont need to stay over night if they can catch a Buck or Moose early and be back home by dark. ET notices some odd growths along the rock face as they move into the shadow of the mountain. Something slimy and irregular fungal patters. The Chief errs on the side of caution and doesnt allow ET to touch any thing he doesnt know from generations in these mountains. Walking down to an unnamed stream they hear a jet above them and as soon as they see the chemtrail disappear into a cloud a violent downpour breaks with lightning. ET and the Chief unroll plastic ponchos to wait it out. The rain is odd, gelatinous and harmful to exposed skin. ET feels an instant revulsion to the rain that is hitting the ground so hard its bouncing into his face, getting in his nose and eyes. He feels something unpleasant under his eye lid, like a hair. Chief doesnt seem to notice, he is about 15 feet away under a camo tarp and messing with his portable tv-flashlight while the rain stops suddenly. What came down was enough to raise the level of the stream into a wider pond, still choked with downed trees and now floating animal life. ET walks down to the stream to rinse his eyes and just as he stoops down to drink the Chief stops him. In the rocky terrain there are indentations where just the rain has collected and something translucent on the surface is squirming around, a fleshy layer of goo on top that looks like one celled organisms under a microscope. The Chief doesnt say much but looks disturbed. They decide to steer clear of the watershed and try to track game on the upper meadows. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. Coming to a trail of strewn equipment on the path they took to the ridge, they both pause as this could be a bear attack on unexperienced campers. Pots, kettles, canteens and several rain coats all discarded dont seem to have any blood signs of struggle. Sounds of violence come from beyond the line of sight. Chief checks his gun and chambers a round, pushing ET back. Stalking the noise to a high point they look down and see a bunch of teenagers fighting in a circle. They are laughing and its likely horse play but Chief is annoyed so he fires a shot in the air, causing the rowdy group to break and run. From this vantage they can see a good place to wait for some game to cross their line of sight. Normally human activity is enough to scare off deer, the scent of hair products, cologne, human food can all cause a dry run on a hunt. This doesnt seem to be a problem, with in minutes a doe and fawn wander into the meadow. Shooting mothers and their young is illegal and the Chief may be a rebel but thats not how he does things. In the scope the doe and her calf are startled by something off to their left. Passing the rifle to ET, Chief takes binoculars and looks far off into the edge of the meadow and doesnt see any thing big. ET jumps back from the rifle and Chief peers down the scope. A large Black Tail Buck has attacked the Mother Doe and her Fawn, trampling and biting them. The Buck has something wrong with its face, some serious injury to one eye and the flesh ragged against pink bone. The Chief fires a shot hitting the Buck in the shoulder and like something he has never seen, it lets off a roar like a Bear and charges them. Chief isnt one to panic, he chambers another shot and misses, hitting the dirt. Trying again he nails the Buck right in the heart but it doesnt go down. Takes a shot between the eyes to down the animal. The Chief reaches the Buck. It smells like poison. It has some bulbous growth coming out of its throat, breathing out something noxious like ammonia or some other caustic chemical. The growth is full of black veins and is a strange color like an internal organ or some rare jellyfish. The sky seems like its vibrating, tumultuous violence above the visible layer makes it seem like its boiling, black clouds lit from above by spiderwebs of lightning. The thunder is so high that it seems to echo off the valleys and mountain tops long after its visible light an anomaly that makes ET pause and the skin on the back of his neck and arms break out in goosebumps. ET heads to the Doe and her Baby who are mutilated and kicking wildly. ET is hesitant to approach, kind of in shock. Before he knew what was happening the doe bit into his shoe and the mother smashed into him from the side. Sending him tumbling head over heals down the slope. The Chief came running and clubbed the mother with a cruel thud, sending the baby streaking off into the woods. Today seemed as if getting any game was in the cards but the Chief hacked off the Bucks head to show the local Vet in town. Back on the road, they must have got turned around. The Chief knows these mountains from birth but where the main highway was has long since eroded, which is impossible because they came this way hours ago. Feeling the earth tremor and hitting the brake from a slamming road rising to meet them. They didnt have time to brace or curl up before the sideways inertia took them into a tumble. Spinning like a top until coming to rest against an abandoned train car out in the woods. Crawling from the wreaked 1970 GMC K2500 Super Custom pick up they are bloody from superficial injuries to the face and hands but nothing broken. ET feels a chill in the air as he gasps at the bizarre place they landed from rolling down the hill. It was a clearing in the trees full of shipping containers and endless mountains of black body bags. Among rows of grey military tents there are wraiths standing in a circle around a long trench in the ground. The wraiths wear florescent yellow hazmat suits and lifeless grey gas masks with black round eyes. The men in rubber suits barely notice the crash or the wounded survivors who are stumbling up to them. ET sees a helicopter trailing smoke from its engine struggling to stay straight, its tail out of control flapping like a panicked fish before it disappears behind the trees in an fireball of bright orange. The Chief walks a few feet and with out a sound collapses. ET never saw the soldier in the gas mask smash his head from behind with the stock of an M16. After that the world becomes etherial, sounds feel like they are spinning, his head feels like its speeding and his heart is dropping. He has a dream about sirens, flashing lights and roaring animals in a flooded zoo. He feels an iv being jammed in his arm and his clothes being cut off. He thinks he sees his father and several doctors discussing his status. ET is so delirious he cant make out a since word. The room is tilting and they inject some new drug into his arm. He has glimpses of changing seasons out the window and a dozen different roommates whimpering behind the curtain. He has an itch in his toes and next to his balls that is so strong he wants to scream. Something like an insect bite or spark from a blazing camp fire in his eye. He hears wind chimes, dogs howling and an EEG machine monitoring his brainwaves as he wakes up in a dark hospital room closed off behind blue rolling curtains between the beds. He wants to call someone but a tube in his throat prevents it. He gags on the hard plastic forced down his larynx. He hears laughter in the hall of women and some kind of strange 50s tv show is strobing his eyes with washed out scenes of people recoiling from some stalking fiend of b movie stardom. Zerkalnoye Otrazheniye Ruchya Зеркальное Отражение Ручья советский детективный журнал. The favorable tidings of the most honorable and noble party of governing council advisors had planned to create a new international sea port on the tourist destination of the Aral Sea. Smaller than the Caspian and Black Sea, the Aral was far more prone to military testing and civilian fisher infrastructure. The Air Port was to be a fabulous international terminal that was built on oyster beds newly uncovered by the receding water levels. The addition of American planes never came but several European countries and points of interest in South East Asian countries has connecting flights so it would be normal to see Swiss, Italians, Indonesians and tourists from Hong Kong so take in the Mirror Like vistas of the Aral. Fabulous and rare dishes were on the menu, Tiger Belly, Reindeer, Giant Squid, Panda, Mongolian Horse living in open air atriums to have the freshest delicacies. A forgotten project of the Soviets was infecting Killer Whales with a brain parasite for weaponized work that was intended for use in the Black Sea to induce accidents as these beasts where trained in taking down luxury yachts for assassinations. They were able to scuttle large boats and then pick off the life rafts. This project was deemed as more of a select operation for black hats, not something that would be useful in the coming third world war. Unfortunately the program was cancelled and a unwise technician dumped the surviving baby stock of the Whales into the Aral testing ground after the final culling of the original test group from the late 1950s. The Airport named after Stalins Pet Moray Eel. ߧԧ֧ݧڧߧ ӧ֧ݧѧߧ, Anzhelina Svetlana which means in english, Angel who shines like the stars. Creating a wholly new architecture style that was largely copied from the Frank Loyd Wright Imperial Tokyo Hotel that was demolished in 1968 that was a favorite of Comrade Stalin and his forebears of the Politburo Khrushchev and Brezhnev who after killing Stalin wanted to maintain a political tie to the mighty hero Stalin in the second world war, but move away from purges, secret police and crushing repression of the Stalin years. Ironically the Killer Whale program was named after Comrade Stalin and was his brain child he had thought of while on holiday on the Black Sea. His compatriots at that time were largely yes men and would devote resources to any wild ideas he had, like air breathing packs of Killer Whales trained in sabotage and mass murder of US airmen in sinking carrier groups during nuclear war. The group of Orcinus Orca that proliferated in the Aral has become an amusement when small. Bumping into tourists boats or laying out on the salt marshes breathing air and hoping after wounded land life. The extent of their difference between their unaltered ancestors was stark. These Orca would peel the skin back from their skulls to menace curious tourists. Not only could they survive days out of the water, beached on the Oyster-beds but they also had a defense mechanism on land. They could exhale a toxic gas that made any victims in proximity feel lethargic and unable to run. So as these giant beasts would be unable to swim while on beaches and rock bars, they could cause their human prey to stumble and fall or be completely paralyzed as swarms of them hopped on their bellies to tear them to pieces. This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. Its unknown how quickly this developed as the selling point of the place was to see these amazing creatures. Its possible that a subtle intoxication of the tourists and staff has let their guard down. From 1968 until the massacre in 1971 when the Air Port was abandoned there were very few incidents, mostly to foreign staff and trainers from India and Sudan who went missing while on the Oyster-beds at night. The day the Air Port was over taken happened suddenly. Larger groups of these ܧѧܧ, էѧѧ ӧ٧է had broken the large glass windows and were lounging in the atriums and concourses. Business went on as usual as the young were shot on dragged out with meat hooks. Larger Air Breathing Orca ܧѧܧ, էѧѧ ӧ٧է were left alone and fed buckets of fish to keep them away from the tourists. The inevitable happened when a group of female soccer players from Uruguay and the Falkland Islands surrounded a pod of several mothers and their calves and 3 males. The women and their boyfriends were rendered in a halcyon state of amusement until they were set upon. Torn to pieces in front of international news cameras. All at once the groups on the Oyster beds, inside the terminals and on the tarmac began hopping after workers and flight crews. The live game in the restaurant were the first to panic and several of the wild animals broke from their glass enclosures and fled the area while the humans had far less sense. Many seeing the bloodshed stayed to gawk at the feeding frenzy. Somehow the gas these beast exhaled had gotten a hold of 2 pilots on different planes that were so distracted by the scene on the ground during take off crashed the planes into the tidal pools of the Aral. Over all the death toll was 330 with 2 dozen missing and presumed dead. The survivors were a group of Palestinian and Japanese terrorists who had been waiting for a chance to skyjack a plane heading to Switzerland and Germany with help of the Red Brigades. This incident was hurriedly covered up by Spetznaz who were able to track the camera crews back to Europe to stage suicides and plant confession notes of the fabricated story about the Air Port in Aral that did not exist. The Aral Sea was allowed to dry up and fishermen in the area continued to turn up missing, boats abandoned and entire coastal cities bulldozed from memory. Now the beautiful Aral is a mostly marshes, rusting ships left in a desert of isolation. The Orca project and massacre is relegated to urban legend as the water quality and depth is no longer able to support large sea life. There are plans to revitalize the region, pump in sea water and bring a new era of wealth and prosperity to this forgotten and desolate chapter in history. Chapter 11: The Ithsmus of Endlessness Life was overwhelming to Deputy Ch''k. He used to come to Echo Beach with his wife when they were in high school. It over looks the bay side islands and main causeway to the mainland that took a long northeast route. This was a US territory, seized with out treaty or funds allocated. His people have been shoved around for years, villages torn down for Naval bases, kids stolen away to Catholic schools. They were technically in Canada on the map, tied into the Prince William Sound by a network of causeways. This no mans land was finally given back to his tribe when the shipyards went bust and the ground water was full of so many cancers that the military didnt want to clean it up so it was abandoned. Families where are named after animal clans. Eagle-Ch''k'', Elk-Gowukn, Wolf-Goch, Whale-Yy, Bear-Sek, Raven-Yil, Beaver-Sugeide, Seal-Tsh, Honey Bee-Gundas''aje, Duck-Tawk. There is a beauty here that defies the surrounding terrain. A microclimate of vast ecological diversity. Animals found here are listed extinct elsewhere. Songbirds, mammals and marine life could make this an oasis in the world outside. The families here speak the Tlingit and Haida languages, share customs but they are unrecognized by larger Federally funded tribes. Many people here survive on welfare. The causeway brings in outsiders and death. Abandoned logging camps mean the roads here are perfect for big rigs and many young girls here run away or are found dead in equal number. He picks up the golden tinged sand and casts it into the sea foam as he takes one last look at the causeway and bridge where his wife died, that cleaved his head open in a giant hook scar along his scalp. Leaving him neurologically damaged, perhaps more emotionally than mentally. Radio squawking as the dawn sun turns from red to silver on a white horizon of morning mist. Birds fleeing the cold fly south over head. The call was about a body. A young woman found wrapped in a carpet and hidden in a pile of snow that hadnt melted in the summer thaw as it sat in the shadow of the mountain. He drives his tan and brown police Bronco to the scene. A drunk driver at hit the snow pile and revealed a human foot protruding. Locals with axes and pry-bars dashed open the snow pile that had sat so long it had settled into a block of dirty ice. Full of leaves, broken brambles and fast food cartons. Inside, frozen solid was turquoise shag carpet with a womans feet protruding from the bottom. Unable to unroll the carpet it was transported whole to defrost at the station and await the Medical Examiner. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. The Sheriff as a small and brutish man who although claiming Native ancestry looked more like a balding Eastern European. He made sexual jokes and had a loud and dismissive tone with subordinates. They call the Sheriff Naak''w s''aati or Witch Man, not because he is particularly powerful or mysterious, but their other term of disparagement Skookum means Sasquatch or White Man is a word he knows and reacts violently to. The Sheriff comes from the the Seal and Bear clans that have died out because he never had kids and his sisters family were killed in a fishing boat accident back in the 70s. They own a junkyard and handles most of the impounds with exclusive contact with the state of Alaska. Also makes him the town used car salesman. The Deputies group up around the coffee vending machine joking around sports and current news headlines. Once the M.E. arrives from the mainland they huddle around the square window as Sheriff Sugeide watches the frozen carpet cut off with a bone saw. Inside is a perfectly preserved Native Women. Jane Doe is mid 20s, tan skin, approx 130 pounds and 5.6. She has silver duct tape around her mouth and the horrible part. Blue Draino coming out of her nose and had caustic acid wounds, burned out pieces of her eyes. The burns were deep and black from age. She was beautiful once and somebody killed her and discarded her corpse in a pile of snow beside a road. A sad reality for Native women across the new world. Chapter 12: The Dust House Reptile There is a place where time stands still. Every one who goes there feels unsettled. Its as if a pitcher of water cracked and allowed centipedes and biting worms to molt their corpses into a stagnant miasma of brackish stasis. Property records for the great house that exists there are nebulous, military owned it for decades. It was likely built as a Russian fishery. The cement layers of toxic debris, ebbing in the tide and leaving broken stone and rebar out in the miles of silt and mire. The windows make you feel like the entire structure, hundreds of thousands of tons was picked up and set back down at perverse angle. This may be the worst place to search for missing persons. The military abandoned this howling decay of silos, fish processing plants besides the flooded Dunich-Metcalf salmon cannery when the base became a superfund site in the 1980s. It was easier to let it silt over than decontaminate. The depression era sign of a dancing fish with a top hat and violin is still visible under years of cryptic HP Lovecraft and Led Zeppelin graffiti. Everywhere you look glass bottles are in piles several feet high from horizon to the sea. Tin cans floating in the tide, heavy machinery stripped to bones and air craft all lie open to the elements. What isnt turning green with moss is totally broken open with oxidization and wood beetles. Among the ruins, willows growing from crawling pools among over turned freighters, shredded train cars and stands of invasive trees reclaiming the edges of reality. Rumors of blind and rabid people animals prowling the fringes of the former base have persisted from even before ww1. There are rumors once this was a mind control testing site, where Naval Intelligence shared facilitates with the Airforce but no one can remember a time where the base was actually open despite pictures in the mayors hall and police station of trucks with missiles being offloaded cargo planes. Deputy Ch''k couldnt stand the frogs. So many frogs screaming from the bogs, accusing the tide of abandoning them far inland where bird estuaries have replaced runways, munitions ranges for tanks and helicopters discarded in states of undress. There is a shrill whistling here of coastal violence where rusted metal screams towards dark skies and sporadic lightning. Sound here is strange. In one spot you would be terrorized by rusty sheet metal windmills making a sound like nails on a chalk board, 5 feet to the left dead silence. Not even your heart beat, just nothing like the vacuum of space. Crows that live here are territorial, swatting and pecking at the search team. One of many anomalous oddities around here. The Dust House was an opulent palace stripped by centuries of vandals harvesting copper from the onion domes and minarets. Cast Iron statues accusing eyes glare at the Sheriffs as they violate decades of bird shit and feathers. Something instinctively harmful was in the air. Like years of fur and dander in a cat ladies house. Every surface was covered in a noxious powder that makes the eyes and throat chalky. Like prison soap or primitive lime for dissolving bodies in a mass grave. Furniture was smashed to pieces, likely for firewood as the chimney was the the only thing in functional state. The place had some charm, candelabras, silver tea sets from imperial Russia and odd art left to be slashed up and spray painted by teenagers. The missing person was a toddler named Timmy Toolman who was playing nearby on the causeway where his mother pulled over to smoke a cigarette. They were on a trip from the Yukon to find the boys father who was a local fisherman but spread a rumor among the people back home he had died, despite their shared bank account still buying booze and cigars. The causeway they had been approaching the middle span was more than ten miles long. Spotted by nearly a dozen tidal islands that were underwater by dusk. The child had been playing with toys from Clash of the Titans and Tron. This had happened around Autumn 1983. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. The renewed interest in the case came from the mother telling a drifter she had drowned her son and hid his body. The mother Nhean Cynthia Malvo was a refugee of the Cambodian genocide. She was half Danish, had come to the pacific north west and lived with her parents who were killed in a mugging in Seattle in the early 80s. Making her somewhat of a street urchin, con artist, prostitute and heroin addict. Giving conflicting statements it is thought she was either lying for attention or had a subconscious urge to be executed by the state due to depression. Assisted by the mother, she had obviously been taking pills all morning and kept falling on her face in the mud by dusk. Soaking wet, she was wearing a Deputies jacket and trying to sabotage the search. There was a stench in the air. Not quite of fish or rot, but of half submerged deteriorating trees. Coming to what looked like a crater, there was an elephant graveyard. Knowing this was a problem that would have them dealing with state red tape from archeologists and universities, the Sheriff wrote it off and continued into the ruins. Things here were odd, sea shells turned into glass, carbonized trees and whale bones making the horizon seem otherworldly. The Dust House was smoking as if it was burning. Which proved to be an optical illusion. Something on really cold days gives a black wind its like the actual light is affected by little glitches in the spectrum, like pieces of the universe are bleeding through the fabric of time. It only happens in violent rain or times when the wind is hard but snow flakes are so fine they streak past like little golden drops of honey. The mother was babbling about seeing a giant bird take her son, about drifters walking beside rail road tracks jeering at her and a cop car that followed them at a distance and came to a stop when she did. A gas station attendant who saw them earlier said he thought she was stealing and when confronted she kicked the antique gas pump over, ripping the hose out and kicking a pail of rain water and cigarette butts into his expensive sneakers. This area was known only as the outskirts where only an abandoned housing development came any where close to. This was a forgotten hobble of factories, scrapyards for ships and full of drifters who came walking down the causeway fleeing some crime spree on the mainland. Inside the body was there, almost as if every one who came there had missed it. In a bathtub dragged into a victorian greenhouse, it rested on a little island in a large empty fountain in the wrought iron atrium. Inside was the corpse of the little boy, still holding his action figures but with out several organs. The body was well preserved but bleached completely white from years and dust. His empty eyes showed some kind of pecking, birds must have got to him, but there was no denying the other signs showed a human hand. Medical equipment for surgery was still pulling back the skin of his exposed chest cavity. There is no way this body had been in a place full of parties, hobo bon fires and junkies for over 10 years. He had hemostats that dopers use to smoke joints spreading his chest cavity open. Scattered among the rubble were giant animatronics with rubber skin and fur falling off them. Some were dinosaurs, others neanderthals and mammoths. Likely from the abandoned theme park but it always gave you a startle to see these skeletal shapes standing in the the gloom. Maybe the place was the maintenance mans work shop. There was a performance art group that rented the space in 1985 called Level 6 Network Men that built props for several cyber punk tv shows like Max Headroom. Thats just as likelythis was the lair of a thief or terrorist who was scavenging parts. The overall mood they set where horrifying. Seeing neolithic cave people that had decayed into the visage of mummified corpse, giving off odors like a dentists office when you get new fillings. Calling for an airlift for the corpse and the other cops leaving to return to duty. Deputy Ch''k sat on broken glass and pieces of chipped pottery on the edge of the fountain while he fought the urge to light up a smoke. He had quit over and over but still kept a pack just in case the job was so overwhelming he needed one. Thinking he was alone he lifted his ass to pass gas and heard a giggle from across the room. Embarrassed but still in the cloth of authority. He chastised the mother for not returning with the police, but he realized if she was still here they either didnt consider her a suspect or didnt care enough to keep tabs. She asks for a cigarette seeing him flipping the pack over between his fingers and he gives her the whole pack still shrink wrapped. Now she is asking for a light. He says, You want me to smoke it for you too? She is attractive but with an air of untrustworthiness like she would spike your drink and take off in your car. Going through her story, he doesnt hear any distinct clues that lead her to have murdered her son. Taking a close look at her, he sees extensive skin grafts on her neck and chest. When she notices him looking she shyly pulls the deputies jacket closed in the cold. She whispers something about a car crash and doses off leaning on his shoulder. Chapter 13: The E.R. ET had sparse memories of the crash. He remembered a helicopter in the air, the fire department medics and nurses shining lights in his eyes and checking his injuries. He was trapped in a nightmare. Walking in a half light world of abandoned cabins and coughing from spores in the air. Every where he went the town was abandoned and half buried in silt. The school, his house, his grandparents all looked like they were hit by a wall of water. The people he did see were all burned up and shrieking, shambling around carrying dead babies or being pushed into pits by men in radiation suits. Where there should be forrest he sees endless white plastic mass grave markers. He wandered endlessly looking for some vestige of society he knew but every thing looked like a nuclear bomb went off. Stray dogs ran in packs, and even they looked dusty and starved. Full of parasites and mange. The world was turning red, an inky darkness smothered the sky like Hiroshima. Trees reduced to smoking cinder, black pillars of fire in the distance. He felt like this was more than a dream. There were odd things, peoples faces chewed off like pink skeletons. In the sky the days were not the usual Alaskan grey of storm clouds and rain. They were a sickly reddish purple, the color of infection. Every where he went he found rubble, cement buildings crushed, mass graves and sounds of gunfire in the distance. Such an ominous atmosphere. Among the ruins he found so many dead people, bloated, whose eyes were popping out of their heads. Everywhere moths, dragon flies and grass hoppers hovered in the air in black clouds. Birds were falling from the sky but there were so many, crows blotted out the sun. Crushed skulls filled cars, people had died in rush hour traffic, glass melted and running down the sides of the cars like frozen drool. Everywhere, rust and blight. ET had other dreams of bizarre vistas, giant brains and eye balls floating in the sky, shattered planets and imploded corpses floating in space. Astronauts walking through vast empty sea floors full of sunken ships and coral reefs among millions of rotting whales and squids. He dreamed some mutated people had caught him and were harvesting his organs. Cruel faces full of stitches and sewn closed eyes, metal bones and overseen by creatures that were like internal organs floating in giant glass jars with insect-like metal armatures to use tools and operate walls of computer screens. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. He dreamed of his sister and grandparents walking in a playground as H-bomb went off on the horizon, too far to send a blast wave but it turned the sky dark as night and the caustic rain burned them with giant back rain drops while lightning hit the jungle gym they were hiding under, cooking them instantly to burned meat. Other times the conversations of nurses took on an evil tone, invading his dreams with illegible gossip that sounded like the buzzing of insects. He imagined a whole hospital full of skeletal staff, carrying out their daily tasks but falling apart with rot and lidless eyes. He felt these corpses washing his body, changing tubes in his arm and inserting tubes in horribly painful procedures. He tried to yell for them to stop, for the nightmare to end. The thing that woke him up was the pain. Incredible pain. His arms and legs were bolted to metal frames. His jaw had the same thing. Giant screws holding it closed and a dry feeling of a huge plastic lump in his throat. Trying to move but his eyes totally swollen shut. A nurse says, Watch out he is fighting the breathing tube. A doctor runs in and says, Its good he is waking up, but if he moves around those pins will shatter whats left of his bones. He hears nurses trying to be soothing. Asking him to calm down. He tries to speak but feels like he cant breathe. He is immobilized and before he can ask about The Chief he is sedated back into a black sleep with out dreams. Even in this state he is aware of the warm sun on his skin and the pleasant sounds of birds at play outside the window. He feels relief that this isnt some prison world of vivisection and no one was here to harvest his organs like a Palestinian. Chapter 14: Mad-god Loses an Eye Mad-god wakes up in his home away from home. An abandoned passenger car out in the woods. He has a cubby in the loft at the grandparents hippie pad but he doesnt like to bring girls over there and have his grandma lay it on thick like some chick he met riding the bus is going to have his kids, showing some doper chick on a home pass from the battered women shelter his baby pictures. Here he is right at home. A series of turn of the century trains from when this part of Alaska was having its own gold rush and retreats popped up around the lakes and hot springs. That was the name on the side of the train in gold leaf, Alaskan Gold Rush and Hot Springs Express. They were a mess when he discovered them as a kid. So black and dirty they arent even tarnished by graffiti. He pulled one of the huge