Tag: Body horror

8: Subservient

I wake with a jolt, and experience all over again the heavy sensation of disorientation and soreness. I look out from the thick patch of shiny brown grass and watch another herd of the brutes stomp their way into the palace. I now know I can never enter this place, not until I have been eaten against my will and made a part of this terrible ecosystem. The shadow of the birds trace dizzying patterns in the marsh grasses, and I am compelled to attempt plucking some of the grass, to see if it is edible. I select a long strand and pull at it, but find that it is rooted firmly, and pulls much of the surrounding ground up with it, bending and not breaking. I relent and stare out across the alien vista, ignoring the grumbling of my stomach and the throbbing in my head. Sleep beckons me again.

My dreams are violent and familiar, painted with the sounds and sights I’ve digested since waking in the ruined city. First I dream that I am again being pursued by the stalking spider machine, with its lurid, contorted face grinning at me through eyeless, lidless sockets. Then I am hiding in the locker again, but the surgeon opens my door this time, and places me on a hook. Suddenly it is Julia, cupping my face in her hands and smiling, as something churns in my stomach, buzzing like flies. She whispers to me, and I gag as something with many legs crawls up my throat.

“Welcome home.”

I gasp and retch as I wake again, and claw feverishly at the wet ground, my torn shirt damp with sweat. I look up and see someone standing over me, a woman wearing a red robe. I pull away in fear, but she stays still, simply watching me. Her face is white, white as can be, and her eyes are red. She has dull, dark black hair flowing over her shoulders, and her hand is outstretched as if offering help. Her voice is soft, and sounds muffled leaving her mouth, as though her throat is stuffed up with cotton.

“Come with me.”

I shake my head and breathe with great difficulty, my body beginning to shut down all but the most essential functions in rebellion against lack of food and water. She insists.

“Come with me, the sentinels will permit you, so long as I am accompanying you.”

I attempt to refuse further, but am too weak to resist as she draws near and lifts me by my shoulders to my feet, making me lean against her. Her hand is cold and hard, and I dimly grasp that it is so pale because it is within a porcelain gauntlet. Perhaps her face is, too. She leads me gently, and together we cross the bridge unassailed by the sentinels.

Inside now, I feel weaker than ever, and barely notice as we cross carpets and pass monochromatic paintings. I feel myself being laid upon a bed with my chest upright, and a vessel is pushed to my lips. I attempt to object, but warm savory liquid passes my lips, and I must swallow it so as not to choke. Almost immediately my vision clears, and the throbbing in my skull fades. I look about me and see half a dozen porcelain women in red robes and dresses, each staring inquisitively at me, as though I am a strange specimen in a jar. The one who came and found me leans back, holding an empty bowl stained red.

“Now rest, and Mother will see you when you are ready.”

As though hypnotized, I feel myself sink down into the soft warm bed, and descend into dreams once more.

Gone are the nightmares, and replacing them are strange sensations with few accompanying images, as though I am first being carried aloft on many hands, then smothered in paint. I feel a sharp pinch, and am suddenly wide awake once more, with another red-stained bowl being pulled away from my lips.

“Enough ichor, or you may become worse.”

Holding the bowl and speaking with a familiar voice is a woman made of ceramic and something like silicone, with hair that flows in an invisible wind. She is wreathed in a red light, and her eyes glow crimson as she looks almost fondly at me. I look around the room, and gather that I am in the guest chamber of some wealthy castle. Paintings of inhuman battles and bizarre congregations adorn every wall, and a window bordered by purple curtains looks out into the marsh. The bed itself is central to the room, and hosts enough pillows to bury me. The woman sits in a chair to one side and sets the bowl down on a nearby table.

“I worried that we might lose you. You stank of Tower’s territory when you first arrived, so I expected to find some of your organs missing or worse- but it seems you were only dehydrated and starving. Both of which, the ichor has remedied.”

