He lay there for a moment as the world crackled into his mind shaking him from the dream realm as he floated his mind back to reality. Time was infinite and mute all at the same time as he grabbed the cell phone and thumbed the dismiss button on display, laying back and settling his head on the pillow
He knew he had to get up had to move and become a real person in the world again but the pillows and blankets had made him one of their tribe. They called to him as deftly and surely as the sirens of Capreae. Laying there floating drifting back to the realm of queen Maab, the monster's claws scattered his thoughts. Spreading themselves back into the ether of sleep all the while the voice in his head repeated its mantra.
“It's time to get up… Time to work… Time to make money… You have to get up…” He was in the middle of telling the voice in his head exactly what it could do with its mantra when a large bump moved his body. Bringing him to the realm of the living he opened up his eyes to mere slits and saw his dog roach...
Roach was an impressive animal a Colby breed PitBull with wide shoulders and a brown and white painted face… He was intimidating if you looked at him but he was the biggest baby in the world… The beast stood there staring the man down as he struggled to wake himself, knowing he could no longer sink back into sleep. His friend needed to go outside and do his business with a tree.
With the weight of sleep clinging to his shoulders he forced himself up and dug around in the dim morning light for his faded pajama pants with the marvel logo on them and tugged them on, searching blindly with one eye finding his zip-up biker boots and wrestled them on, He caught a glimpse of himself in The hallway mirror. He was a sight...
He was not beautiful like you would find in magazines or on tv, especially as he was dressed now. He was a little chubby but his broad shoulders, arms, and legs carried the muscle of a person that has known hard work in his life, He was a little taller than average with his arms slightly longer but not enough that they looked out of proportion or place And he was not an ugly man either. All in all, he had that honest rugged boy in mischief look to him, His short-cropped spiky hair and blue wife-beater shirt adding to this ...
The tattoos that danced their way like spilled ink across his coppery leather skin added to his don't fuck with me attitude. It was only a glimpse but he was the most obliviously aware person you will ever meet And the sight brought a curse from his lips.
"god damn Cole you look rough..." His reflection in the mirror had no reply for him so off he went to take his buddy outside… the in the morning air it was freezing, The kind of cold that freezes the cells in your lungs and makes your nose burn, it was like the first drag off a cool menthol cigarette.
He was glad that Roach wasted no time in making friends with the greenery and with a few swipes from his paw they turned going back inside. The rest of the morning went by quickly and Cole fell into his morning routine. He finished his ritual in the laundry room, sliding on his light blue arc flash shirt and dark blue slacks, and finished by lacing up his nine-pound steel toe work boots.
Keys jangled at his waist as he unlocked the door to his monstrous blue Chevy, his SUV wasn't much to look at but like its owner no matter how beat and banged up it became it always started. He put the key in the ignition setting his cell phone in the passenger seat and rolled the engine over, feeling it flare to life in defiance of the cold, one quick stop at the gas station for an energy drink and caffeine pills, a combination he liked to call tech fuel and he was on his way to work.
His drive to work was long, and he could feel the stimulants kicking in, burning through his veins and bringing him back to life. Mostly he enjoyed the long drive, it let his mind wander into the worlds of fantasy and daydreams that he had, from an early age his imagination had been his refuge from a bad childhood and tragic life. Falling into the rhythm of the road he let the hypnotic sound of the tires drag him further into his daydreams.
The sight of the security gate brought him back. As always his dreams had melted the time making it feel like the hour drive had taken only moments. He fumbled in his back pocket for the wallet that carried his I.D. badge and swiped it on the little panel outside his window. It took a couple of swipes before the panel recognized his badge and for a slight moment, he imagined the security office computer was an ancient piece of technology that was held together with silly string and prayers.
He tossed his wallet into the passenger side seat as he pulled into the parking lot of his facility. He took a smoke out of his pack and lit it with the green butane lighter, listening to the paper crackling as he pulled in a deep drag, Laying his head back on the seat he stared at the building, It was quite large and never shut down, the workers constantly moving in and out of the doors.
Today was different though it was the beginning of the new year and the almighty upper management had decided to cut back on the workforce over time. Leaving the building to be staffed like a bastardized skeleton crew. He could feel the weight of despair and monotony boiling off the building like waves of steam in snow. This was always the hardest part of the day.