metal doors off with a tow truck during a short lived gig as a repo man. He unbolted all the chairs and created a kind of outside living room on the roof of the train. Here he scavenges old Harleys and builds skateboard ramps. Next to him is My Nguyen, Vietnamese drug queen-pin who he met in Graduate school. She came here originally as part of a court ordered rehab, now any time her longtime boyfriend beats her up, this is where she hides out before going back to him. She brought him Thai food all the way from Seattle. She is plump by asian standards, picked up about 30 pounds of prison weight when she did 4 years on her boyfriends drug trafficking beef to save him from doing life. She is stacked, huge T&A on a tiny asian waist. She has a voice like she is singing, but as the most toxic and abusive sense of humor. She relishes the opportunity to talk people to the point of tears and push peoples buttons and not surprisingly she only dates convicts who abuse her. Mad-god is the exception, he spoils her with more sex than she can handle but every once in a while she turns on him. Mad-god gets the impression she is schizophrenic and hallucinates but never turns her away when she comes looking for him. She was about 5 years older, in her early 30s. She was a nympho but always brought cataclysms and violence to Mad-gods placid world in the splendor of unspoiled wilderness and breath taking scenery. The Alaskan Gold Rush and Hot Springs Express is their little love shack, full of scavenged furniture, a king sized bed and even a big screen TV and VCR. Mad-god has decked it out with wood stoves, stolen satellite dishes and a compost toilet that unfortunately attracts packs of wolves. The pack of black wolves here are largely tame because he throws them bbq roadkill but about once a year it leads to a sketchy situation where he needs to either fire a shot or beat one to death when his position as the alpha is in question. Maddog despite being to prison twice and being a member of an outlaw biker club really just wants to be a hippie. He hates having to beat the shit out of people. He is a joker, a lover but when somebody fucks with his family thats the exception. He heard a rumor of some drifter beating up and robbing his nephew. So today he goes into town with a score to settle. Checking the scene of the crime at the abandoned theme park, he hears the other hobos side of the story. They didnt know, didnt see, and if they were there tried to help. This sounds like bullshit. He knows they watched the new guy and his underage girlfriend jump on ET while he was asleep, likely helped them selves to any thing else in his pockets. These clowns arent helping, they dont know who he is talking about but thinks the guy he means is drinking down at hobo beach. Climbing down the tunnel he doesnt see any body but sees some half done graffiti. EYE DIE FLY, the fill ins are mostly down but no final outline. Maddog used to tag in the 80s. Still has some art skills but his instincts tell him this is the guilty party. He shakes a couple empty spray cans and finds one with some juice so he crosses out the pieces and writes Mad-god is looking for you! 187! Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. Right as he finishes what he is doing he can hear somebody on the latter behind him come to an abrupt stop. Its him! He sees the mother fucker! They lock eyes but as Mad-god takes two quick steps across the slick green moss and slips, he hears this asshole laugh at him. Regaining his footing he gets to the ladder and the guy was gone. Ran off. Mad-god crests the top of the cement river and the shit head has a huge head start, disappearing around the side of a building. Chasing him to no effect. He is either hiding from him or has totally outpaced him. In a black rage Mad-god goes around all the places the street kids, winos, taggers and runaways congregate. Its a dry run, nobody is out except the Murphster. Maddog half way though Murph had died or gotten some heavy time. He hasnt been around for a couple years. As soon as the Murphster sees Mad-god they rush into a smiling embrace. Murphster was a cool Rastafarian homeless dude from New York City who comes around every couple years to skate the spots and hangs out. He had long deadlocks almost to his knees. Always has some bizarre tshirt you cant read with crazy visuals he makes for Seattle bands. He was a tagger. Probably the first one around here. Murphs tag is Destroyer CTC and knows exactly who Mad-god is talking about messing with his nephew. Murph confesses he used to buy ET beer in middle school. Deciding to help Maddog find this character, they check all the abandoned buildings and boats where he could be hiding. They walk in circles for hours and right when his feet where aching and was thinking about eating. There he was, coming out of the liquor store with a bag of beer and several young girls. Mad-god doesnt say any thing, just charges forth and smashes this blonde tweaker in the mount with his fist. Knocking the guys front teeth out while Murph snatches the bag of beer, as an asian girl in the group pulls out a 40oz of old english and smashes Mad-god over the head with it. Mad-god is throwing TKOs but the the squirrelly tweaker is juking them with sidesteps. The ones that landed after the first couple as glancing blows the the forehead. The tweaker is faster with his punches but also scratching at Mad-gods eyes. This infuriates Mad-god even more. Murph is throwing random punches into who ever he can reach. Screaming back and forth with the girls. Murph tries to end the fight with a brick but the asian girl stabs him in the bellybutton. Making him miss and cracks Mad-god in the side of the head. They both go down and its getting vicious. The tweaker bites Mad-gods throat and tries to shove one of his long fingernails into Mad-gods eye socket. Mad-god recoils and snaps two of the guys fingers. While distracted by the pain Mad-god lands some super heavy hits that likely broke the Blonde Tweakers jaw. The blonde Tweaker goes totally limp and Mad-god continues pounding his still head with horrific hits. This turns into a bloody brawl with the girls and Murphster. Mad-god beating this guy almost to death until the cops show up to save his life. Mad-god is in shock, his vision on the right side is gone. Carefully touching his eye lid, it feels different. Deflated and leaking some kind of fluid that isnt tears or blood, more like mucus or pus. He doesnt need confirmation from the cops, he lost vision in his right eye. Cops dont wait for explanations, they rush in with bean bag rounds and takers. Beating the crowd and putting every one involved in a Paddy Wagon. Chapter 15: Apoplectic Ignominy The next time ET awoke it was two months later. Blasting waves of heat and light as the nurses opened the curtains in his hospital room. An old man was in the next bed whimpering behind the dividing sheet. He was making a low sound between a hiss and a laugh followed by the sounds snip, snip. ET feels agony in his calves and stomach muscles twisting and knots. Waking startled he paws at his nose and mouth to be sure the breathing tube that has been torturing him in panic dreams is gone it is. Reaching down to his groin, ET checks if he has catheter still, he didnt. Making his way to sit up was a chore. Feeling white hot pain under the sedatives of druggy sleep made him partially aware of a dry tortured throat, raw and bloody from tubes forced into his collapsed lung and stomach. In the absence of intravenous clamps, he feels phantom blazing throbbing medical hostility in his bladder and colon from sharp plastic tubing leaving interior wounds language has no voice for. He feels like the nurses ran caustic acid through his internal organs. ET noted that this time his arms, legs and jaw were free from the metal brackets and pins bolted into his skin. Keeping him immobile and uncomfortable in months of endless bad dreams. Careful to keep all his IV tubes like he had seen in movies. He couldnt figure out how to lower the metal arm guard so he scooted to the edge of the bed and with out any grace at all fell directly on his face with the back of the gown open to greet the hot female nurses who just walked in with his bare ass. They didnt make a fuss or laugh, they ushered him into the bathroom and went back to attend to the old man. Sleeping through bones resetting is an odd thing. Those kind of growing pains in reverse. The devil has strange tricks for the paralyzed and the traumatized locked in medically sedated coma. Waking in a world of daylight feels less real than the german expressionist dreamscapes he felt trapped in for centuries. Broken bones and screws feel kind of good when the ache of the void has settled into the tightening of leg braces or wire holding still a glass jaw. ET trying to stand up straight almost bites it again, catching the hand rail to not fall over when he hears the nurses scream. Rushing out despite the giant piss stain on the front of his gown. He sees the nurses trying to restrain the old man who is digging small surgical scissors under his eye lid and into the back of his eye socket as if scratching an itch. It looks like the old man had been snipping away at his eye lids because they were almost non existent. He hears an alarm sound and ducks back into the bathroom as burly orderlies rush in to restrain the old man. ET sees what look like dragonfly wings protruding from the mans temples and some kind of larva falling from his nose and mouth. With that ET was moved to his own room where his clothes were folded up on the bed and with in 10 minutes was in the lobby with his grandparents. They looked like they hadnt slept in days, asking endless questions about what was going on. ET was scared to ask if the Chief made it, and his question was answered when outside on the curb the Chief was smoking a joint with his hand up a nurses skirt. They told him Mad-god had roughed up the guy who beat him up but was stuck in jail until his court date in a couple weeks. At his grandparents they all agreed to watch some horror movies on VHS but ET couldnt stay awake. Next thing he knew it was time for school. Walking to school he noticed all his graffiti was dissed and craziest of all. Enrique and Max where tagging the rival crew, striking up Ether and Marble DIE Crew now. That was a real kick in the balls. He has known them since pre school and betrayed him with out hesitation. Right when he arrived he felt something was off. Other students and teachers were staring, whispering and laughing at him. Nobody said any thing or greeted him. Making his way out to the lunch table dragged away from the others where the stoners and losers hung out. He was aghast to see the asian chick whose boy friend robbed him, sitting with his friends. He can see Enrique and Max sneering at him and when he goes to sit down they stop him. Enrique says, You got a lot of nerve coming over here. We heard you got marked out and didnt do shit! His jaw still likely broken or at the least still causing pain, ET doesnt respond. He is glaring at the asian chick who jumps up and punches him in the eye. Who the fuck you staring at bitch? To ETs surprise his oldest friends Enrique and Max join in, hitting him with plastic drink cups frozen from the morning frost and a padlock on a blue plastic bike chain. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. ET gets a couple slaps in and kicks the asian chicks knee, jarring it and sending her down into a cold pool of muddy water. She screams in pain and before ET knows it, he was grabbed by his collar and dragged into the Vice Principals office. Sitting there alone, waiting for some condemnation and skewed version of what just happened, he walks out while no one is paying attention. Decides to spend the day skateboarding around and planning his revenge. Catching up with Murphster who started his graffiti crew CTC, ET fills him in on Enrique and Maxs treason. Dissing the crew and paling around with the enemy. Murph is beyond the high school drama of the toys. Showing his scar from being stabbed by the asian chick, he tells ET what went down with Mad-god and the blonde tweaker. Murphster has a date with an older chick who feeds him down at the diner and checks on his stomach wound, so he fades off into the rare noon sun. Coming to the abandoned paint store they looted all their vandalism materials, his heart dropped as he sees the Blonde Tweeker in there, eyes hostile from the darkness beyond the smashed front window. Feeling the serrated kitchen knife in his pocket, ET decides today will be the day and openly brandishes it as he steps through the broken window frame onto the crunchy safety glass covering the floor. Seeing a lighter spark, illuminating the Tweekers face. He can see this dude is at least in his 30s. Looks like some kind of homeless wizard or meth cook, maybe both. Hearing the unmistakable click of a revolver. Lets get this sorted out before it gets out of hand. You want to smoke? ET listens to this clown introduce him self. I write F-L-Y, but you can call me Aqualung. My girlfriend writes EYE BALL DIE CREW. ET doesnt shake his hand. Picturing puncturing it with his blade honestly. You must be Zygote? ET takes the extended joint, ignoring the introduction. Taking a big hit and immediately starts coughing his lungs out. The Blonde Tweeker Aqualung has a raspy laugh like a chain smoker used to yelling over the noise of freight trains. Walking through the store ET sees this asshole has cleaned out as much spray paint in one week as his friends have in years. Leaving the place nearly empty. The Blonde Tweeker tells him to pick up some paint rollers and cans of paint. The Blonde Tweaker leads ET out the backdoor still at gunpoint, but making jokes and acting civil. ET hasnt forgotten the disrespect but has a cautious curiosity who this clown was and why he is in his town. Silently they walk through the woods to a place ET has never been before. A giant future site of a Dam with dozens of round tunnels dividing spillways into endless unpainted walls, newly poured cement in miles of tunnels, culverts and spillways. ET feels a mix of excitement of finding a new spot. In the back of his mind still thinking he is being led to a lonely place to be shot in the head and buried in a shallow grave in a soon to be flooded valley. The Tweeker asks if ET wants to help to a roller shot up the top of the dam. ET feels all kinds of hostile things he wants to say but in the end, ends up helping his rival do a big walk up blockbuster shot with 10 foot letters upside down from ropes tied to rebar on the Dam. Finishing up the piece, rain starts coming down, making all the letters bleed drips down the entire dam. They walk through the planned site for the dam to inundate with water and come to a little abandoned village. Totem poles as old as time sit sunbaked, bleached grey. Monoliths to the sea faring power and intellect these precontact marvels of the tribal people. The village didnt have a name, but due to the endless DIE graffiti he can tell this is their lair. Wind ravaged green tarps sweep off the village thats survived wild fires and tidal waves but about to die under the crushing onslaught of progress. ET can hear a screeching of fighter jets over head. Looking up he can see long chemtrails fading off the end of the planes. As the trails disperse into the air ET sees strange things in the puddles. Something almost invisible but squirming around, like something you see on an educational show about micro organisms. Feeling something sinister about where he is being led, his instinct is to head back towards town. Away from this stinging rain and the strange life in the pools where rain has collected. He sees the Blonde Tweeker disappear into one of the huts. Turning to run, ET trips over a girls lifeless body wrapped in a clear plastic bag. He doesnt know much about death, but its a girl with milky