Looking at her, I begin to remember, and finally place her as the individual I saw from the catwalk after my brush with the surgeon. Her smile is calm, a work of curiosity allowed by the careful interplay of her flexible and inflexible sections. Much of her arms and legs are porcelain, as is most of her face, with silicone and black rubber providing the flexibility required of joints. Her torso is wrapped up in red cloth that forms a sort of draping skirt longer at the back, but what I can see of her body appears to be black silicone and rubber, as with her joints. Here and there I see tubing like IV lines carrying an opaque, metallic golden fluid throughout her body. She watches me as I watch her, then sits back and looks out through the window.

“Julia told me you would be coming, but until one of the couriers depicted you following it, I never suspected you’d come all this way by yourself.”

Hearing Julia’s name, I sit up and look about, remembering how I had left her at the mercy of another again. Seeing my agitation, the woman presses her hand to my chest and firmly makes me lay back down.

“Stay put. While I cannot harbor you here forever, you must rest a while longer. Your body has yet to finish intaking the ichor. Be assured, none of the vivisurgeons or scavengers dare enter my territory. Your pursuers have given up on you.”

7: Subsistence

I find that I have entered a room made mostly of iron and stone. What unnerves me, however, is the webbing of red arteries that clings to every surface, pulsing with the flow of liquid within. The growths end in small tips that connect with the walls, ceiling, and floor, and seem to carry their fluid cargo to these spots. The room itself has three openings, the first of which is the shut gate of the elevator behind me. The second is an iron gate that might typically present the entrance to a property outdoors, juxtaposed against the doorway it occupies, through which I can see a long corridor that seems to become more fleshy as it continues into darkness.

I approach this gate reluctantly, and press it lightly, finding that it swings open readily. I look back at the third opening to the room; A staircase descends down into an area that is better lit by a light like incandescent bulbs gathered in great quantity. I turn forward again and shudder, pulling the gate closed and making my choice. I make for the stairs, avoiding stepping on any of the vessels.

I have entered a broad open space that is lit from around the corners of gaps in the walls too narrow for ingress. Raised platforms make up tables over which translucent sheets are laid, to cover whatever might be laid upon them. As my eyes adjust to the welcome light, I pick out etched writing along the bottom of each platform, in a sharp language that I do not recognize. As I continue deeper, I feel a faint sense of pressure at the back of my head, and there is a dissonant ringing in my ears, as though someone is singing a dirge.

The music does not remain in my head, but moments later is confirmed by the sound of shouting, screaming. All around me, from beneath the sheets, hands stretch up and claw desperately at the air, prevented by the white material, supplemented by the pained shouts of the owners. I am stuck in place, transfixed by the overlapping screaming of men and women alike. More and more hands strain upward, more than should be possible from bodies within the platforms. I begin to run, again. There are stairs further down at the back of the room. I am discomforted by the etchings in the walls there, but most anywhere seems preferable to this cacophony of agony. Light and heat streams up at me from below, but I gladly continue to descend as the voices become more distant.

As I slow to a more sustainable pace, I rest my hand on the wall, and look back. The wall feels porous, rough. Though I feel the urge to submit, to roll over and die, rising in my gut, I force it down. I cannot yet. This hell cannot be where I end. I swallow dryly, so very dryly, and press on.

The stairs continue for what feels like hours, and at times I pause to give my aching feet a rest. At last, I come to an alcove to the side of the continuing steps, and lean my head in. A faint odor of sweat emanates from this chamber, and I hear soft voices. Though I recall no friendly encounters, no person who is not sadist or victim, I press in, hoping against hope that I have found a clutch of survivors like myself. The hall is squat and wide, and seems laid together from prodigious stone bricks. My hair brushes against the ceiling. The voices become clearer, and I make out what seems to be an exchange between two women, one who seems close to crying, and the other who comforts her in a language I do not know. There are many harsh consonants, and short vowels.

I come to the end of the hallway and turn the corner into a broad chamber with many translucent fabrics draped from ceiling to floor, tainting the light of many candles into a pink glow. The strange fabrics form a maze that I traverse slowly, my hands brushing the drapery. It feels warm to the touch. I hear the women sighing and huffing as though frustrated or bereft of someone dear to them. The walls and floor are of a pale, ivory wood, with unusual grains woven across boards that narrow and widen strangely as I cross them.