That moment in between worlds when he would stop being free and would have to become the slave of the workforce. He knew there was no help for it and with that feeling, he steeled his mind and heart at the upcoming onslaught of the day.
He got out of his SUV flicking the cherry from his cigarette and putting the butt in his pocket, it was an old habit from his marine corps days and he did it without thought, taking off his regular glasses and changing them out with the company approved safety glasses he let out a slow breath and walked into the building.
He swiped his badge at the panel on the door and it beeped him through the sound of the lock like a hammer against metal as he walked into the hallway that Coles to the production floor. There was always this feeling he got as he walked the floor. Never being sure of what exactly caused the feeling he had become accustomed to it, in his mind he saw it a lot like swimming, when you first jump in, the cool water is shocking to your system until you grow comfortable with the temperature. Today felt different.
When the transition hit him it was not the smooth cool way of jumping into a pool, but instead, it was like walking into an invisible bubble. He pressed against it with his mind and for a moment wondered if he was still in his head dreaming. He closed his eyes as the world seemed to spin and lurch under his feet, suddenly the bubble popped. Cole opened his eyes slowly trying to get his stomach under control and reorient his senses to the factory environment.
He looked around noticing the lights were dimmer, and all the usual scents that are associated with making car parts hit him, except in the air was something new. The acrid smell of gunpowder floated about him like fog on a cool morning. His mind raced over the possibilities of the new smell but eventually settled on the thought that a machine had burned up its motor and the smell of its mechanical guts was spreading through the air.
He passed it off as another machine he would have to fix and made his way to the time clock. The lights remained dim causing him to think someone must have turned the motion detection off to save money and slid his badge through the time clock, waiting for the message, "Punch accepted."
He looked around scanning his machines for the green production signs that read, "In production" letting him know all of his machines were up and running, but as he did so he noticed… There was no movement, nobody at the machines, no forklifts moving baskets or managers walking the floor checking numbers. In his mind, the fear he was late and missing an all-employee meeting flared inside his head and he ran for the break room.
His hand touched the smooth glass pane just as he was looking through the door trying to find people, but only silence greeted him. He caught a glimpse of the outside world through the huge bay window of the break room. It has been cold but sunny outside and it was only two in the afternoon. The sun had been out bright and shining, But the sky he gazed upon now was the rust color red of a summer twilight.
Confusion burst through his head, he usually knew when the plant would be shut down for the day because he was part of the shutdown crew. Though he knew it was not impossible that the day crew had shut down and forgot to call him letting him know not to come in. He walked his way to the maintenance shop where they had computers set out for the workers to check email and finish the paperwork required for their machine repairs.
Without a thought, he held his badge up to the panel letting it beep his way into the maintenance shop. The first thing he noticed as he walked in was the lights were off. In his mind, this confirmed that the fuck heads on first shift didn't call him and he had wasted gas driving in when he was not needed.
He looked around for the light switch and noticed that the light to the inner office of the maintenance shop was on. He followed it like a homing beacon and through the Plexiglas windows, he could see his boss Bill sitting at his desk staring at the computer. Cole stopped for a moment and watched not wanting to interrupt anything important. His boss was not an impressive man.
A hand shorter than Cole with a handlebar mustache and morbidly overweight, the man often wheezed when he was forced to walk.
Cole stood there for a moment but when he felt sure Bill was not going to look up and notice him he walked into the office. Bill sat at his desk quietly, only the sound of his breathing breaking the awkward feeling of the room
"Hey, Bill looks like you shut down and didn't tell me I wasn't supposed to be here, what about we give me 4 hours on the books because I clocked in when I don't have to be here and we call it even" Cole always had a smart ass tone to his voice when he talked but he was charming in his way and most people liked him. Bill sat in silence at his desk, Not moving, just that steady heavy breath of lungs working under too much fat.
"Hey bill, you ok man?" Cole asked as he reached out to touch the man's shoulder.
It happened so fast Cole's mind was left reeling. Bill came awake at the touch of his hand and reacted like a Venus fly trap lying in wait. The heavy man's hand grabbed Cole's in a vice-like grip, the kind of grip one develops over many years of turning wrenches and slinging hammers for a living, And hauled him in close with a forceful jerk, pulling Cole's face close to his.