blue eyes and stench of rot is unmistakable. The Blonde Tweeker comes running out of the hut snarling and attempts to shoot ET in the back of the head. Pulling the trigger, the gun malfunctions, blows up in his hand. Turning his fingers into a garbled mess of exposed bone and missing digits. ET takes this as a chance to run, dashes back into town while the wild eyed Tweeker Aqualung hurls curses. Chapter: 16 The Stillborn Horrors of Test Tube Babies Brynjar Gustav Lennart was the local yokel. He was older than any one else still buying speed and eating every meal from the dumpsters behind the pizza spot. He would come into town with his pack of wild dogs and shopping cart full of strange things scavenged from the military base. He kept a long grey beard and walking stick capped off with a large geode, like something you would see the the fantasy art of Judy King Rieniets. Brynjar was probably in high school when Eisenhower was still a General but he was part of the cool underground of hermits, mystics and survivalists up in these mountains waiting for the end of time. He got every thing he needed on the mountain. As a strict pacifist he would only skin mountain lions, foxes and deer found dead on the road. Still highly illegal but didnt make him a poacher. He lived where the trees were so tall they blocked the sun with triple canopy. Where nameless rivers spider webbed the landscape, disappearing into caves. Where old fire towers were now staffed by snipers for illegal canibus grows from the local biker gangs. It was not a place for hunters, only the lawless and savage living rough made these mountains home. His home was a huge tree house made out of pieces of cars and airplanes that went down around here. His domain was beyond the old mines on Surveillance mountain. He lived in a place where you could find hand fulls of rubies, garnets and sapphires scattered across the ground. He had fooled a couple truckers with bags of fools gold he traded for a boat, horse or donkey. This made him a thorn in the side of the cops who had to go up into the hills to arrest him. Today he had a story to tell about bodies he had found who got up and chased him. Deputy Ch''k thinks he might be schizophrenic. He spoke with the clipped air of an intellectual leaning heavy into mad scientist territory. Brynjar always has outlandish lies to tell about tribes of proto-human cannibals living in the Washing Machine creek, nuclear bombs being tested in theendless miles of exposed sea floor beyond the island or finding some kind of downed man made UFO he wanted to part out for scrap. Countless times the Sheriffs office had to break up fights between him and loggers encroaching on his woods. Brynjar had a bad habit of sabotaging bull dozers and burning surveyors vehicles and tents, he went to prison for it twice. He was an early member of the Earth First terrorist group. Despite years of false accusations, outright lies and wild goose chases reports of bodies warranted a visit up to the mountain. Brynjar was feeding his yelping mongrels pieces of tuna he was fishing from a can with his fingers. Sending them away with a hand full of gravel. He looked out to lunch, barely acknowledging the police lights. Coming peaceful he rode in the front seat and mostly stared up at the sky and making cryptic statements under his breath when asked what his raving phone call to dispatch was about. Having Brynjar in his Bronco was not pleasant. The man smelled sharp like old beer, piss, vodka and rotten shoes. Like some kind of legend from the three wise men in the bible he wore layers of old world silk tapestry for clothes. Odd colors you dont see often like Lavender, Cerulean Blue, Amethyst, Indigo like he was clothed in the night sky. He had all kinds of costume jewelry made of plastic, plated gold and glass. The worst fashion of the 1960s all concentrated into one specter of bad life choices. Brynjar was dressed so preposterous. He actually had on the wizard hat from Fantasia, blue with yellow stars on a pointed nome cap like a goddamned maniac. He wore vintage spectacles with extra armatures for old fashioned jewelers lenses. Attached to John Lenon style circular reading glasses like some kind of 19th century Bavarian alchemist or Carl Jung. Now when asked questions he was playing the silent treatment except when it was to point to sudden turn offs or to note a rare bird in the sky. Brynjar was originally from Europe. No one was sure what country but he used to run the rides at Red Erik Raggnarsens Silly Scandanavia, back then he wasnt such a nuisance. He lived in town and used to seem halfway normal. That was before his common law wife was struck by lightning while out at sea. Her body needing to be identified is what set him off. Looking into her fish chewed and blackened eyes is what made him move into the hills and live in a homeless camp. Crossing bridges that hadnt been maintained since the 30s was scary. Deputy Ch''k wasnt having much luck cracking the cases of the women found murdered recently, this would only add to the pressure. Mainland news crews hadnt caught on to their epidemic of missing and exploited women. This was a hot spot for disappearances. Locals had all kinds of stories about why this archipelago had so many deaths and unexplained phenomenon. Every thing from Yetis and Giant Birds, to Government Tests and ancient Druids who found Alaska and built underground complexes of tombs. Deputy Ch''k liked to read about these mysterious stories but didnt buy into it. When they make movies about Alaska they dont come here. It isnt the iced up desolation you think of when you picture Alaska. This was a wetter and more rocky terrain. Full of fjords, thousands of little islands and bunkers built to fight the Japanese during ww2. Coming to the end of the drive, Ch''k asks how Brynjar hikes up and down the mountain to his camp a couple times a day? Brynjar laughs, this isnt his camp. There was no way he would bring the fuzz back to his domain of solitude. This was just a place he liked to fish and take in the scenery. They hiked up and down several rises and places where flash floods had wiped out the trail to a place where sure enough there were pieces of bodies. In the ravine where Brynjar has come across the mysterious bodies he claimed got up and chased him like Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. There was some miscellaneous signs of violence, claw marks in mud, stains of blood and pieces of what looks like broken teeth. There were shards of metal, canvas from parachutes and equipment that Ch''k couldnt place. Looking around there were certainly people here bleeding out, and a chase. There was something unpleasant all over the ground, in pools and dripping from the trees. It was slime, some kind of clear gelatin that when caught in the beam of direct sunlight had something barely visible swimming around in it. Like primitive one celled organisms that cause brain parasites in standing water. Hearing sounds like pops and mechanical shrieks they move farther up the trail where they see a large white cloud rising from a valley beyond the trees. Closer they get there is signs of fire and impact but too far off to see clearly. Coming to a break in the trees its clear a large plane had gone down, military from the looks of it. Ch''k can see the tail end intact. Some kind of fine particulate was coming off the wing still. Making a powerful stream of the sprayed gas into a tower of white mist, hitting the edges of a cliff and drifting up in a concentrated column into the sky. There was a debris field hundreds of meters long that splintered trees and had smoking layers of twisted metal, still red hot. There was something eerie about this. Ch''k knows a military flight wouldnt be lost long, and the markings on the plane dont have any writing system he can read. Among the smashed crates, massive canisters in the steel fuselage and rows of dislodged empty seats there is something else. Glass vials, rubber tubing and broken containers of embryos. There is a bad smell in the air like chemicals, when Ch''k gets a whiff he covers his nose and orders Brynjar to do the same. What ever this fluid and fumes these corpses were bathed in wasnt smart to breathe. They tried to cover their faces with their shirts but it was a fools errand. Breathing this in made them both feel weak, itchy and sweaty all at once. The cloud manifesting above them was a warm gold and white from the setting sun, but inside it were all the iridescent colors of the rainbow, like an oil spill. Ch''k knows the radio signal would be scrambled up here, he does his best to get coordinates based on landmarks he can see on the horizon. Taking pictures of the site, Ch''k is startled by movement. He sees people far off in the wreckage. He starts to call to them when Brynjar stops him. Looking around the edges of the forrest, they see silhouettes. Their skin is black with spot of sharp pink, like exposed flesh. They look like pictures you see of the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Burned, naked and many with out lips, showing exposed teeth and eyeballs. The group he had first seek are crouched down tearing through piles of twisted metal. In a shock, Ch''k realizes what is happening here. They are eating the survivors alive. The group in the treeline stand silently, watching with glassed over eyes. His first thought is zombies, dead creatures in some optical illusion that seemed to be standing upright. Looking back at the first group, he can hear screams of people trapped under the wreckage. Firing a shot and warning who ever is over there to stand back. A shiver of abject terror fills him, all at once a roar comes from the darkness in the trees. The ones he saw are gone and Brynjar is already half a football field away, sprinting back to the Bronco. Ch''k panics. He isnt sure what the protocol is for unarmed / injured people gone feral, but he instinctively runs back to the trail. He cant see any pursuers but he feels a need to look back, like teeth and fetid breath of survivors driven mad by third degree burns were about to dig into the back of his neck. Its now the end of dusk, where the golden light tricks your eyes into missing the moving shapes in the blackness of shadow where your eyes cannot adjust quick enough. An odd thought crosses Ch''ks mind. A story about a tribe called the Jaak?w x?''eix? Jee-g?aas x?eitl Unwelcome or Uninvited, that had the same burned flesh and exposed facial bones. Its an old story, going back before the first European trappers from Russia came here before the foundation of America. Far out in the most unreachable depths of the forrest were wild men. People totally insane with ravenous cannibal ritualistic murder cults. A tribe who mutilates their own faces with horrible wounds, who would set on hunters who strayed into their territory. A kids story every one around here knew. Hearing scrambling up the rock face bellow them. Ch''k loses his footing and goes tumbling down into the midst of the crash. All around him he can hear snarling, sounds of limbs being wrestled from smoldering corpses and running. Pulling his service weapon and flashlight he is thinking if he has flash bangs in his belt or more likely left them in the truck because they were heavy and caused severe burns if triggered accidentally. In the darkness beyond the burning bodies and trees reduced to cinder he sees movement like wolves, circling the site, hunting him or worse as a distraction for actual killers just out of her peripheral vision. He spins around ready for contact but sees nothing that poses an immediate threat. Cautiously backing up the rock face he slides back down several times. Feeling that moment when your adrenaline goes stale and turns to pain in the face. He is ready to provoke a confrontation as violence he understands. Its the waiting to be leapt upon that terrifies him. As the wind kicks up he hears thumping engine above. Rotors cutting the smoke and fumes to reveal a blinding spotlight. Before he can judge his proper response, men in yellow rubber hazmat suits with machine guns pour from the darkness. Where he was sure there were some unconnected tribe of burning men, what he sees is a full strike group of soldiers and chemical responders in space suits. Before he can identity him self. He is slammed into the ground, disarmed and arrested. Brynjar is nowhere to be seen. First sign of trouble he melted into the shadows. Another group in pale blue paper suits stands back from the men with guns. These must be feds or military scientists. Ch''k knows they see his uniform, so indignant he stands silent when they violently seize him up from the ground. He doesnt know how or why but when he awakes he is back in his Bronco at the foot of the mountain. He felt bruises all over his body and smelled something unpleasant on his uniform. He knows this was no dream. He was spirited away from scene by military spooks. Chapter 17: Unfathomable Truths In Vietnam The Chief knew this was a dream, any time he hears 50s love songs or 60s bubblegum, its a dream. Rare songs from his childhood he never hears on the radio its a sure thing he is remembering a softer world where taste of spicy cinnamon or lemon drops were on girls lips. He wonders how he managed to have so many girlfriends when he was too young to do any thing about it. Had a pair of twin sisters named Missy and Kissy who used to let him hide in their barn when he was in trouble in school. He remembers his mother who died young. She had the face of an angel and the voice of a devil. She abandoned him to marry a jazz playing drifter and with in a month she was dead in a river with a needle stuck in her arm. He remembers his mother always smelled like devil grass and wine. She inherited some money and sent him to a boys home for delinquents because raising kids was cramping her social life. His mother had a really scratchy voice, when she was a runaway she had her throat slit in a park by a man she had robbed. She was so drunk she didnt even wake up, they found her wrapped in news papers in a park in White Horse. She day she died he was actually relieved, like a curse had been lifted from his soul. His mother was never shy about saying how much she hated him. Never said i love you except after she had done something so horrible it made the words take on an evil meaning. Like some empty phrase and fake tears were an even trade for destroying any moment of safety and joy he had as a kid. The Chief had no patience for bible school or stern work camps where they sent orphaned Indians, so he ran away. He spent some time down in Yakima, Dallas and Nashville. Stealing cars, breaking into grocery stores and riding freight trains. They were greasers, a gang of hooligans that swept into little towns like a tidal wave of break ins, larceny, drunk / disorderly and take over robbery. In his travels he met some rough characters during a snow storm in the rail yards of Denver. They formed a gang called drowned orphans and terrorized white towns. When it got hot with johnny law, they spent the cold months down in Baja. The leaders were Smiling Jack and Slow Joe, they were at least twice the Chiefs age. From the old generation of hobos from the depression. There were younger guys like Smart Alec, Smoking Sam, Blind Willy, Weird Wallace, Freddy the Fink, Hurtful Harry, Dick the Creep and a black blues player named Devil Johnson on the run for a murder back in Mississippi. They used to meet wealthy girls from private schools and have big parties out in the ghost towns of the south west. The last time, Chief was too drunk to walk they day they said he drove a car in a shootout after a robbery town in the Oklahoma panhandle. Since The Chief was a minor he got to go to Vietnam instead of the electric chair like the rest of his gang. The War was something else. The music, the hash, the cities were all so cool. The war was bloody and horrifying but