I find myself passing the last few layers, and am greeted with the sight of two people kneeling upon a bed, their smoky outlines in the fabric portraying a strangely languid scene. I draw closer, and one calls out, facing me. She rises from the bed and presses herself to one of the curtains between us, clearly painting the image of her body. I hesitate, her voice is familiar. I at last round the final curtain, and am greeted with the lurid sight of two naked women staring at me, their faces pulled into smiles, their hands extended in welcome. I hear my heartbeat in my ears as the one that rose earlier comes closer, and I immediately recognize her as Julia.

“You’ve made it. Welcome, come, lay with us.”

I take a step back, as I remember, ruefully, the last I saw of her, lying unconscious upon the table of the man on the surface, whose words haunt me now more than ever. I can see on her no traces of the trials we endured, not even puncture wounds upon her arm where he grabbed her. She frowns, and pulls away to sit invitingly beside her companion, who strokes her hair affectionately.

“Won’t you join us? It’s better here, no lunatic surgeons or monsters, or collectors. Only sensations.”

My feet seem to ache more at this offer, and I consider sitting with them. My clothes itch, my body shakes with exhaustion, my eyelids droop and my throat stings. But as I look in disbelief at Julia, I notice a smudge of red on her thighs. She seems to notice my confusion, and pats the spot as if calling me to it.

“Not to worry. Please, come and stay. There’s nowhere ahead better than here. You can stay forever.”

A twinge of distrust brings my senses back to full alert, and I watch in terror as her companion leans in as if to kiss her, but pulls her head back and drives a thick bony needle from where her tongue should be into Julia’s throat. Julia moans in something that might be pain or pleasure, even as I see her blood pour violently down her chest in striking waterfalls. The woman pushes her down onto her back, and crouches over Julia, her spinal column strikingly sharp under her skin. I now notice other details about both of them, like the hairline seams in their skin around their joints, and the unnatural length of their fingers.

I begin to flee, running back through the curtains, tearing some as I pass. I am revolted as I notice arteries and nerve clusters in them being shredded, driving sharp moans from the things behind me. I race desperately through the hallway back to the stairs, and am so eager to continue downwards that I trip, and begin to fall.

I wake at the bottom of the steps, bruised and bloodied, but alive. I rise to my feet and grip myself with shuddering horror, and glance about myself. Behind me is a long and narrow obelisk through which the stairs must run, leading unfathomably high up into the sky until it fades into the noxious green clouds. The ground beneath me is soft and wet, and seems rife with brownish narrow grasses. The sky is bright and gray, and speckled with the forms of solitary birds. I watch a pair of these meet and begin fighting, until one eventually drops like a stone, and the other swoops down for the spoils. In all directions are clumps of lumbering four legged creatures like gorillas, easily ten feet tall. They are faceless masses of sinew, bone, and muscle, and pay me no mind as they march about, though their bony hooves worry me.

Directly to my left I see a structure that rivals the monolith from which I have emerged. An immense castle of soft pinks and yellowed whites, with banners stretching from each pinnacle to the outer wall, stands resolute on the horizon. This, I decide, will be my destination, once I overcome the shaking and weakness in my limbs.

Many of the terrible beasts are heading in the same direction as I am now, and I entertain the possibility of sparing my legs by seeing if one will allow me to climb onto its back. I cross over the marshy plain to come up alongside one, and contemplate its hideousness. All red and slick, its front is shored up with what is surely bone and keratin. A chitinous substance protects much of its legs and back, and bone spurs jut from many of its joints. I prepare to grasp one of these in an effort to climb it, when I notice that its face has turned back towards me as it marches. A single seam runs from top to bottom of the ovalloid head, and I detect breath whistling and snorting from this crease, soon surmising it to be a mouth. I resolve not to ride the beast after all, and am grateful to have reached the decision when I did; The mouth opens to two rows of thick molars as large as my hands, and the beast makes a noise that could be the whinnying of a deranged horse crossed with the roar of a grizzly.

