The Nightmare Game (23 page)

“Okay,” I said to myself aloud, trying to psych
myself up. “I guess this is it.”

Slowly, cautiously, reluctantly, I turned the
doorknob, remembering that the floor of the room had fallen away under my feet
last night, wondering what I should hold onto should that happen again. No
sooner had I opened the door just a crack and before I could shut it again,
than the door ripped open with a terrible force. A blinding light emanated from
the entrance and a violent power beyond my strength sucked me in, beyond the
door, beyond my ability to retreat.

The bright light blinded me as I was suctioned
into the doorway and felled to my knees by the intensity of the force. I
covered my eyes, prostrate, unable to move, steeling myself against the
violence of the wind whipping around me, wondering if this storm would pass or
if, like the one in the shower vortex, get only worse. Very soon, however, its
pitch lessened until it died altogether. It was only then that I had the
courage to uncover my eyes.

I found myself alone on a dirt path. There was no
evidence that any storm had ever come this way at all, for the air was
stifling, hot and extremely humid, with heavy blue-black thunderclouds
dominating the sky, signaling a storm’s mounting rather than its aftermath. I
seemed to be in a countryside somewhere; there were neither homes nor any other
evidence that another human being was around besides myself. Only the dirt path
lay before me and behind me a dead end. This world was framed by grasses and
weeds alongside trees dripping heavily with Spanish Moss.

I had no way of knowing where I was, so I simply
got up and headed down the path. The day was becoming even hotter and more
humid as I walked and the sun rose higher in the sky, fighting the
thunderclouds for preponderance. I knew I was now in the realm that Edmond said
that Rochere controlled, if for no other reason that it had been evening when I
opened the second door at The Crypt a few moments ago and it was approaching
mid-day at present. If I kept walking, I wondered whether or not I would find
another living soul in this place. I thought it best not to ponder too much on
it, for the idea of being abandoned alone in this realm would only accelerate
my fears and I was working hard to keep them at bay. The only course of action
for me to take was to keep walking, so I just continued down the path. My
spirits perked up a little when, after about ten minutes, the path broadened
into an uneven, pocked dirt road; I took it as a sign that perhaps there was
more life in this world, after all. I hoped I wasn’t being overly optimistic.

I kept making progress down the road, but after
I’d walked for about another twenty minutes, I was still in the middle of
nowhere and still in the same situation as when I first arrived. I’d seen
neither another person nor any sign that one even existed here. I could feel my
anxiety rising, so I decided to focus my attention less inward and take in the
scenery for distraction. Odd that I hadn’t noticed it before, but there was a
remarkable lack of color here. Had it been this way all along or was I just
observing it now? This place, whatever it was, suddenly seemed even more
threatening. If there was concrete evidence that I was no longer in the real
world, this lack of color saturation was it. The scenery in all other aspects
now strongly resembled that not of New Orleans, but rather that of southwestern
Louisiana, a part of the country I remembered well as being quite colorful in
many varied ways, not least of which was visual. Despite any superficial
resemblance to Cajun country, this place was strange, unearthly, unhealthy. It
was truly colorless without the dull, dead appearance of an area hit by a long,
heavy drought, because all the trees were lush, all the grasses overgrown.
Everything did have some color, it was just that its saturation was incredibly
low. I wondered why I only now noticed it. My question was soon answered, for
as I walked, the remaining color around me began to leach out. The entire area
suddenly appeared to have been shot in black and white, but not a black and
white captured on good film. If I looked at something long enough, it seemed to
have a slight tint of color, but I couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t just a trick
of my eyes or my brain trying to fill in what wasn’t really there. Everything
was in shades of muddy grey. The light suddenly began to dim and I was left
with the feeling that I was in the middle of one of those “daytime-nighttime”
scenes made famous by the old low-budget “B” movies, whose scenes were shot in
the daylight on low-cost, low-contrast film with the brightness turned down in
an attempt to emulate a night shoot that the producers couldn’t afford. The
world around me became even more unreal; I felt as if I were on a cheap movie
set and if I veered off this path, the set would end and I would find myself in
a warehouse or a back lot. When I heard thunder overhead, I picked up my pace.
The dense thunderclouds, now darkest grey for they had lost their blue, had
taken over the entire sky. Once again, I reminded myself that these were only
tricks that Rochere was using to frighten me, so I kept walking. Whatever
mission I was here to accomplish, I needed to get it accomplished as soon as
possible.