his liberty in Saigon and Hue City were the best. A bunch of frisky women who liked to drink and listen to Jimi Hendrix. Unlimited chances to steal booze and weapons from the Army. He made a little side hustle selling VC weapons back home to Hippie radicals. People back in the states always wanted crazy stuff like human skulls, tiger bones, enemy knives and magical stuff from the orient. The Chief liked doing good acid and drinking good whisky. He reenlisted twice and hid a couple serious injuries because he thought the Army had answered all his questions. He would have stayed in for life if it wasnt for some court martial and suspicion of wrong doing. They tried to say he fragged an officer. Which he did, more than once but not on this occasion. There was no finks or rats in his squad so the guys all circled the wagons and said the guy was morose and likely did it to himself because they all liked him and tried to cheer him up. None of that was true. They painted the guy as a coward and cross dresser but really he was an A1 asshole, marching them right into a shooting gallery like expendable men in chess. These kind of officers didnt last. The soldiers werent there for patriotism or hate of the Viet Cong, they were drafted. This wasnt a cushy West Point appointment for them. A high kill rate comes with a 100% casualty rate where every body was guaranteed to lose an eye, a foot the use of their dick when their balls end up blown 500 feet away in a rice patty. The Chief lost all the best friends he ever had. By 1971 he was just sleeping walking though ambushes, with instincts taking over. Making stalking the VC and hitting the dirt to zero in on the poor bastards like a tiger on the prowl. He could have gotten some special forces wings, but for what? Maybe turning down the Rangers and jump school is why they shit canned him. Maybe it was because he was a leader with out the rank to go with it. He was busted down to private so many times it was a joke. The money was shit, his Vietnamese girlfriend was sleeping around in Saigon. A trip back to his hometown and body full of scar tissue was all he had to look forward to. Night terrors, a life of organized crime back at home. He learned a lot of tricks from some of the connected Italian guys from back east. Telling him how to do high end burglaries and hatchet jobs for the Mob. A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. The thing about the war was how addictive the action was. At first you were scared to death. Hiding in the elephant grass, practically dying from wet boots, jungle rot, insects and sores. Then somewhere half way though your tour it gets easy. When you first get to Nam you have no quarrel with the VC. Maybe even empathize with them. Then they try to stab you in the dark, drag your road dog into a tunnel and he is marked MIA and never seen again, they plant leaflets of blood splattered porn on you while sleeping that says. Next time GI. The Chief became an expert killing machine. Interrogation, castration, torture, amputation. All things they did first, became part of the language of combat. These were like second nature. Some of the more hard core guys used to boil the skin off bones and drink the broth. He wasnt that out there. He wasnt master bating with peeled off womens faces or keeping breasts and vaginal lips in zip lock bags like some guys. The Chief was a warrior of the Raven family like his sister and her children. His real name was Xots-?adaadoog Xak, meaning the Bears skinless head. He took personal interest in trailing squads of VC back to their strongholds. He was not taking pleasure in skinning men alive, impaling them on kitchen hooks them or setting them on fire with incendiary grenades. He was just giving it back to them in the explicit manner they did to him. He was captured once and an NVA officer ordered his tattoos removed. The Chief sat though it quietly and when he was able to pick the rope they held him with with his fingernails. He left 17 men in that cave with out any faces. Leaving them screaming in the dark with their faced peeled off. Then he blew the entrance to the cave. Revenge was not a natural response in his people. They were ferocious warriors but the idea of tarnished honor, vengeance and feuds lasting decades was a European invention brought by Russian trappers who invaded their land in the 1700s. There was a famous story of the nearby Haida Chief who was disrespected by an American ship. They whipped him in front of his people, looted his village and stole many of his wives. When the Americans returned they suffered endless raids by Haida warriors who wore ferocious wooden armor like the knights of old. They came with spears and whale bone clubs, overwhelming the Americans muskets and canon. Sending volleys of arrows while the Americas had to fire in waves as it took about half a minute to reload. A skilled archer could let off almost 30 arrows in that time. 25 with deadly aim. This earned a grudging respect by the foreign invaders. But like all great tribes they were won over with commerce for iron pots, mirrors, glass beads and the same muskets. This started a long standing contractural dispute between the Americans and British who divided up these automatous lands from afar. Not risking the actual manning of forts since the Russians were so cruelly sieged in the Fort that stood where Ostrog Arkhangelsk became modern Sitka. The Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian peoples fell to Small Pox not military domination. They were absorbed into a no mans land between Canada, Russian Empire and later the 1867 American purchase of Alaska. This meant many of their most powerful warriors went into either the Militaries of these foreign powers, or taken away into Indian schools where their culture was beaten out of them. Returning shamed and broken by years of torture / anglo culture. Taught to hate their own brown skin and favor the paler members of the tribe. What haunted Chief and many young men of the tribe was if time away was making them white. Not that all white people were evil or to be admonished. What he felt was that something inside was lost. Some integral feeling of what it means to be a man of their tribe. Like calling some one a sissy or queer. He wonders if all this mental pollution of marching around in lines, learning cadences and the thought process of the western colonial mind was taking the place of some deep wisdom he was meant to learn. Was there some majestic spirit song lost to time by not being raised among your people? Was there some important piece of Indian logic or story he would never learn under the crushing weight of running away from his oath and duty to the tribe? He thinks about this now 20 years after to war. The Chief throws his dog tags into the black sea and instantly regrets it. Sitting in a dinghy drunk in blackness, letting the tide pull him and his rolling whiskey bottle out to sea. He looks at the blazing colors of the northern lights far away. All that color and vibrant life somewhere out in space. The thing about the Northern Lights is to see them well you have to travel deep into the frozen tundra, where white bears the size of buses wait for the unwary to start stripping off their clothes as hypothermia makes them feel like they are boiling from the inside. He thinks about making the journey to see the Aksarnirq where souls of the dead dance in the Aurora Borealis. The Inuit land of the dead. Where the boneyards of Mammoths and prehistoric Whales lie still among ice castles, where only Eagles dare. Chapter 18: The Chimera and the shapeshifting woman who takes babies away Laurasiateria Callisto was spoiled. She didnt choose it or want any different treatment but thats just the way it was. Things that would get Enceladus Euarchontoglires slugged through a sheetrock wall by her father, got her non threatening warnings or even taken on a special outing by her grandparents to teach her the old stories and lore of the Lingt Aan and Haida Gwaii surrounding them. She loved stories from the Hecate Straight about the Qalupalik, the green skinned witch who steals children walking too close to the shore after dark. There are more likely suspects like white men from the mainland. The Kooshdaakaa Ottermen, a race of shape shifting trixters who lure people near with cries of family members to eat them in the dark woods. There were several forms of wild man or Sasquatch here, the dog man, the bear man. These didnt scare here since she was never out after dark. Hers was a world of mornings bathed in golden sunlight, sea spray and weaving baskets in forests full of bunnies, deer and foxes. Callisto likes to rescue baby birds thrown out of the nest. She has raised 3 to be well enough to be released. Sadly its a 50/50 attrition rate. Her grandmother wasnt the typical tribal matriarch. In her youth she was a rebel. Had left in the 1960s to join the American Indian Movement take over of Alcatraz while getting her masters at Berkeley. She has published numerous books on the culture, the wild life, lore and injustices done against the people of South East Alaska and the Inner Passage. Their cabin was like a library full of books on every subject and Callisto was an avid reader. Wanting to become a veterinarian, archeologist, astronaut and experimental surgeon someday. Callisto studies college level anatomy books on sea life, primeval forests and astronomy. She has a dozen telescopes her grandmas boyfriend gets from antique stores in Juneau and Sitka. Many with impressive brass dials and settings in Chinese, Russian and French. She likes to draw shipwrecks and watch science documentaries. Today she is driving around with Grandma to get essentials for her friends that work as midwifes to help with home births. When grandma is busy, Callisto sneaks off to read a book in the attic about birth defects from weapons of war tested here. Since their tribe has no treaty, exposing them to decades of pollution and neglect by the US govt. It is a pictorial history of still born babies, the deformed and the history of medical experiments at the recently closed Naval base. All the land around them was occupied so by default they became Americans. Thinking about deformation and toxic waste spread by the military depressed her. Grandma expressly forbid reading this book, but every time she hides it. Callisto finds it. Seems like throwing it away is too hard for Grandma, it must be tied to her research into what she calls Chimera. Grandma is an advocate for Native women, going into hospitals and warning the girls against birthing in places known for sterilization, forced adoption and other things the doctors do to keep their Federal funding. There is a whole racket of taking babies from single mothers, migrants and people living in poverty. Sending their children to rich investors on the mainland who get huge kickbacks for raising them, the social workers and doctors get commissions. Its like a farm for breaking up families. Today was a heavy day. Grandma isnt sure Callisto should see this. So giving her a stack of Tolkien commentaries, Lloyd Alexander coloring books and some HP Lovecraft if she felt like something scary she locked Callisto in the car with the radio on. Callisto wasnt bad or doing it on purpose. But why stay in the car on a rainy day when less than 100 feet away there was a fabulous forrest, a drainage ditch out of the mountain that looked like a waterfall, and the sea shore across the highway, accessible through a tunnel under the road? Nothing scary was here besides seals and maybe a big sea lion. But they were slow and if she didnt chase them, they would ignore her. Once inside and away from the windows Callisto carefully took off her seat belt, found her raincoat and umbrella walked to take the most cautious and well intentioned look at the sights. She sat near the waterfall where her grandma could see her. Looking for bright colored bugs under rocks and in the leaves. Growing bored of this, she moves on to looking for pollywogs in the drainage ditch. She had brought a brand new disposable camera. Taking the most scientific shots, saving the majority of the roll for later. Now she had to think if she really wanted to go past where her grandma could see her from the window. She was already out of bounds but not really in trouble like she would be walking under the highway to the beach. Peering to see the birds and seals on the shore. She imagines all the fun she could have watching the boats go by to Haines and Skagway. Looking for shells and looking for nature spirits from the invisible world. Callisto knew why she was forbidden from the culverts and ocean alone. Flash floods, rogue waves, creepy guys. She knew never to talk to truckers, commercial fishermen from the trawlers or even outside family from the extended tribe. She would run away even if any busy body women looking like they wanted to raise a neglected Native girl, using her being alone as an excuse to kidnap her. There were some lonely rich white ladies stalking the area who would take her into a car headed over the state line just as sure as any pervert. Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. Shes not sure if she should go so she went and knocked on the door and asked for some tea. Grandma was too busy birthing the baby, there was a problem and Grandma promised to take her for to pick wild berries if they were done before dark. One of the women at the birthing ceremony made her a tuna sandwich and gave her orange juice for being so good. Now that they were sure of where she was, she snuck out the kitchen and ran though the tunnel to the sea shore. She felt so guilty, but she was at an age where playing with dolls wasnt her thing. She wanted real art supplies like wooden armatures to test movement, shading and colored pencils you could dab with rubbing alcohol to get advanced effects. Here on the shore it was so worth it. The sun was beaming through the clouds. Pleasant bells rang from the deep water buoys. Far off a family of whales crested the water line to spout water and breathe the clean air. This was such a magical day. Callisto ran among seagulls hunting for burrowing shrimp in the sand. She sees some art carved in the sand stone. Faces and animals. Surf tribe messages in far out lettering, sharks, cephalopods, whale bones. Mystical motifs of goddesses, fantasy landscapes and UFOs. Every week it was different. Hippies and researchers from the mainland came here for bon fires. Among the dirty sand she could see smoking wood and abandoned fishing gear. Looking to the roof of the yellow victorian where the birthing ceremony was, she saw its peaked roof over the highway. Tracing her path all the way back to the drainage ditch and sees something bizarre. There is a a tribal dancer. A woman dressed as an owl. Not like a stylized pacific northwest owl, but like an actual owl. She was playfully skipping, swooping, gliding with her arms out. On her head was an owl headdress, her arms covered in feathers and her clothing was iridescent, made of shiny stones and beads. Ignoring her this women intently twirled and glided, kicking over piles of leaves and trash in the shadow of the highway. Callisto was intrigued. Feeling drawn closer almost by tractor beam. She got with in 20 feet and called a greeting in the local dialect. The woman smiled and continued her dance. As the sun moved and the clouds broke the owl woman had an almost angelic visage. Her black, brown and grey feathers sparkled in the beam of warm sun looking almost like they were made of white gold and silver. She smiled and waved Callisto towards her. Enraptured by some deep instinct to learn the dance Callisto mimicked her movement, hopping, swooping, twirling. Taking her hand being spun around until her feet were off the ground. She stared into the golden eyes of his magical creature. There was nothing scary. Just an other worldly feeling that if she closed