Thankfully, it loses interest in me, as a bird thing has swooped down closer, and I now see that the flying thing is closer to a four-winged bat, with a face like an insect, with hundreds of human eyes glistening on the sides of its horrid head. The flier shrieks through a beakish mouth, and the beast makes its uncanny howl again. The bird-thing swoops down and rakes its four clawed feet across the back of the beast I nearly attempted to mount. I begin to retreat in weak terror. The beast swipes its forelegs at the attacker, which is made wary by this defense, and seems to turn its many eyes on me. My heart feels set to burst with dread as it drops in to grab me with its talons, which I now see well enough to call true claws, at the end of almost canine limbs. As I fall to my backend, the monster suddenly halts, and is yanked backwards with an ear splitting shriek of protest.

The lumbering beast has the bird-thing by its long sinewy tail, its front hooves now revealed to be a pair of opposable fingers pressed into a cloven knuckle. The beast stands on its hindlegs with difficulty, but pulls the bird, which now seems frail by comparison for all its thrashing, close enough that the beast can bite around the horrible head of the thing, and crush it with a mighty display of muscle. The victim goes limp, and the winner sits back to feast noisily on its prize. I am stricken senseless, this only the latest in a series of trials.

Once the bone-brute has had its fill, it returns to all fours, and plods along once more, and I am possessed of the urge to stay nearby, as this thing has cemented itself in my mind as worthy protection. Our journey is a long one, and we are soon joined by more brutes, each sporting slight physiological differences. I notice that mine has begun developing a pair of human sized arms in its chest- limbs incredibly alike to the talons of the bird that attacked us- that it occasionally leans its head down to for an almost dog-like scratching. Other brutes boast similar trophies that I surmise have come from other prey; one sports a set of horns on its head, another has spikes all along its back, and another still has a tremendous pair of leathery wings folded at its shoulder. I feel a sort of fortune that my chosen brute seems to be on the larger side, as one of the more typical ones approaches with the apparent intent to make a meal of me, and add something of me to itself, but my chosen beast snaps territorially at it, shooing it away.

As the herd and I come close to the castle, I become aware of two things- firstly, that the castle itself is made of a white brick that seems carved from bone, and secondly, that a pair of tremendous creatures stand watch at the bridge over a suspicious red moat. These are nearly humanoid, with long arms ending in chitinous shears, four legs much like those of a hairless lion, and tails curled up and ending in a suspiciously sharp tip. Their faces, like the brutes’, are featureless, but host a single eye where the mouth might belong. Both seem to spot me immediately, and raise their arms with an intent I care not to learn.

The brutes pass by unharried, and I am soon left standing alone, unwilling to proceed forward and risk the giants’ Ire.

3: Subversion

I need to catch my breath. I crouch and gasp for air, again feeling the dryness that informs me that I have not had an answer to my thirst since waking. I look about, and see that I am in a room lined with dented and disused metal lockers. Benches rise from the floor between each row, and I surmise that I have reached a dressing area of sorts. I look up, and am greeted with the discouraging sight of rusted hooks hanging from the ceiling, swaying subtly with the wind of my arrival. I resolve to move, and journey a bit further before coming upon a room with many shower heads, separated from the first by a chest-high wall. I feel a glimmer of hope ignite in my chest, and approach one of the fixtures, laying my hand upon what promises to be the knob to call forth cold water, a salve to my aching. I turn the knob, and wince as it squeaks with resounding noise, but indeed blesses me with liquid.

The water is warm, but I drink regardless, finding it unfailingly sweet upon my tongue. The patting of every drop against my clothes is a comfort I have unknowingly longed for. But I hear, over the spray and splatter, a sound that fills me with renewed dread, the uneven step of something heavy and eager, drawn by the noise I have made in my haste. Pulling away from the water is agony, but I mount the wall and shove myself into one of the lockers, closing it as gently as I can, ignoring the stiff protest of my shoulders to be forced into awkward angles against the metal. The gait draws nearer, and I can picture the lumbering thing that makes them without seeing it, but none of my predictions prepare me properly for what rounds into view through the rhomboid holes of my shelter.