The moment I thought that this environment could
get no more freakish, I noticed a fog beginning to roll in. Real fear, which
I’d successfully staved away thus far, finally began to grip me. Even though
intellectually I knew that I was in Rochere’s realm, I’d kept up my hope that
it might at least contain some occupants other than myself. What if I was
wrong? I might be nowhere with nothing to guide me, nothing to look forward to,
nothing to find and nothing and no one to help me on the other end if and when
I ever got there. What if there was no one here except for me and I was only on
a hellish road to nowhere? What if she’d brought me here only to have me die of
abandonment? I suddenly realized that ever since I’d entered into this world, I
had seen no evidence of animal life. I’d heard no birds, no frogs, no cicadas
or crickets; as humid as it was, there weren’t even any mosquitos or tree
roaches. I was terrified, I was alone, I was helpless. It was getting darker by
the minute, day turning to night at least six hours prematurely.

The fog began to thicken, but I had to keep
walking. I walked for what seemed like an eternity, exhaustion settling deeply
into me. I walked until I had to force myself to walk; I was dead on my feet,
but I was afraid to stop. If I stopped to rest, if I stopped to sleep, I would
probably never get up or even wake up again. Rochere most likely would kill me
in my sleep. I couldn’t die here. I couldn’t face the thought of staring at
death when I was so completely lost, so entirely alone in this strange
dimension so foreign to the one in which I was born.

Putting one foot in front of the other became the
entire focus of my life. Nothing seemed to be changing. While I was afraid of
night falling, the half-twilight that had come upon me so quickly didn’t seem
to be getting any darker but seemed instead static. However, the thickening fog
made it harder and harder for me to see where I was going and soon I could not
see beyond roughly twenty feet, although I was so tired that I kept my head
down most of the time anyway. Whenever I felt strong enough to look up, while I
could still see a little way up the road, it was never far enough to tell
whether I was nearing a town or an encampment, if one even did exist. I
wondered again if this world without color had any other occupants. What if
there wasn’t any life other than plant life here? My exhaustion forced these
questions to loom ever larger over me. Was I really as alone as I felt? Had
Rochere already found an easier way to capture the amulet and did she bring me
here just to die? Or was fear rather than death the effect she was really
trying to engender?

Just as I began to sink further and further into
despair, I looked up just in time to notice that the dirt road upon which I
traveled now forked into two separate directions.

 “Oh, crap!” I said aloud with the most energy I’d
been able to muster in at least three miles. I didn’t even know where I was.
How was I supposed to know which fork to take? Why now I was being forced to
make a choice in my exhaustion? I decided to go left, for it was slightly
straighter route. It seemed like a little less work; it probably wouldn’t
matter anyway.

 I had not quite reached the fork when I heard the
sound of dull scuffling on the dirt road. I had prayed for signs of life, but
this was not a noise signaling any life I wanted to meet. It didn’t really
sound human, so my mind went into overdrive trying to imagine its source. I
stopped and listened carefully. It didn’t sound much like an animal either. I
wanted to run but I couldn’t figure out yet which fork from which it was
coming. I realized that sound was somewhat muffled in this realm as well.

 I listened hard, mustering up my last reserves to
run, if I had to, away from whatever was making that noise. The choice of which
fork I should take seemed to have been made for me. I stood still, straining to
hear which direction to avoid. The sound repeated. Was it coming from the right
fork? Yes, I decided, it was definitely coming from there. I began to gather my
energy to run past the fork and down the left road, but before I could, a shape
emerged from the mist. It was a man. I wasn’t alone here after all. I didn’t
know whether to be afraid or relieved, for I did not know if he was friend or
foe. As he came nearer, I noticed that he was even weaker than myself, barely
hanging on and walking with a scraping, shuffling motion. He seemed quite hurt,
without the strength even to pick up his feet as he walked. He was in bad shape
and I felt sorry for him.

“Hello?” I ventured timidly, still very
apprehensive.

“Help me.” he murmured weakly.

“I don’t know how to help you. I’m completely
lost. Do you know where we are? Is there help somewhere near? I can’t help you
unless you can tell me.”

