Mighty_Wingman
01-15-2004, 01:51 AM
A man sits alone in front of his computer late at night . He's bored and can't sleep. Normally he writes cheezy banking brochures and a small monthly column in the local free entertainment rag, which in all likelihood, is more commonly used by bums as toilet paper than a source reading material.
But tonite , that man will enter.... ( cue the music ) The Skylight Zone.
Ok seriously, the following is an excerpt from a short story. Critisism , constructive or otherwise is welcomed.
From : " Absolute Darkness "
Sometimes even the brightest places in the world have a sense of darkness about them. The sun stands at one o’clock high, grains of sand bleached white as snow , reflecting the pinpricks of light back into your retinas. Even the deep blue of the sky is so bright it hurts to look at. When you’ve been awake for forty-six hours , everything does.
“ The ruins are visible from the top of the next hill. We’re almost there “ Sanji looks at me with a wane smile and then looks into his lap for moment brushing his inner thigh as if something is crawling up his leg. I just wish he’d watch the road . “ Dr. Ellis said not to be late. “ He keeps repeating that , despite the expression of disdain it brings to my face. Under other circumstances, I might be more appreciative of his company. Under other circumstances, I wouldn’t be here.
Four years ago I attended one of Dr. Ellis’ lectures that was back when I liked and respected him, before I knew him as the pretentious windbag he now is. Before we discovered how the world will end.
We are getting closer now. I can feel my stomach twisting into knots , I can feel my tear ducts swelling .I can feel the goose bumpy wave up the back of neck as the hairs raise.
It’s all too familiar.
Hells ’ forefathers are coming home .
At first it was just a bunch of squiggly lines . An ancient variant of long dead language from a long dead time. Buried under eons and two hundred feet of sand in the desert wasteland of North Africa. Now those squiggly lines carved in stone were speaking in a voice that echoed through his mind and made his body tremble. Rasping his fidgety fingers over the gritty sandstone he could hear that voice , powerful , commanding and not too distant . In the flickering torchlight he mouthed the words “ When the end comes we will be there.”
The black tongue of Mhykerain was supposed to be a myth , a hoax made up by superstitious locals to keep the scientists from digging up the graves of the sacred , but here it was , in a place that had not seen sunlight in over five thousand years . The oldest of the sites , this would be the fourth place on the fourth continent that we found the same message in the same dead ( supposedly counterfeit ) language .
“ Disturb our darkness will disturb your light . “
Some languages were never intended for translation to English . But when your nine year old daughter - who never learned any language besides English - wakes up in the middle of the night speaking weird tongues in a voice that’s not her own , you study everything that might help you find answers . “ Nosh de foth kor wein giff derengea “ translation : Those who walk blind will enter . “ Nige wreth khin et rom vakina “ : And the deaf will speak our praises. “ Boareukh gilead tes macrohd “. : The great darkness will consume . “ Nige dehkhaurt guesh hiast rhoblied ham vumin taug .“ And none will know the living from the dead .
If he’s reading it right .
Eve offered me the fruit she found . She told me where she found it and I ate it anyway . Knowledge is a tricky thing . You spend your life trying to learn as much about everything as you can and then one day you find something you can’t unlearn . The mystery you should of left unsolved , but now Pandoras’ box is opened , because we had to know what was inside . 1st Corinthians 10:25 “ Whatsoever is sold in shambles , that eat , asking no question for conscious sake . “
The squiggly double dotted lines could’ve been trails left by trilobites in the mud during the Paleozoic period some 250 million years ago that’s what they looked like to me at first glance and that’s what the carbon dating suggested but something about them seemed more decisive than a large, prehistoric crustacean scurrying about, on its daily errands. Learning to understand it was like the test you get from the eye doctor as he clicks different lenses in front of your eye. The shape changes from blurry and meaningless , to a symbol that forms a sound , to sounds that make a word . Read line five please . “Nige evak luniet norsh vie keeja . “ : And rivers will flow with blood .
The truth is, I don’t know why Dr. Ellis chose me . I’m inclined to think he didn’t like me. I’d rather have been left ignorant like most the rest of the world. You see , other people were referred to him . Other people were waking up their families in the middle of night spouting nonsense and having no recollection of what they said , why they were saying it or what it meant. People from all walks of life, people of all shapes , colors and sizes .
When Muriel , my daughter , first started doing it, I thought it was cute , I thought she was displaying the early signs of great and vivid imagination . But whenever the message was finished and she was once again aware of herself , she was terrified . She would scream and cry for hours and not be able to give any reason why . I honestly thought she was making it up so she wouldn’t have to sleep in her own bed .
Lucia, My wife, called Father Clarke . Four days and nights he spent with Muriel, and not one occurrence . She didn’t shy away from crosses , and holy water didn’t burn her skin , that was enough to convince Father Clarke she was not possessed . We went to counseling .
Dr. Tami Baxter PhD. , saw Muriel twice a week for three weeks and under hypnosis my very own baby daughter describes the face of a powerful, hideous demon that tells her what she must say , and in time , what she must do. And my scared little baby daughter will do what she’s told because she just wants it all to stop. When it’s over and I’m talking to Dr. Baxter alone she says it’s the eighth time she’s seen this in the past five months and when she conferred with her colleagues they were all seeing it , remarkably similar accounts. Not just my daughter . Not just in my town . Not just in my country .