The monster is a thing of skin and flesh, but also the same plastic and metal that has made up the other things that have pursued me up to now. It moans softly through its scratched lips and sways its head from side to side as it enters the shower area in vexation. Its head is like an apron of skin pulled tight over a cracked lead sphere, with only a pair of lengthy thick sections to act as the borders to its mouth full of oxidized teeth jutting from bloody gums. A throat of rubbery tubes interwoven with bloated arteries and frayed muscles hoist the uncanny organ above a body of similar design, with tendons and fractured bones clutching at ribbed and misshapen mechanisms perilously connected to real viscera. Three arms- which seem to share only enough flesh for two, supplemented by steel and warped iron- clutch at the air until one gently settles on the knob of the still-running shower and silences its hiss. The creature raises one of its six-taloned hands and caresses its smooth head, grinding its teeth in a hideous grin. The intestinal tract that drapes over its pelvic area only partially conceals the stuttering movements of the insectoid, mechanical legs that drag it back towards the first room, unpleasantly close to where I hide. It opens one of the lockers and hacks a foul sound from its throat, the grating of metal an additional displeasure in its labor. It pulls something from the locker it has opened, and closes it almost gingerly, tossing what I now recognize as a limp body over its shoulder and stalking out of sight. I listen in revulsion as I wait to hear it recede, but am troubled when it seems to stop short. The next sound is that of something being lifted, then the rattling of a chain as great weight is placed upon it.

The cyborg beast makes a series of short guttural coughs, then opens another locker. I hear it lift something out, then the high-pitched whine of a small motor being tested. My skin crawling, I hear the motor begin in earnest, then deepen slightly in pitch as its implement- a blade or drill- is made to bite into a soft surface. This sound is joined by the groaning of the monster, and rapidly by the stifled, muffled shouting of the man he carried. Anguish fills the air, and I shudder unwillingly as the motor again becomes labored, having found something harder beneath the soft substance. The man’s shouting has become agonized shrieking. I close my eyes and grit my teeth as I hear the beast gurgle and squeal as if delighted by the results of its merciless actions. The motor stops a moment later, and I hear through the pained calls of the man that the monster has set aside its implement. It grasps something new, and the man’s screams become more desperate. There is a sudden squelch, and the voice is silenced. I open my eyes again, and look around the locker as more wet noises come from behind me, ever serenaded by drunken grunts from the laborer. There is nothing to comfort my sight as I hear a new tool turn on, and identify the sound of something being affixed by screws that bite into soft, then harder material.

An affirming belch comes from the creature, and the process begins again, but this time the man makes no complaint as the primary tool settles into its work. Exhaustion lays itself over my body from the strain of deciphering the distressing work being conducted out of my view. I slump in the uncomfortable position I have taken. The process continues, and repeats, with new facets being added in each cycle, sometimes with the return of the man’s pained, begging screams, only to return to silence at the presentation of a repeated squelching sound, something I decide must be an injection of a sedative or paralytic. The latter strikes me as more likely, somehow.

After what I judge to be multiple painful hours of this, The work comes to a close with the shutting of a locker door, and the receding dragging steps of the surgeon, gurgling his satisfaction as he goes. I do not wish to leave my hiding place, and the stiffness of my limbs assents with the preference. But as I contemplate the option, I consider that the surgeon may return, may open my locker in search of a place to stow a new patient, and find in me yet another. I strain, and shift my pressure-numbed limbs, fighting the comparably easy pain of pins and needles, and slowly, shakily open my door.

The metallic taste of blood in the air washes over me, having been previously masked by my own sweat. Swaying with nausea, I find my adrenaline pushing me around the corner and into the front of the room, where I am visually attacked by the result of the surgeon’s labors.

