Listening For That Sweet Tune-Chapter 28: Further Down The Hollow Pt. 1

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Chapter 1: A Simple Beginning

Previously on Listening For That Sweet Tune:

Chapter 27: The Beginning of the End Pt. 2

'Kill it then leave this place.' Seemed simple enough but I don't have the slightest idea how to do that. I thought back to when I killed that man in the lighthouse and I've had my suspicions about him being a Wretched but I never really thought about it in keen detail. Is it really that simple? I walked back in forth in my cell waiting for the man to return and set me free hoping that it would be easy coming the rest of the way but I had questions and they weren't going to be answered easily. 'Kill it then leave this place.' It couldn't be that simple. Either way I was becoming one and something fowl smelled with that thought. I repeated it once more out loud 'Kill it then leave this place.' I could just leave this place and never turn around to look back and that would do the exact same thing for me yet I felt compelled to meet this certain Wretched like it had all the answers. 

I took off my shirt and looked down to the bullet I had in my shoulder not a single drop of blood stained my shirt or even went out of my wound. Black veins surrounded the black hole that pierced through my skin and I touched it to see if it was swollen. It wasn't anything. It just happened to be a black hole and nothing else. I placed my finger inside the wound seeing if the bullet was still there and not a single shot of pain pulsed through my body. Seconds led to minutes and I pulled the bullet out Witt my fingers. It was long and I was surprised it didn't go through my body but there it was in my hand. Black goo with a hint of dark red covered the bullet I pulled out but I wasn't quite sure to make out of it so I threw it in the corner of my cell. 

Minutes turned to hours and I was left sitting in a corner thinking no less of the subject than I was hours before. Maybe I could reason with it, convince it to leave this town and I could follow it to where this Mother Sow is and reason with her. I thought of an elegant woman, older but still pretty. Long black hair wearing a long red dress that went down to her heels but she was as deadly as she was attractive. I then thought of Moony and how she must be tracking me down to finish the process—if I wasn't one already—sharpening her blade to slit my throat. I gulped hard then got back to myself, how was I to do this? Maybe the thing was more civilized then I make it sound in actuallity, maybe he is just waiting for me to come around so it could confuse me more than I already am giving me a new set of tasks to do before I can confront this mental ward patient. 

The man came back to the doorway and dinged the key in his hand against the iron bars that made its excuse to be my door. I didn't give him my immediate attention because I was still lost in thought about what was about to happen to me. In fact I knew he was there talking to me but everything sounded all muddled and incoherent to my ears. I tried to shake my head to put me back into the present moment but it only gave me a headache and made my condition worse. I finally got the strength to look up at him and he was waiving at me to what seemed to be speaking very slow. The fog outside grew thicker and started to creep through the window and onto the floor and by the time I put my attention back to my jailer, he was already in my cell walking towards me. 

'It's time Ben. We can't wait any longer.' Everything sped up back to its own perspective natural speed and I realized that he was talking to me. 

'Yes. Lets go.' I got up and dusted off my knees before I took any more steps forward then followed him out of the cell. We walked past several other cells before we reached a main commons area. In front of me were several tables and a couch in which Pete sat glaring at me while he was polishing his gun. Now I don't blame him for hating me for what I've done and I could only hope to make it better when I get his other daughter to safety but he couldn't really blame me. I resisted in my dream and that was something I had no desire to do in the moment but here I am, guilty of my crimes facing what could be simply known as death row. 

I was lead outside onto the main street of the town and the man who led me out pointed to my left further down the street then looked back to me. I nodded back to him and began to head down the road. Even though the fog was thicker than normal I could still see both sides of the street. As people walked past me they gave me ample enough space to walk forward but they gave me looks as if the blood was still on my hands. I guess it was a small town, everybody knew everyone. People knew that there was a killer amoung them and it must be the new face, makes sense. 

I examined the buildings as I crossed them. Several of the buildings had visible damage on the outside as if bombs were being dropped on the ground periodically. Smoke rose from several others as if they were still on fire but I was confident that it’s been a while since they had an attack. Children played on the sidewalk in front of me giggling and running till they saw me. They ran in fear away from me just from the sign of my face. I looked down at my hands to see if there was something I wasn't getting then felt my face to see if anything didn't belong but nothing felt different than before. 

When I got further down the road I saw a monolithic structure in front of me at the end of the road.  The buildings in this town ranged from one story to two story but the silhouette—from what I could make out in the fog—appeared to be much higher. Spires towered into the sky as trees covered the garden in front of the building. As I grew closer to the building I realized that it was the church itself. It was crafted from old stone and stained glass. It was truly a miraculous structure and then I thought if this was one of the Wretched created buildings. It's similarities to the room in which I was with Moony seemed familiar as the aura I felt in the stomach felt the same as when I was with Moony, when I approached the twisted buildings where I met my first Wretched and when I went to the villa which had the colossal tower behind it. 

Soon as my feet touched the property all of my wounds—past and present—ached with a sharp pain. I grunted in anguish and stumbled in my walk but it left before I could think any more about it. The building was styled as an old Gothic cathedral but a house as well. Walking around you could tell that a church was up front but several rooms a few stories high were out back. I'd imagine if you would view it from above it would look like a huge capital T making the leg apart of the chapel. I walked back in front passing all the flowers, shrubs and trees of a garden surrounding the building. Large wooden doors where in front of me and I dreaded every second I looked at the door. 