"We didn't forget Cole, you're supposed to be here..." Bill's voice sounded like bone over chalkboard mixed with the fetid breath that could boil the flesh from your bones. Cole’s mind threatened to break, it had to be a dream, he was still in bed locked in one of his horrible night terrors. Pain shot through his hand as Bill tightened his grip and used his other hand to grab him by the thigh. Lifting Cole from mother earth he threw him hard against the wall. He could hear the plaster and boards break. He was pretty sure in his racing thoughts he had cracked a couple of ribs as he hit the floor in a heap. He lay there on the ground his body throbbing with pain, his vision tunneling down to pinpoints as his mind scattered, watching as Bill started to move toward him.
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"What in the hell is going on?..." The thought floated through Cole's mind
"Hell is right boy, and you're smack in the middle of downtown!!" Bill roared at him as he used one hand to lift his desk and toss it through the window. The sound of shattering glass broke the fog in Cole's mind as wind hot enough to cool the sun poured in the windows. He struggled to move, and run, but Bill was faster, one hand grabbing him by the front of his shirt tearing the buttons open and exposing Cole's flesh to the supernova wind.
"It's time to pay the piper Cole baby let's have a dance..." Bill laughed in an insane way that sounded like rattlesnakes crossing pavement, Cole's mind broke into survival mode. With a great effort and searing pain in his ribs, he lifted his hands above his head and attacked his assailant's arms, trying in vain to strike the pressure points that would make the arm go dead and release him from the monster's grip, But blow after blow only brought more of the horrid laughter from the beast that had been his boss Bill...
He watched as Bill pulled back his free hand. The skin ripping and tearing away from the bones in his fingers as they extended into long jagged claws. Bill pulled his hand back readying for the strike. "15 minutes Cole baby, you lasted 15 minutes in hell!!" The demon let out a vile laugh of victory and plunged his hand toward Cole’s chest
Cole knew it was coming and there was nothing he could do to escape the blow, he could almost hear the wet thump as the claw reached his bare skin, And he knew death was upon him. Hanging there limp and helpless he waited for the eternity it took in life and death situations for the blow to land.
He felt peaceful as the monster's fingertips hit his chest and felt it sear across his body like molten lava. The pain threatened to take his mind as the force of the blow pushed in on his chest. There in that moment, he screamed in his mind. Somewhere outside of him he heard another scream, it was vile and like nothing he had ever heard before, the scream was coming from Bill
He had pulled his hand back and all that remained was a charred bloody stub, his scream carried, building until the concrete mortar began to crack and Cole covered his ears with his hands tucking his chin into his chest to protect him. Looking down at his chest he discovered the tattoo he wore there glowed with a white light that reminded him of the phosphorous grenades he had trained with while in the Corps.
It was a remembrance tattoo with his daughter's name in runic and a triquetra in the center and it burned like acid on his skin… Cole's mind lurched as it fought with reality but in the end, instincts and ancient training won out. He looked passed the demon ignoring the pain in his body another trick he had learned in the Marines. He shoved it into a box he kept in his mind and summoned the killer inside his soul.
Old and faded the killer emerged sinking into Cole's body and taking control. The pain was distant, the fight the only thought, cold eyes ran over the room using their adrenaline-fueled senses to search for anything that could be used as a weapon. His eyes fell onto the bucket in the back of the room, behind the chair that Bill had been sitting in, there standing like Excalibur in its stone he saw it. A brass hammer standing tall above the mismatched tools. His body screamed as he forced it forward, but he had a job to do. He rolled his way over to the bucket as the monster wailed and cursed, trying to crush his skull with the sound.
"You fucking fuck, what is it you bring here, you little piss ant, I watched heaven fall to its knees, and you think kitchen witchery will stop me!!!" Bill's defiant shout echoed into Cole's very bones but in it, he could hear fear, “Fear is good, only things that can die feel fear…” the killer in his head informed him
It was a moment stretched to the breaking point, Cole hammer in hand had regained his footing and Bill stared at him, with hate-filled, burning eyes that had begun to ooze like candle wax in the hot sun. Bill screamed, charging at him, but Cole was ready, and though he had not fought in years, his body and the killer within took over.
Driven by sheer force of will, Cole parried the streaking claws. He moved clumsily, as his body had more weight on it since he had been a Marine, but it was good enough. At first, the fight was like a dance, Bill in his monstrous rage striking at his chest, throat, and guts as Cole blocked, dodged, and struggled to keep his stance.