her eyes she would turn into a bird and fly away. This scared her and she let go, falling into the cold, damp sand. The woman was gone with only the sound of angels wings taking flight. It was a jarring moment. Back in the real world where she sees her Grandmothers angry face. She had discovered her gone and went looking in the most likely direction. Grandma pulled her roughly with out saying a word. Grandma was not a disciplinarian and just the realization she made her unhappy was enough to make Callisto bawl into tears. Holding her hand, bringing her up to the road. Waiting for traffic to be clear and walking swiftly back to the birthing house. Callisto wanted to say she went under the highway which was much safer but she knew silence was best. In the dark of the main room. The women where gathered around a screaming mother. The birth was difficult and as grandma washed her hands, put on her medical gown and adjusted her head lamp, Callisto watched in awe this ritual of womanhood. She smelled strange odors of blood, amniotic fluid, incense, herbs and sacred oils. She women smiled at her as this was a traumatic thing to see to a child born. With a dismissive wave grandma sent her back to the kitchen at the first sign of trouble. Callisto had dry tears on her face and went back to pour some tea on the table. Hearing the women talking in their language. She picked up there was trouble. The baby was not in the correct position. Struggling to fix it, the women gasped as the baby came out malformed. There were cries and grandmothers soothing voice whispering. The mother holds a black shape. Callisto has silently walked back and sees something strange. The women all rock back and forth whispering prayers and remembering the traditions of the old ways. Walking into their midst and peering at the dead baby held tightly in the mothers arms. She couldnt look away, the mother opened her eyes looking right at Callisto and says. Look what they have done to us. Look what their poisons, their factories and their corporations took awaydepleted uranium, agent orange, napalm, white phosphorus, nano thermite, fracking, micro plastics in our aquifers. Callisto sees something indescribable. A birth defect so profound and sad that words would do it injustice to describe. She wants to look away. Seeing a corrupted head and legs. Arms curled more like a chicken wing and a crab claw, chewed away in utero by the toxic ground water. The still born child was totally disfigured. One red eye far larger than her own, black flesh and extremities that looked like stone or an oyster shell. Hard and calcified. It was like a mummy but part of its belly was so normal where the umbilical cord lay. This baby could have been the next President, the next Einstein or Spielberg. Now it was there lifeless. Callisto wanted to look away. She couldnt. Like some urge to be part of this grief she reached forward. Putting her hand on the mothers forehead. Kissing her face and took the baby away. The mother unsure, then giving her the blanket the baby was in. The baby was so heavy. Callisto asked what was the name. The mother broke into an anguished cry and tried to not scream but caught her self and quietly said. Willow Bird. Callisto smiled and said. Thats your name. The baby opened its deformed eye and cried. The baby was alive. Every one stood in awe and Callisto smiled down at the little face. Thinking maybe the owl woman decided not to take this one away. Chapter 19: The Angel of the Unwary Sheriff Sugeide was tired after an all night threesome he had with two middle aged mainland hookers. He paid them and send them on their way before driving to work at dawn. He looks at the plaque on his wall Fraternal Order of Bear Skins. People think its a similar to the Masons or Elks, where ww2 vets drink and talk about going on vacation to Hawaii. Its not, he would not be Sheriff if people knew its true dark deeds. It was not a club you could join, you had to be selected and its members go back to the early Russian hunters around here who took Native wives. The Bare Skins it should be called. A couple times a year they bring in a truckload of girls from Vancouver, straight off shipping containers from the Orient, Central America and Eastern Europe. They film home movies and do it all on the back of the tax payer. Many famous and important people were guests at these parties. Him being head of the Lodge made him far more important than the Sheriff gig. His current wife was from Ukraine, a hotspot for the slave trade. The Sheriff was like Henry the 8th. When he tired of a woman, she went away and he ordered a new one mail order. He was thinking about Cynthia Malvo and how much trouble she could cause if left alive. She had made statements about being followed by a police car. That part of the report was swept away in the Detectives findings. They were spinning their wheels not sure where to look. He didnt like it. Cynthia was put up in a motel nearby. She was a bad drunk, could be lured out into a lonely place then silenced. It couldnt be him, she may remember him. Maybe his piece of shit son could be useful to gain pick her up in a bar, or force his way in her room. His sons name was Lev Arkhangelsk who calls him self Aqualung. Was back from 5 years in reform school and already picked up an underage girlfriend and had been vandalizing the town. A good for nothing tweeker who caused trouble every day of his life. This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. He was stupid like his mother. A blonde hooker he picked up in the Puget sound when he was working there as a insurance broker. She came to the USA to be a model and ended up doing porn up and down the west coast, stripping and still spoke very little English. He picked her up with his floral use of the Russian language which was rare for Americans to speak. She moved into his house and picked up bad habits like blow, racking up credit card bills and fucking young men in his bed. He tolerated her long enough to have a son, who he has a contemptuous relationship with. Only comes home to ask for money or to borrow a used car. Like his mother, he may need to strangle him with an electric cord if he causes any more trouble. The Sheriff heads over to the junk yard to check on his son, and the over all state of the facility. Getting to the gate the 2 mongrel beasts that usually would be barking and trying to jump over the fence were silent. Somewhere else in the place. He sees the blue van his son uses. One of those old 70s style custom jobs with a lounge interior. Undoing the chain and rolling back the gate one of the dogs Malphas comes and peaks his head from the last row, nervous and darts back behind piles of crushed cars. The other attack dog, Balam is nowhere to be seen. The neon sign for Beaver Falls Tow is blinking out, was struck by lightning the week before. Sheriff Sugeide walks hesitantly towards the car crusher and metal shredder in the back. He hears some whimpering and is shocked to see a naked woman covered in stab wounds come running towards him expecting help. She runs into his arms in a tight embrace and he sees his scumbag son come strolling out of the control shed splattered with blood and naked except for boots, smoking a cigarette and says casually. Saved you one. The Sheriff smiles in a sneer, throws the victim to the ground, cuffing her and walking her towards the stairs to his love shack in the basement of the pump house. Chapter 20: The Ghost out of Time Welfare checks are supposed to be a rookie job. Deputy Ch''k has more important problems to deal with but when a house known for domestic violence, calls about brandishing firearms goes silent Its cause for concern. A few days ago the mail man complained of being shot at by Bill String, before the Dept could respond he called to say it was a false alarm as Spring was actually shooting at a wasps nest. The mail man is now saying he thinks they shot them selves and abandoned their pets. William String and his native wife Sleepy Gahlts''akw have been known for some bloody brawls. Their age gap of 30 years makes fist fights equal as he is pushing 70 and she is not even 40. Disputes over the car, the checking account or magazine subscriptions have let to him pistol whipping her and her stabbing him several times. She once accused him of holding her hostage and torturing her, only to withdraw charges when she was unable to cash his VA retirement check per a note he mailed off from the jail to freeze payments. Ch''k cant stand woman beaters, but he gets the impression Sleepy is the driving force behind the trouble. She has a long history of homelessness, speed addiction and petty theft. If not for living with the retired Military Policeman, she might be another body found floating in the bay. Bill String is a veteran of the Korean War. He is a nasty piece of work. A violent alcoholic who has a tendency to propose to every waitress and single mother in town. This time he ended up with one with as bad a temper as himself. Ch''k has a better rapport with Mr String than with the wife, who once crashed into his patrol car when cornered at the site of a break in. The house is set back from the road quite a ways. Past endless tangles of thorny vines, rusting junk and dead trees is the cabin. It has a rustic hunting lodge vibe, but is over built into a mish mash of log, stone and scavenged fiber board. Its kind of an eye sore but they dont deal with code enforcement out here. The whole point of living this far from society is a rugged self reliance and distrust of county building codes. Coming to the house there are no obvious signs of violence. The door gets no answer and walking around to the back, Ch''k sees no obvious open windows. Yelling for any signs of life get nothing. Seeing an unfinished wall around the side covered in plastic blowing in the wind. Ch''k takes note of the easy access if he needs to go inside. On the right side of the house there is a falling down garage, poorly built and leaning with age. Inside there are several abandoned cars. A 71 Plymouth Satellite with mostly blue body panels. Under a orange tarp, an illegal early 70s Datsun Skyline. A car never submitted for US safety tests, therefore illegal. A yellow and black 70 Dodge Coronet and lastly a silver and white European Roadster of some vintage, with open wheels and no top. All these cars are likely salvage titles or bought from some company supposed to crush illegal imports on the mainland. Ch''k guesses all these cars have some kind of illegal modification that leads them to be abandoned in a building about to fall down. Ch''k always loved Mopar hotrods, maybe if the crazy couple is laying face down in a murder suicide he will impound the Dodge and the Plymouth as projects. Maybe if Enceladus gets his act together he can have the Datsun if they fib the numbers. Walking back to the house Ch''k hears a sound like a shelf full of tools fall over. Something is alive in the house. Maybe a starving dog, or Sleepy waiting in there with a pistol in the throws of some delusion. Ch''k thinks about what likely happened. String had some kind of health emergency and she emptied out the bank account and has been living with some drifter. Sleepy got touchy about her spending habits and shot String in his sleep? A big knock down, drag out brawl where he beat her to death with a can of dog food? These thoughts all amuse him as he steps through the plastic unfinished wall. Its dark inside and he can hear a screen door slamming in the wind. Thats strange, he didnt see a screen door on the first walk around. The house is dark, bowls full of moldy food fill the sink and the bedroom smells bad like something spilled long ago has decayed. The bathroom is the first sign of trouble. Dried blood fills the sink and tub. Far too much blood for any one to survive, but after seeing a portion of a moose head in a bucket squirming with maggots he isnt sure about the species that bled out here. Maybe they were doing some poaching and got wounded? String had an aversion to going to the hospital when she stabbed him. When they forced him to go because she hit him in the mouth with a tire iron, the damned bastard escaped in the wheel chair they cuffed him to. This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. Rounding out the search to the living room, he sees the body. William String was dead, his corpse sat in a rocking chair with no obvious signs of violence. Maybe his heart went out or he had a stroke? The body was totally grey with dust and cobwebs. From the looks of the mummification it had been some time here undisturbed. Ch''k remembers them having a big dog and several cats. Looking closer Ch''k can see what looks like chewing on both the feet, they are stripped of flesh. In Strings lap is still his remote control, a crystal ashtray full of doobies and roaches. Also in his lap, a comic book covered in marijuana and powder that appears to be cocaine. A shame its Incredible Hulk #180. First appearance of Wolverine. Probably too inundated with putrid body fluids and the stench of death to be readable. Ch''k tries his radio, its dead. No signal out here on the inlet. Using his flashlight he goes and looks around some more. Sleepy must be here, or at least the pets? Ch''k is startled as he thinks he sees a powerful man holding an axe in the hallway with wings like a moth or butterfly growing out of his shoulders and head. Upon drawing down on the suspect, It turns out to be a dirty mirror reacting bizarrely to his flashlight. Ch''k sees the ladder to the crawlspace is down. Calling up he gets no reply and really dreads having go up there. Instead he goes outside and tries to get a signal from the Bronco. No dice. This doesnt seem like an emergency but the open crawlspace is bothering him. If there was someone living in the house, thats the last place he hasnt searched. Going back in, he is startled again by a womans scream. Rushing in and clearing the house again, the only place left is the crawlspace. Hearing a sound like rats or small animals running around. He gets up there to see Sleepy is backed into the corner about 20 feet away. She is nude but covered in something like dirt or motor oil and blood. She is rocking back and forth, crying in a panic. Ch''k tries to get her to come to the ladder but she wont respond. Ch''k thinks this might be better for a crisis worker. But knowing sleepy she has a knife or gun back there. He doesnt want a nurse or paramedic to take a bullet because he didnt disarm her first. Struggling to make it through the cramped opening, then messing up his uniform on dusty unfinished floor full of tacks and staples. He gets near where Sleepy is, and sees she does indeed have a pistol. She isnt responding and he has to crawl up to her and take it. Ch''k sees she clawed out her own eyes. He tries to pull her out but she lashes out. Striking his face and slashing at his eyes. This is too much. Ch''k retreats from the crawlspace having disarmed her. He wants to go back up and carry her out in a blanket or sheet but every thing in the house is too nasty to touch. Every surface is covered in either slimy grime, crawling maggots or stained with god knows what. Ch''k thinks he should just leave the place as is and drive back towards the station to get a signal. Its too hateful an idea to get back in that crawlspace with a naked woman having some kind of emotional break, who possibly killed her husband and has been living among the bones of animals for weeks or months. That kind of thing is just too horrifying to contemplate. What goes through the mind of someone who keeps a mummified corpse in the house with them? All the windows closed and the stench of death and putrefaction for months. Watching flies and spiders nest in the eye sockets until the body dries out and becomes brittle. Ch''k decides to bite the bullet and give one last try to get her down. Bringing his brown leather Sheriffs