Up next in Listening For That Sweet Tune:

Chapter 28: Further Down The Hollow Pt. 2 

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Listening For That Sweet Tune-Chapter 27: The Beginning of the End Pt. 2

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Have you read the preceding chapters?

If not then read it from the beginning

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Read the preceding chapter...

Go to the beginning:

Chapter 1: A Simple Beginning

Previously on Listening For That Sweet Tune:

Chapter 27: The Beginning of the End Pt. 1

I felt like he was mocking me, like I really wasn't what I claimed to be but in all seriousness the man never cracked a smile. Who was I really? I honestly don't know for sure. I just remember what I'm told and act accordingly but I am not just some meat sack that does what it's told; no, I have a choice of what I want to do therefore I'm human I know that but for my name I am unsure. 

'I don't really know to be honest. I've been looking for someone ever since I woke up; well I am looking for two people now and the 'one true looking glass.'

'Looking glass?' The man questioned.

'Ya, you know a mirror?' The man looked at me puzzled. 'You know where you see your own reflection. Where you can see yourself waving back like another you.' I was talking to a wall the man had never heard of a mirror before. 'You've never seen one before have you?' He nodded no and I thought he just as might have not even seen his own reflection before. I sat down thinking how else I could explain it. 

'So why are you looking for these things Ben?' He asked. 

'I need to find some answers, why we are like we are, what's happening to this world, what The Wretched are.' The man stopped me after I mentioned The Wretched. 

'The Wretched are the beginning and the end. They are why we are here, why this world is as it is. They created everything here and all they ask for is our complete devotion.'

'And you don't question that?' I asked. 

'No. At least we didn't at one point.'

'What happened? What about the Mother Sow?' The man flinched to that name till I finished saying it. 

'She is the reason why the world is like it is today. We were all fine till she showed up. She demanded blood, The Wretched were nice to us, yes they demanded blood as well but not full bodies. Not asking us to take each others lives. The Mother Sow changed everything in our lives, how we lived, how we see ourselves, how we worshipped. We stopped worshipping The Wretched after that and it has been a big mistake since. They became warmongers, demons, evil itself.'

'What happened?' I asked. 

'They invaded our lands. They destroyed our cities and they are now taking our people and children. We tried worshipping again but they would not accept our plea's.'

'The Wretched?'

'Yes!'

'How long has this been going?' I asked. 

'Thousands of years and I fear this is only the beginning.' I thought to myself deeply and thought how when people die they become one with The Wretched. 

    

'So this began before your time.' I asked. He looked at me oddly and thought for a second. 

'You really aren't from around here are you?' He asked I thought to myself. 'This may seem weird but we don't age. It's been the same since day one, we wake up and we're with our families. Some people claim that they follow someone out of the buildings made by The Wretched to never return but those doors are always boarded up and sealed. I wouldn't understand how they even ended up in there in the first place but here they are, new people come everyday sometimes alone, other times with multiple people. Where do you come from?'

'I come from across the ocean on another continent.' The man got up and started muttering to himself. I got up and put my hands on the bars between us. 

'You can't do that! It doesn't work like that! Haven't you ever heard of Captain Ezra Craft and his crew? If there was one thing that The Wretched does not tolerate, its that. Captain Ezra Craft came back, only one left alive but there was something wrong with him. He was cursed. Living dead amoung the living. He had no say in it, it just happened. A warning to the rest of us.'

'What ever happened to him?' I asked. 

'It wasn't long before his return till he had some major change. He started killing people and his own punishment was death.' I raised my eyebrows. 'Nobody knows what happens when they die but I do know one thing, when blessed to live forever the worst thing to happen is to die.'

'So deaths happen rarely?' 

'Deaths never happen.' He said. 

'But what's to stop a person becoming a serial killer? People get those urges don't they?'

'Only when they are to become a Wretched is when that happens.' I thought to myself and how I had those urges. 'You are to become one, you know that right? You are already showing signs of it.' Everything around me seemed to move faster.

'But what's to stop a neighbor envying over what you have? I asked. 

'We are given a peace of mind when we arrive. There's nothing that we want that we don't already have. Though we can create buildings, new homes with just a thought but we need to be because bad things happen to us when we do but most people don't even know that they have that ability, good to keep it a secret if you ask me. More times than not we just stumble across new houses like it was made by our subconscious and that's the best way to go. We aren't held liable for what we did subconsciously.'

'What kind of bad things happen?'

'Well the worst thing is death and that's the leading causes of death here and most other places but sometimes we loose a leg, maybe an eye. It just happens, it just you know shuts off.' I was about to ask another question when he interrupted me. 'You know, don't you want to know what's going to happen to you?'

'I’m becoming a Wretched, case closed.' I said. 

'No I mean what we're going to do with you.' 

'Oh, you’re going to kill me right?'

'You still have some good left in you even though you killed Pete's daughter. You see, Pete has two daughters and the one you killed is the one who isn't missing. There's a Wretched held up in the local church and that's where we think she is. This Wretched has been held up there for some time resting and we're afraid that he's going to make another strike soon.'

'What are you proposing me to do?' I asked. 

'Well, kill it. Then leave this place.'

Up next in Listening For That Sweet Tune:

Chapter 28: Further Down The Hollow

Remember me