The man can hardly be called as such any longer; he more resembles his torturer than himself. In places his skin has been peeled away and replaced with plastic through which his organs can be seen, pulsing with the flow of his blood. His face has been complicated with a series of tubes that lead into his mouth and wrap around to a device that has been affixed to his ribs on his back. His fingers have been augmented with uneven iron claws, and one of his legs has been severed and replaced with a pair of many-segmented limbs ending in spurred spikes. I retch, and cover my mouth as bile seeks to climb my throat at the realization that I can see a handful of blinking lights sticking out of a rubber bag that has taken the place of his stomach. His head shudders slightly, and one of his eyes opens; the other has been instead mounted with a trio of black lenses. He strains his throat as though intending to declare his agony or beg my aid, but all that comes from his mouth is white foam.

I flee. I do not take the passage that would lead back to where I first came from, but instead turn down a corridor that suggests a gentle slope into the ground. Anywhere is better than where I have come from. I pass through doorways, take turns, and unquestioningly take a ladder up to a catwalk when I am presented the option of it or a door that proves to be locked when I attempt it.

I stagger across the catwalk and fall to my knees, heaving breath, fighting the outrage of my stomach that demands to be emptied in protest. It is empty already. I shiver, and place my hands on the metal, and try again to grasp my surroundings. It is dark, and I can see a number of chemical lamps beneath me, casting their diseased light over rows upon rows of sleek capsules of metal. I close my mouth against my gasping breaths, and rise to my feet, leaning on a railing for support. I begin to hear again after the deafening sound of my own panic has subsided in my ears, and I detect only the hum of electricity. I have not been followed. My nose for once declares that the air is tolerable, containing only the smothering presence of oil. I resume moving forward, now cautious of the possibility the catwalk presents for making heavy footfalls resound with great calamity. Below, a door opens, and I slow my pace further as I watch a trio of humanoid forms stalk calmly into the vast chamber. With so much space, their voices echo loudly to reach me, but I am struck by their qualities. The first is a woman’s voice, smooth and devoid of apparent aberration, certain in itself.

“I care little for your experiments, Tower.”

The next is a man’s voice, increased artificially with static and digital noise.

“So you say, but you know very well that my children are effective. Even their defective progeny produce results.”

The third figure does not speak, but seems to follow the woman with solemnity, as though it awaits instruction from her always. Its head bears curved horns. She turns and lays a hand with long fingers upon one of the capsules, causing it to light up within. The metal clears in an oval radiating from where it is touched, revealing a person’s body submerged in fluid within. Wires and tubes sustain the body, and various protrusions indicate that it has been grafted with a multitude of mechanical parts.

“A disgusting mutt. Even Fortress understands the beauty of totality. You claim efficiency, and yet you offer me sculptures with lopsided and uneven bodies, that on occasion make a mess of their surroundings with their excretions.”

The man, who she addresses as ‘Tower’, bows his head, and rasps a sigh in displeasure. The woman, whose hair seems to sway in slow motion as she moves, withdraws from the capsule, and folds her arms. As my eyes adjust to the low light, I detect a faint red glow about her, that follows lines in her body, and concentrates around where I estimate her eyes to be. The yellow light of the lamps paints her sickly and pale. The machine-tainted voice raises again.

“Fortress would do away with everything you love if he could. He hates his task as surely as he hates you.”

The third figure suddenly lashes out, and grabs the stunted figure of the man, who coughs violently in response to being raised. The woman unfolds her arms and turns away. I check my progress, and see that I am almost to the edge of the room.

“Fortress is obedient. He is clean and decisive, and for these reasons he has my love.”

The man chokes out his words with great difficulty.

“He would… overthrow you at a moment- moment’s notice… if he thought he… had the chance!”

The enforcer drops the man, and leaves him to sputter on his hands and knees as the other two recede towards the door. The woman pauses at the exit, and seems to laugh under her breath before replying to the statement.

“As would any of you. That’s why I don’t give you the chance.”

The door slams shut, leaving Tower to gather himself. I find that I wish to leave, make it to the end of the catwalk, and slowly push through a door of my own, casting one last glance to the scientist affectionately petting his experiment capsule. I close the door, careful not to make a sound.