Then it started flowing back, like a veil lifted from his mind, and Cole could hear the war drums beating in his chest. The feeling of the fight flared in his veins and the bittersweet metallic taste of bloodlust touched his tongue. He was home. The killer again, a demon of his own making locked away in his head, drowned out with therapy, cigarettes, and booze. The killer was loose, and it felt good to be free. His anger feeding his muscles, his reactions, and senses.
He smacked away Bill's hands, throwing them wide in an arch leaving the demon open. Cole took the advantage without a thought, twisting on his feet, rolling into his opponent, striking him with the force and weight of his entire body.
The brass hammer took Bill across the chin, a satisfying crack of bone and thump of muscle greeting Cole, and he couldn’t help but smile. The monster fell, curses still falling from his lips as he hit the ground. "Rule one in a fight: being on the ground is death. Jump him!" the killer's thought blasted Cole's mind, and he followed the instructions as any good soldier would. He fell on top of Bill, his hammer swinging, again and again, his skull sounding like a watermelon splitting on concrete with each blow.
He could feel the monster's claws raking his skin making his tattoo burn with each strike, but Cole had the fight. It was over, he stood gasping for air in an effort to clear the rage from his blood and lock the killer away.
Bill twitched on the ground, blood and bone covered the room like a Jackson Pollock painting and all Cole could do was laugh, A maniacal evil laugh at what he had done. Another bad habit that he had picked up in the Corps and this one had earned him a nickname.
"Welcome home Joker," he told the killer in his mind, “I think you need to stick around for a while." He could hear the insane laughter in his head and he knew at the end of this he was going to have an even harder fight to lock Joker back up deep in his soul.
Cole let himself slide down the wall until he was sitting on the floor. Bill's remains had stopped twitching in their death throes, they had begun to bubble and steam letting out a noxious fog into the air of the office.
It smelled like a cat had pissed on a tire fire and then rolled around in week old skunk. Cole could feel his stomach begin to quiver at the stench and he promptly vomited on the floor to his side with a sickening sound. The brass hammer that had saved his life sat in his lap the weight of it bringing a small comfort to him. The room had begun to turn green with bill's death fog and Cole knew he had to get away from it.
With muscles that screamed from their long forgotten movements, he hauled himself from the floor, pushing the door shut and jamming a floor mat under it to keep the fumes from spilling into the shop. He made his way to the light switch by the door, listening hard for any movement in the dark. The lights flicked on, not with their usual fluorescent brilliance, but with the subtle ruddy glow that always comes from industrial lights when they have grown old and underpowered
The shop had a metal sink set up next to the garage door where the crew would wash the grease, metal splinters, and debris of the day off of them. Right, above it stood a mirror, a sort of dented piece of metal, Polished just enough that you could check over your uniform but never good enough for the close-up details. He looked at himself in the mirror, blood and gore covered his skin where it lay bare from his torn shirt, but his reflection was not good enough for him to check his wounds. His ribs ached in the familiar way he had long ago learned to associate with broken and cracked bones.
"They are just cracked, go through the procedure, assess the damage, are you bleeding?" Joker's voice cut through his haze making him start the routine at his feet, flexing and relaxing each body part, feeling for pain, cuts, and if the limbs were functional. Lastly, he turned on the faucet to wash the massacre of flesh from his chest, the stench of sulfur burned his nose as yellow liquid poured from the faucet.
The smell reminded him of aunt's well water back home, it had been dug too close to a sulfur pocket and had always carried the stench of rotten eggs, and while it smelled horrible it was still safe to drink. He put the tips of his fingers in the running water and it oozed over his skin. The feeling of clean water covered in slime reminded him of pond scum, but at least it had not eaten away his flesh.
He hit the lever on the paper towel dispenser that hung on the wall and used them to clean the blood off his chest. Relief flooded through him as the remains of his fight washed off of his skin, there was no cut. He knew there should be a gash big enough to bleed him out crawling its way over his body, but all he found was chestnut copper skin. It was his tattoo that caught his attention.