Deputy coat, he wraps her up and gets her out. She stands there shivering, covering her privates and looking at the floor. Trying to get answers, he wont make a sound. Rocking back and forth. Ch''k leads her to the door and is shocked as Mr String is behind him loading a shotgun, alive and pissed off. Standing there with his shotgun leveled at Ch''ks chest. Howling accusations in an annoyed tone of voice. What the hell is going on? Ch''k doesnt know what to say. He looks back at the chair with the corpse and its empty. Get the fuck out of my house! Sleepy is smiling in an evil way and goes running into the back of the house. Ch''k tries to stammer a response but his voice croaks in his throat. Mr String shoves him out the door and peaks out the blinds in the window with the double barreled shotgun up to the glass. Ch''k starts to think he is having a midlife crisis. Was he coming down with schizophrenia? What could explain what he saw? He takes a drink of whisky, watching the house as he can hear yelling, slapping and the usual violence. Pulling out the driveway Ch''k starts to question his own mental health. Chapter 21: The Shithouse Rat ET doesnt know if life is worth living. Every thing he based his life around collecting is gone. All his achievements for nothing. Every mural he ever painted is defaced. These out of towners showed up and started crossing him out. Turned his friends against him and now he doesnt have a place to live because his dad thinks he helped them clean out his house. He decides to break into the Chiefs house which is now vacant due to Chief being out of town, healing up at a girl friends. Knowing the Chief has a couple old revolvers he wont miss hidden in a shoe box. Getting into the house is easy. Chief doesnt worry about burglars and leaves all his windows open. He even showed ET how to break in if he gets locked out. Using a drywall chisel or flathead screw driver he simply clicks the screen out and pops the lock on the window. Within seconds he is inside. Chiefs place is pretty strange. For such a tough guy he sure likes a lot of 100 year old french figural lamps, neoclassical bronze statues and chandeliers. Every thing here is likely salvaged from a sunken ship. The term Rococo comes to mind. What does the Chief think, he is Louie the 14th? ET finds the shoebox but the guns are gone. Only things inside are some diamond rings, gold chains, playing cards displayed with dead bodies and pictures of his unit in Vietnam. ET takes the rings since they are too small for Chiefs fingers and too big for any of his girlfriends. Probably won them in a card game or planned to trade them for motorcycle parts. ET sets out on his mission to buy a gun. He knows Monkey and Lucinda tend to trade in those kind of wares. Walking around the amusement park, under the pier and the abandoned aquariums. The winos are gone but there are some skate boarders down there filming a skate video. ET exchanges info with them, but when asking if they would sell him a gun the skates exchange furtive looks like ET is some kind of narc. He excuses him self to go to the place he knows will sell him a gun. The Drunken Werewolves Motorcycle Club. He always heard this club was started by his father before he was a cop. He wasnt sure enough about how true that is to bring it up to the members. They have a clubhouse in a shack on the outskirts of the amusement parks grounds. Around here its the only place with any signs of life. Barbed wire fences, a sturdy rolling gate and neon signs for defunct strip clubs dot the windows. The dogs are no problem, Lucifer and Barbarella. Two Rottweilers who are vicious as hell but always happy to get a piece of salami or a dead fish from him. ET has been here plenty of times when Mad-god was a member. Mad-god got tired of paying dues, fines for missing meetings and having somebody monitoring his wheeling and dealing expecting a piece of his action. There is no bad blood but he doesnt come around any more. The main two ET talks to in town are Joker and Smokey. They arent around but the mechanic Wizard is grinding out a bad weld on a gas tank. He has crazy Soviet high altitude goggles and a face that looks like he grew up knife fighting. He has one eye that is glass and a dark sense of humor. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. Wizard isnt sure if he can trade any guns to ET. He tells ET to go find Butcher Jerry, the President. He is taking care of some yard work for a blind old lady who is the mother of a dead member. Its too far to walk, so he decides to give ET a ride in his VB bug dune buggy. Its like something from mad-max with purple ghost flames, doors removed, has tires that look they were stolen off a lunar lander and a monstrous engine sticking out the back with a muffler that sounds like a jet taking off. Arriving at the blind ladies pad, they see Butcher Jerry yelling down into a well. Walking up unannounced ET hears whats going on. Down in the hole is a guy named Chuy, like Chewie. He is being interrogated for stealing from the club. Butcher Jerry annoyed. This clown isnt giving up the goods, still joking around, trying to buy time. Butcher Jerry has a portable cement mixer parked beside the well, almost full. A couple guys standing there loading in bags of cement powder, shovelfuls of rocks and continuous water. Butcher Jerry cant hear the guy in the well over the cement mixer. Smiling and nodding while he peals an apple with a knife. He tosses Chuy the apple, a pack of smokes and one last beer. Giving him a few minutes to finish while the guys loading the cement mixer defecate into the well. Chuy covered in shit, is screaming and laughing at the same time. Chuy cant get the cigarette pack back over the lip of the well and Jerry decides to entomb them with him. With out ceremony Butcher Jerry drops a lit stick of dynamite, a couple heavy shopping carts down on top of Chuy. The blast sends a shock wave of rock and black water up out of the well. Turning and smiling when ET picks up a smaller shopping cart and tosses it in too. Then in a group effort they all turn the heavy wheel that turns the cement mixer in to fill in the well. Pouring up the bottom third of the well. I guess Chuy will never give up the goods he stole now. Butcher Jerry is pissed. His eyes darting from Wizard of to ET. He is gritting his teeth. Thinking about what his next move should be. Butcher Jerry is a red head with a white beard. He is covered in prison ink and has a Janes Addiction t-shirt on. Shoving ET to the ground with a serious look, Butcher Jerry says. You fucked up big time kid, you werent supposed to see that! ET is too shocked to speak, he imagines what it would be like, entombed in a well drowning in cement. Behind him he is startled to see Chuy climbing out of a second well behind the house with a ladder and heavy metal latch. Butcher Jerry smiles, offering ET a hand and says. You dont think i would let you witness a murder with your dad being a pig would ya? ET is relieved he really thought they were going to kill him. Jerry asks, So how can i help you? ET explains the problem he has been having and shows the scars where they cared their tagging crew on his stomach. Why he needs a gun. Jerry says, I dont blame you kid. I will loan you a gun but make sure you take that costume jewelry back where you found it. Taking ET into a workshop they have behind the blind ladies house, Jerry rifles through a green pirates chest full of clothes, loose pieces of paper and finally a little metal box. Inside is a couple silver .38 special snub nose revolvers, a black beretta 9mm and a scratched up ww2 45. ET wants the 45 but Jerry thinks its too big for him. The beretta is cool, has a open barrel on the top and looks like something a spy would have. Behind him Wizard says, How about this? Holding a big beltfed M60 tripod machine gun like the ones from Rambo movies. On the wall behind him are some surplus AK47s and M-16s from Vietnam. ET wants to check out every thing but in the end ends up with the Beretta that Jerry is not sure will fire and besides has no bullets for. ET wants to know for sure and will have to find 9mm rounds somewhere. Chapter 22: Grandma wants to talk about Spirits in the woods ET gets dropped off by Wizard in the scum bucket VW bug rat rod. ET was pretty close to asking the biker gang to adopt him but didnt want to be laughed at. Coming into his grandmas house he sees the Old Man outside the window sanding down a surfboard. Covered in foam dust and wearing a respirator. Led Zeppelin so loud it rattles his teeth comes blasting from speakers mounted to the walls. Turning down the tunes and staying only grandma is home and wants to see him out back. ET always had an easy rapport with the old man. He wasnt his grandfather but has been part of the family since before he was born. He was white and looked like a mad scientist. He had long braided white hair and always wore the craziest t-shirts from bands like Grateful Dead, Dinosaur Jr, Bikini Kill, Meat Puppets, Melvins, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. He could talk to the old man about any thing except wanting bullets to get revenge for his assault out in the ruins of the amusement park. ET knew the old man would find some funny way to get back at the out of towners but ET wasnt in the mood for hair brained schemes. He wanted to shoot them in the head and leave their bodies out in the marsh for the seagulls to feed. Walking through the house he knows grandma has a gun somewhere but not the caliber. Mad-god might too. Creeping to a couple rooms to check under dressers, in stash spots and drawers he comes up empty. Mad-god did have some bullets, but they were for some kind of 40mm anti-aircraft canon from ww2. Feeling kind of dirty for searching others possessions, ET goes out the back door to see grandma. Grandma has a massive koi pond that ices over in winter. Its not that gold yet but the fish are not active as they would be in warmer weather. The whole backyard is designed in a Bali motif with exotic flowers, wooden walkways and statues of dancing temple guardians. ET always felt peaceful back where. Wind chimes, fountains, waterfalls and wind in the trees gave him a serenity that was rare in his life. Feeling watcher he sees his Grandma and Callisto gigging on the meditation platform of the treehouse which had no walls or ceiling. The original plan was for a woven cocoon in the shape of peach pit for taking lazy naps in the fresh air. Mad-god couldnt figure out how to design it so the Oldman and ET took over the project. Mad-god promises he will finish the final level before her birthday, but he started saying that 3 years ago. There was a gentle wind that swayed the tree branches, little stone stair case led to the first platform about 5 feet off the ground, 2 more feet up to the second platform and 2 more feet to the top where Grandma and Callisto were laughing about some invented words for crickets, caterpillars and humming birds they just made up. When grandma forgot a word she would make up some bogus sounding scientific title, but since she was a scientist they never knew which was real or invented. Their whole world here was so different here than at home. Home was like a tornado of garbage had gone through the place. Here every thing smelled like old books, cat piss and scented candles. Grandma had a heard of rare cats from all over the world, strange looking rescues that seemed half feral and related to big spotted cats from Asia and Africa. Thankful they arent around because they dont like ET and try to bite him every chance they get. A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation. The Treehouse was a tangle of inventive chaos. A couple platforms for plants, tea ceremonies the highest where Grandma would meditate and Callisto would silently work on her artwork. All of it was less than 10 feet off the ground but the suspension ropes it hung from being salvaged from a tug boat always made him inspect the threads closely when putting weight on the platforms. It was brilliantly lit with floating candles in glass orbs suspended from chains. A Tibetan incense burner she got in her travels in the east lends a pleasant aura about the little bubble of calm in their cold and harsh world. Today Callisto is drawing Moth Men, Butterfly Women and a giant Centipede the size of Godzilla. Sending Callisto to play in the house. Grandma shares her concerns. Whats going on in your life? ET doesnt know how to respond. He feels ready to burst with so much tension and a million things that bother him, but not one of them is fit to explain to his Grandmother. She smiles and makes and expression like spit it out. ET tries to think of something that wouldnt get him in trouble or get him lectured. Grandma takes the hint of silence that he is uncomfortable talking about what happened so she switches gears. How is your graffiti art going? ET cant help but smile. Most grandparents would be against vandalism but she actually buys him spray paint because she would rather him tagging than doing drugs or joining gangs. ET tells her the latest. I had some burners running at Hobo Beach and the amusement park but someone has been crossing me out. She makes a grim face and asks. Same people who jumped you and cut your stomach? ET doesnt want to conform or deny. Says he, Doesnt know. Grandma changes subjects and starts talking about Nature Spirits in the forrest. ET kind of tunes out this bullshit but he likes when she thinks she saw a zombie or swamp thing out in the marshes. Grandma wants to show him some weird specimens she hasnt been able to catch. Asks if ET wants a job capturing insects and plants in the forrest. ET could use some money to buy bullets but urban legends about the Axeman murderer who fees missing kids to his mutant plants gives him pause. He guesses its ok with grandma, but asks her to bring her gun. Chapter 23: Forrest of Lost Souls Setting out with grandma into the Cleft Pallet forest with grandma was always fun. She would get enthusiastic about moss and tree bark, bug cocoons and fungus. ET got the impression she was looking for something nefarious but he couldnt place why exactly he thought that. ET has heard about larvae in the rain ponds. ET has always heard strange things about this area. People taken away by the military to be returned with pieces of their brain and organs missing. Man made UFOs, cattle mutilation and floating embryos in the creeks. Grandma has many specimens of deformed birds and frogs. These journeys into the unknown always reminded him of episodes of Johnny Quest. Grandma wasnt exactly a mad scientist but she was retired on a mental disability program, so somebody thought she was a little touched in the head. Cleft Pallet was a coastal swamp that led into the foothills of the Hourglass Mountains to the south. It was not a beautiful place but it had a stillness that made one feel unease. currents in the marsh always went opposite the tide from the strong wind. Exotic flowers with no known relatives grow here. A couple species of duck and fish not in textbooks as well. Alaska has so much bio diversity, far beyond any other region. Varieties of Honey Bee, Bat, Bird, Reptiles and Dragon Flies live among the striking granite cliffs and fog laden valleys. Grandma is looking for the chrysalis nests of certain flies and moths. She described finding a cabin filled with mucus and dead men in radiation suits. ET is sure this is a dream she had but he is willing to humor anything if he can remove a couple rounds from Grandmas handgun. The low lands have varieties of moss she takes samples of in small jars. Gathering up some purple flowers and yellow mushrooms, they move on into the rock formations. They have to cross a mass of green coastal caves and arches totally green with plant life. Here there are some dangerous places where the tide can rise up to 70 feet in unuseual geological contentions where the