There are worse evils in the universe than any you know about . Evils that can’t be explained away by science or warded off by religion or philosophy . Evils older than humanity , that left their marks on our world before the first living organisms stirred . Left their marks for us to find . Evil that sleeps and waits for it’s time.
It’s time is now .
But tonite , that man will enter.... ( cue the music ) The Skylight Zone.
Ok seriously, the following is an excerpt from a short story. Critisism , constructive or otherwise is welcomed.
From : " Absolute Darkness "
Sometimes even the brightest places in the world have a sense of darkness about them. The sun stands at one o’clock high, grains of sand bleached white as snow , reflecting the pinpricks of light back into your retinas. Even the deep blue of the sky is so bright it hurts to look at. When you’ve been awake for forty-six hours , everything does.
“ The ruins are visible from the top of the next hill. We’re almost there “ Sanji looks at me with a wane smile and then looks into his lap for moment brushing his inner thigh as if something is crawling up his leg. I just wish he’d watch the road . “ Dr. Ellis said not to be late. “ He keeps repeating that , despite the expression of disdain it brings to my face. Under other circumstances, I might be more appreciative of his company. Under other circumstances, I wouldn’t be here.
Four years ago I attended one of Dr. Ellis’ lectures that was back when I liked and respected him, before I knew him as the pretentious windbag he now is. Before we discovered how the world will end.
We are getting closer now. I can feel my stomach twisting into knots , I can feel my tear ducts swelling .I can feel the goose bumpy wave up the back of neck as the hairs raise.
It’s all too familiar.
Hells ’ forefathers are coming home .
At first it was just a bunch of squiggly lines . An ancient variant of long dead language from a long dead time. Buried under eons and two hundred feet of sand in the desert wasteland of North Africa. Now those squiggly lines carved in stone were speaking in a voice that echoed through his mind and made his body tremble. Rasping his fidgety fingers over the gritty sandstone he could hear that voice , powerful , commanding and not too distant . In the flickering torchlight he mouthed the words “ When the end comes we will be there.”
The black tongue of Mhykerain was supposed to be a myth , a hoax made up by superstitious locals to keep the scientists from digging up the graves of the sacred , but here it was , in a place that had not seen sunlight in over five thousand years . The oldest of the sites , this would be the fourth place on the fourth continent that we found the same message in the same dead ( supposedly counterfeit ) language .
“ Disturb our darkness will disturb your light . “
Some languages were never intended for translation to English . But when your nine year old daughter - who never learned any language besides English - wakes up in the middle of the night speaking weird tongues in a voice that’s not her own , you study everything that might help you find answers . “ Nosh de foth kor wein giff derengea “ translation : Those who walk blind will enter . “ Nige wreth khin et rom vakina “ : And the deaf will speak our praises. “ Boareukh gilead tes macrohd “. : The great darkness will consume . “ Nige dehkhaurt guesh hiast rhoblied ham vumin taug .“ And none will know the living from the dead .
If he’s reading it right .
Eve offered me the fruit she found . She told me where she found it and I ate it anyway . Knowledge is a tricky thing . You spend your life trying to learn as much about everything as you can and then one day you find something you can’t unlearn . The mystery you should of left unsolved , but now Pandoras’ box is opened , because we had to know what was inside . 1st Corinthians 10:25 “ Whatsoever is sold in shambles , that eat , asking no question for conscious sake . “
The squiggly double dotted lines could’ve been trails left by trilobites in the mud during the Paleozoic period some 250 million years ago that’s what they looked like to me at first glance and that’s what the carbon dating suggested but something about them seemed more decisive than a large, prehistoric crustacean scurrying about, on its daily errands. Learning to understand it was like the test you get from the eye doctor as he clicks different lenses in front of your eye. The shape changes from blurry and meaningless , to a symbol that forms a sound , to sounds that make a word . Read line five please . “Nige evak luniet norsh vie keeja . “ : And rivers will flow with blood .
The truth is, I don’t know why Dr. Ellis chose me . I’m inclined to think he didn’t like me. I’d rather have been left ignorant like most the rest of the world. You see , other people were referred to him . Other people were waking up their families in the middle of night spouting nonsense and having no recollection of what they said , why they were saying it or what it meant. People from all walks of life, people of all shapes , colors and sizes .
When Muriel , my daughter , first started doing it, I thought it was cute , I thought she was displaying the early signs of great and vivid imagination . But whenever the message was finished and she was once again aware of herself , she was terrified . She would scream and cry for hours and not be able to give any reason why . I honestly thought she was making it up so she wouldn’t have to sleep in her own bed .
Lucia, My wife, called Father Clarke . Four days and nights he spent with Muriel, and not one occurrence . She didn’t shy away from crosses , and holy water didn’t burn her skin , that was enough to convince Father Clarke she was not possessed . We went to counseling .
Dr. Tami Baxter PhD. , saw Muriel twice a week for three weeks and under hypnosis my very own baby daughter describes the face of a powerful, hideous demon that tells her what she must say , and in time , what she must do. And my scared little baby daughter will do what she’s told because she just wants it all to stop. When it’s over and I’m talking to Dr. Baxter alone she says it’s the eighth time she’s seen this in the past five months and when she conferred with her colleagues they were all seeing it , remarkably similar accounts. Not just my daughter . Not just in my town . Not just in my country .
There are worse evils in the universe than any you know about . Evils that can’t be explained away by science or warded off by religion or philosophy . Evils older than humanity , that left their marks on our world before the first living organisms stirred . Left their marks for us to find . Evil that sleeps and waits for it’s time.
It’s time is now .