It was the same as always two ravens above each breast, a triquetra in the center, and underneath a name spelled out in Celtic runes that went across his entire lower chest. All of the tattoos were colored in various shades of black except the raven's eyes, which were blue, but now as he looked at it, he could see dim light emanating from it, Glowing faintly like a child's glow stick he had given to his kids to use during Halloween.
He cupped his hand over the inked flesh thinking it was a trick of the light, but no, there beneath the shadow of his hand the ink was glowing with a bluish green light."What the fuck is going on here?" His words fell from his lips as a slight whisper, "This has to be a dream, I'm locked in a dream, I need to wake up!" he closed his eyes as he realized he was talking to himself and began gathering his will.
He had suffered from night terrors since he was a child and though most kids grow out of them Cole was one of the lucky few who had not. He pulled in his will and imagined himself floating in a dark black pool, he had learned long ago to control his dreams, at least to the point where he could wake himself up, most times. He felt the dark pool surround him, filling him, it was him and then he floated to the surface, just as he had done hundreds of times in his life.
All he had to do was reach the top and break the surface and he would wake from this horrible nightmare. The darkness shifted, and Cole grasped at the nothingness trying to hold onto it, fighting with all he had to break the surface and end the dream, it shifted in the grasp of his will and then floated away from him, scattering like smoke in the wind.
"This isn't a dream Cole baby, you know that you feel those ribs, this putrid air burning in our lungs, we have been shifted, kidnapped, shanghaied to the never-never world." Joker's voice cracked through his mind as a harsh laugh. "We can't be there, no living man can enter hell and leave... It's God's decree, a law of creation and it can't be broken I know that.." Cole threw his rage-filled thought at joker
"True but who said you're going to leave, and for that matter who says there aren't ways around the law..." Joker's voice fell back into laughter as Cole stepped away from the sink looking out the window into the ruddy red twilight. His thoughts rolled over themselves giving him the possibilities of his situation, his passion had been spirituality, everything from Jesus Christ to Aleister Crowley
He knew there was lore and myth about people being taken into the ether by changelings, brownies, and all sorts of otherworldly boogiemen but this, this was straight out of Greek myth and he was Persephone. The P.A. system crackled and sparked to life cutting Cole's thoughts short as his attention shifted to the noise.
Music picked its way across the room, falling into a song his mind recognized and his thoughts began to roll in time to the lyrics of “Welcome to the Jungle.” He listened to the song as it abruptly cut away the static of dead air filling the room. He heard a small sound like someone clearing their throat just before a Smoky sultry voice spoke.
"Sorry about that Cole baby, but we appreciate a good laugh every now and then." A polite laugh paused the speech from the P.A. system and continued. "Now that I have your attention welcome to our little shop of horrors, you must be wondering who am I, don't fret about it Cole baby you aren't the first to come here and you won't be the last." Amusement seeped through the woman's tone as he listened and joker cackled, "We're fucked..."
"Allow me to explain," the woman's voice purred "You are here for our enjoyment, every so often we get bored you see, tempting humanity to sin, all to make father cry at his lost loves, but it's nice to get a reboot, something fresher than the damned souls here in Hell, so Cole boy, it's a game, you play and maybe you could walk out of here, lose or refuse to play and we swallow you up..." A rumble shakes through the speakers of the P.A. system, the sounds of people shuffling to sit down causing the woman to pause.
"Here is the game, three buildings, three days to find your way back home, find the way out and we send you on your merry way, run out of time or die... we feast!" The voice purred through the static, breaking through the scattered thoughts of Cole's mind.
"You have one hour to prepare, let the game begin!.." The P.A. cut off with the woman still laughing plunging the factory into an eerie silence, not even the hum of the normally running machines to break it.
Cole searched his mind looking for answers, frantic thoughts bouncing around his head, "What is this place?..." The thought skimmed through his head, he reached down to scratch his right arm, the tattoo had begun to itch and made his skin feel like it was crawling. The itching grew like ants trying to peel away his flesh bringing his attention to his arm.
It was covered in the black letters of a poem written about him, a token of love that he had decided to place on his skin to carry forever. Over the years he had grown used to the dark script covering him, in this place the ink glowed with a faint reddish color. As he glanced at it his eyes caught the moment in the ink and for a moment he thought it was a trick of the light.
Doubt flooded from him and replaced itself with confused awe as the glowing letters and words moved themselves to the blank space of his arm spelling the words, "You are in Theosis" in bright red letters.