racing sea water cuts deep channels among the spiderwebs of rushing white water and slick black stone. Running between gouts of frozen sea water, climbing tree roots and traversing deep casysms like The Devils Cistern, Monkeys Neck, and Broken Teeth Grotto. Finally they get to the proper forrest away from the sea. This is where the fog really gets intense. There are endless lava fields here inundated with Red Wood and Sequoia so old they have lifted off the ground, leaving deep culverts in the roots where you could get out of the rain and start a campfire. Which when the rain turned to violent lightning around noon, they tried to cook a nice lunch. Finding dry leaves, abandoned books and news papers in what could have been a homeless camp, they heat up coffee, biscuits and tuna salad. Grandma has a secret way of making tunafish sandwiches with secret ingredients with bits of martini olive, red onion, cabbage, pickled carrots and celery. Served on hearty Cinnamon-Rye bread with nuts, oats and sesame seeds. Today she has Black Rye bread. ET smells it since he suspects she grabbed much of the weeks groceries from the dumpster behind the health food store. Grandma goes into one of her stories about being pregnant with his mother while she was on the run from Federal Authorities for some act of late 60s revolution. ET liked the idea his Grandma was a fugitive, living under an assumed name, has had books banned by the Government and survived several assaults by Swat teams. Even being shot once by a sniper when she was imbedded as a journalist with the Black Panthers. She tells him about his real grandfather who turned out to be an informant for the FBI. He was a native man but she cant bring her self to mention his name. She says he was at once the best friend she ever had and the most detestable enemy. They had met during the summer of 69 while she was working with Native American revolutionaries who occupied Alcatraz. His Grandfather pretended to be interested in the rituals, the old songs, culture of his people. In actuallity he was a Bureau of Indian Affairs Informant to the FBI, working undercover to frame the Indians for terrorism. Trying to bait people into buying drugs over the phone and setting up fake bomb making schemes for busts. The fact he had gotten her pregnant soured his case. Giving her a chance to escape from the Hospital and leaving him with a nasty scar down the side of his face where she cut him.ET imagines his grandma as young and ferocious, punching cops and throwing hots kettles of feces on storm troopers breaking down the back door. As the rain broke, leaving a calm in the air. The bugs were crawling around. ET got a big centipede for grandma and they decided to move on past the pioneer ghost towns of Goose-Neck and Bramble. When the US purchased Alaska this area was rich with cooper and silver mines. They went bust sometime before it became a state. Sitting empty and home to only looters looking to salvage windows, plumbing and old doors. This was a place ET did not come alone. Several of the fallen down shacks had signs of big animals in the basements. The settlement was built across a hillside out of stone and worm eaten wood. Everywhere the roofs and chimneys were hidden under raspberry bushes. Making it an ideal habitat forBears and Wildcats. They had to pass this place to get to the abandoned military hospital she was curious about. There was an eerie quality to green stair cases where no house stands. Unpleasant trails where you could trip over a lost tomb stone or peace of broken masonry. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Grandma was distracted by ever piece of fungus and odd bird. Taking pictures and stooping to collect residue, she was running around like a chicken with its head cut off in the scientific ecstasy of discovery. ET starts to wonder why grandma brought him and not Callisto, Mad-god or the Old Man. Something here must be dangerous. That made him both proud she trusted him and worried about what would cause pause in the most fearless person he knows. ET started to think about things he thought he saw on Surveillance Mountain to the North-East. Unpleasant glimpses or hallucinations scrambling in the grass. Chewed up faces, bloody and burnt. White eyes and lipless mouths gnashing teeth in vicious hunger for flesh. Thats not what he envisions here. ET remembers the movie Matango about Japanese sailors marooned on an island where the only food they can find when starving is psychedelic mushroom caps. Mushrooms that mutate them into outlandish freaks shambling through the forrest, in the bellies of abandoned ships. He remembers the bible passage Beware! Your old enemy the devil stalks the darkness, seeking whom he may devour. Here there is always darkness, even in the bright glow of the sun. Tripple tree canopy leaves pools of darkness among the ruins. Gulfs of loathsome shadow where biting insects and hungry bears lie still in anticipation of ripping flesh. Feeling like he is tricking him self into being scared he runs back to Grandma. Trying to hurry her into getting to where they are going. Every second alone he fells like malshapen creatures with fungal grows popping out their eyes, and cannibalizing their own faces until they appear like ghouls from Thriller. He tripped over a dead dog that had become a home to biting flies and worms. Among the exposed ribs and spine mushrooms were coming up, covered in hair and full of noxious slime. ET felt instant repulsion, disgusted by the crawling mass of life in the eye sockets of what was likely someones pet. He wanted to pick up the name tag on the collar but it was too much for him. The yellowish green eye balls with pale blue corneas. Reminded him of a halloween breakfast cereal with like dried grapes and marshmallows that made him puke when he was a kid. Thinking about cockroach eggs and fleas in his breakfast as a kid made him actually throw up. He tried to deny the unconscious reaction but it was overwhelming. Retching on his hands and knees as a shrub broke behind him. Instantly feeling the cold air turn sour on his flushed skin. A chill ran down his spine as he looked out into the layers of trees and sees a hateful yellow eye. ET wonders if bears have yellow eyes? He knows Mountain Lions do and before he can get a good look, what ever it is sunk back into the undergrowth, disappearing from sight. Losing all sense of composure, ET sprints back to the last place he saw his Grandmother. She wasnt there and he was too scared to cry out to find her. ET stayed low and checked around the buildings, the bricked up culverts and broken cement rain gutters. The unending copse of trees growing from roofs of fallen in dwellings blotted out the sunshine. Every where ET checked there was no sign. Finally realizing there next ghost town over was just as likely. ET gazed out across the expanse of ferns and gullies that separated the places. He sees her pink traditional Haida straw hat with peacock feathers among the rocks of a stream about 2 football fields away. ET wanted to close that distance but was never a fast runner. Stumbling over sharp roots, broken chimneys and decaying structures until he was in shouting distance. Grandma was oblivious while searching pools of rainwater with a magnifying glass. She took water samples and all around them ET felt an ominous shuffling on his heels. Coming to a deep brick pit that must have been the foundation of a factory that spanned the width of the valley he was not eager to jump down into the pit to cross the flooded pit 20 feet deep and 400 feet long. Feeling something touching him, he turns to see Callisto has followed them and is making a shush sign up to her mouth. Among the leaning walls and vine covered rusty sheet metal roof are what look like people. At least a dozen figures are fanned out around them, blocking the way they came. Their heads had no faces or human features, or rather living human features. Empty husks of eye sockets and mouths warped into rainbowish growths. Shocking neon colors on grey pallors of dead skin. He was about to say it but Callisto whispered it first. Zombies! Times like this reason and common sense do not dispel the fight or flight impulse to dash through broken machinery rusting in pools of orange pollution to escape the unknown figures surrounding them with rusty farm tools. Callisto shrieks and ET is horrified to see he falling 20 feet down into the abandoned glass factory. Turning to look behind him he sees the lurking figures closing in with Axes and Pitchforks rusted black. The figures dont seem to be looking at him, but responding to the sound of Callistos cries. She doesnt look hurt, she landed on a deep pile of sand. That was lucky because all around her are broken pipes, crushed boilers and shards of twisted metal. Feeling no fear he leaps down as Callisto scrambles out of the way. His aim wasnt as good and smashes his face into a pile of sharp thorns, reacting to which sent him splashing into a deep pool of yellow water. No time to rest the siblings rushed to the other side of the foundation, pulling pieces of sharp thorns from their faces and hands. Reaching the other side where a staircase was visible under a century of undergrowth. Reaching the top they look back and see no sign of the figures pursing them. Thinking the things would stumble over the edge or end up impaled on sharp metal was too much to ask for. The crests of the foundation were empty. No sign of life beside darting Dragon Flies and mounds of red ants. Coming to the place where grandma was happily eating an oatmeal cookie she smiled and asked if they wanted some. Chapter 24: The Fred C Netermeyer Military Hospital for Burns and Infectious Diseases Looming high above them on overgrown cliffs is the abandoned hospital. It is said to be built by a student of Frank Lloyd Wright who copied his style so closely he was sued and publicly shamed. The design was very similar to the Tokyo Imperial Hotel. In the 1920s Japan was seen as an emerging business market, that reputation changed after Peal Harbor. Creating an open contempt by the Federal Govt, that slashed funding and began to use the place as a punitive detention hospital for soldiers deemed dangerous and insane during ww2. Its a shame as the Japanese design ques of cherry blossom trees, rich wildlife and a peaceful garden aesthetic is wasted when it was decommissioned some time in then 1950s. The ascent follows half eroded staircase dotted with gulfs of empty space, where parts of it slid down the hill in sinkholes. Climbing over shattered iron gates, massive drainage pipes, heads and limbs of roman style statues littering the hillside. The climb was beautiful but took over an hour. Out of breath about half way up, they pause to take in the views. Mist, fields of wild roses and rugged coastal cliffs send grandma into filling half her camera roll with birds and flowers. Returning to the climb, they get a better view of the hospital. Its shrouded in flowering trees. Its a place you would expect thunder and lightning, soot smeared stark gothic statues and lurking hunchbacks yelling about trespassing. Its none of that, more like a ancient temple or hidden palace in a lost city. Reaching a second gate totally covered in vines and nesting birds, they set off an angry flocking birds protecting their nests. Retreated to a second gate that had some of its foundation slip down the cliff. Enabling them to climb underneath it and into a U shaped courtyard. This part is not as floral and grand. The courtyard was littered with old rolling beds, laundry carts and broken furniture. Coming to a bank of windows they peer inside. Its pitch black, not much is visible besides covered couches and dead plants. Every where they look are dead bugs and broken pottery. Coming to a chained door that seems to have been broken down with an axe. They climb through the gap in the double doors. Inside is a huge empty room. Broken mirrors on the walls fill the entire black space with sparkly pieces of safety glass. ET feels like they have gone underground into a kings bunker. The scale of the rooms is so vast he wonders if it was build for giants. Callisto and Grandma walk carefully on the broken glass. Among the vaulted ceilings and fallen arches are endless hallways branching off in other directions. Grandma thinks she knows where they are going and sets off the direction of some grand stairs decorated in lions heads. She says they are looking for an indoor pool that has the plants and specimens she is looking for. ET loves abandoned buildings and keeps trying to scare Callisto, she is murmering about wanting to leave before nightfall. This is probably wise. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. After stumbling around in the dark for about an hour, they hear the sound of falling rain echoing at the other side of a hallway. Coming to the door they see part of the roof has fallen in. Leaving the perfect environment for a microclimate for moths, dragonflies and fruit bats to nest on invasive trees. The water is surprisingly clean, where rain coming in the roof is rushing out the exterior doors like a waterfall. There is strange calmness here. Trees growing in an oasis among urban decay, creating waterfalls and moss covered statuary. The place took on a sacred quality. Grandma distracted Callisto with bugs and crawling things to capture in jars. ET looks at the graffiti. Taggers he has never seen have covered the walls, turning the open space into a vandals gallery. Smashed statues, remarkable art and asian pottery make him feel like he is in a kings tomb. The stillness is shattered by the sounds of machinery and yelling. From the broken skylight they see a blinding light beam. Men in yellow radiation suits and black gas masks surge in the doors with guns drawn. ET doesnt have time to check what became of Callisto and Grandma as gas grenades thrown at them knock him out. He cant tell if he is dreaming or falling in and out of consciousness. He sees the world upside down from a speeding helicopter. Everywhere the world is filled with alarms and screams. Seeing the sunsetting in its red and black majesty. All he can think is he will never see his home again. They were abducted for organ harvest in a Government facility. Or so they thought. ET awoke alone in a room that didnt look real. It looked like something that came with toys that kept they from being damaged. Vacum-formed plastic totally white, even his skin seemed white here like the deathlessness of the walls burned his eyes and made his skin feel like it was bleached and burned. The chair was white, the hand cuffs attached to the table were white, the food tray and cup for feeding were white, even his shadow was white. He felt like he was growing old and dying in a place where the only sound is a feint buzzing in his ear drums and sound of his heart beating. When he made any noise from squeaking a chair on the ground or even audibly breathing too loud it filled him with terror. He spend his days alternately chained to a table in an interview room where no one came, or chained to a gurney staring up at a stucco ceiling and bright electric lights that seemed to cause his eyeballs to shake like a stobe light and the sound of jet engines, air conditioning and far off sounds that could be alarms or voices so low he thinks its a hallucination. After what seemed like decades he started to be free of this mental construct of reality. He would have fantastic dreams laced with esortic mysteries, journeys to distant lands but always with the subtle realization of cold drool across his face or sticky plastic mattress pads under him causing bed sores. ET howled for someone to talk to him, explain where he is and why he is trapped in this hell of solitude, broken up only by restless sleep and feelings of violation by catheters, intravenous feeding, breathing tube ripping his throat raw and iv tubes aching in his arm