He kept shuffling toward me. I could barely see
him because of the fog; I had little to help me judge whether I should help or
run.

“Help me,” he said again.

“I’d like to but I don’t know where I am. I’m
lost,” I reiterated. “Are you lost too?”

He didn’t answer but instead staggered closer
until he was only a couple of yards away, close enough now for me to see more
of his face through the mist. I searching for an expression, a clue to see
whether he was dangerous or not, whether I should run or stay, but there was
none. His face was vacant. I knew he could see me, because he had spoken to me
and was walking in my direction, but his eyes were dark and lacked focus as he
kept shuffling toward me in his stumbling motion.

 “Help me.”

 There was something about his limp, lifeless
stagger and his old, torn, frayed clothes that frightened me horribly but there
was a sincere, pathetic tone to his weak, raspy voice that made me believe that
he was truly in dire need of help. Perhaps he also was one of Rochere’s
victims, stranded here the same way I had been. He was moving slowly enough
that I would have time to make it past the fork and run if he threatened me. I
was afraid, but I didn’t know whether it was he that was making me skittish or
whether it was the atmosphere and the situation. I edged away from him anyway,
to the other side of the road and past the fork, my instincts torn between
trying to do something to help and running away. He slowly came closer.
Deciding to take no chance, I was poised to run.

 “Who are you, sir?” I asked, inching away. “I
told you that I don’t think I can help you, since I don’t know where I am.
Sorry, I really wish I could.”

 “Help me,” was all he said as he came nearer. I
began to walk away, not turning my back on him.

“Help me,” he repeated over and over as he continued
walking toward me, shuffling so very slowly.

The hair on the back of my neck stood up as he
came close enough for me to see him really clearly for the very first time.
There was something extraordinarily unhealthy about him. His eyes were glazed over,
his eye sockets and his cheeks were sunken, he had open sores in his flesh and
when he opened his mouth to speak his only words “help me”, his teeth were
rotten. My nerves immediately jumped to red alert, shrieking in danger. I
turned to flee, but before I could actually break into that run, he sprang at
me with more speed than I would have thought possible, touching my right
forearm lightly with his index finger, the spot turning cold immediately. While
I’d never touched liquid nitrogen, I could imagine that it would have much the
same effect upon my skin. The spot was beyond cold, it was completely frozen.
The cold spread quickly to my surrounding skin and my entire right hand went
numb. Stunned, I looked at the man. His head was tilted back and his eyes were
rolling up into his head. A lazy, erotic smile crossed his ugly mouth, a
blackened tongue licking his lips as drool seeped from the corners. A grotesque
“Ahh” sound issued from his throat. If I hadn’t known better, I would have
taken him to be a long-time junky in the grip of narcotic euphoria, the
aftermath of a hit that he needed more than life itself.

I had barely enough time register what had just
transpired when I heard more scuffling sounds coming from the same direction
that he had. “Help me,” came more cries from more mouths. Terror seeping into
my heart, I quickly realized that there was more than just one “me”. The first
man was still in the throws of his obscene ecstasy, but more were coming. I
broke into a run, racing as fast as I could, my tiredness left behind as
self-preservation kicked my adrenals into high gear. I hoped all the while that
whatever these creatures were, they would be confined to the right fork in the
road and that I would encounter none of them up ahead. The fog got even
thicker, until I could see less than four feet in front of me. All I could do
was to keep running because I could hear the discordant chorus of the creatures
behind me, who were turning out to be, while not swift, certainly faster than
I’d expected. I ran as fast as I could, stumbling through the fog as tree limbs
grabbed at my hair and forced me to stop for the few precious seconds that it
took to rip my hair free with my good left hand. No matter how fast I tried to
run, I could still hear them behind me, their faint groans of “help me, help
me” taunting me, knowing that if they ever caught up with me, I would be dead.
At one point, I stumbled over a log left in the middle of the road and went
tumbling. Under any other circumstances, I was so spent and so exhausted that I
would have just stopped and not been able to get up again, but knowing what was
behind me supplied me with a fresh dose of sheer adrenaline. In the minutes
that it took for me to scramble to my feet, aided by my good arm, I could hear
the parasites coming closer and closer; they seemed to be right behind me.
Again I bolted, not running toward anything, only away from the terror that
lurked behind me. Eventually, exhaustion triumphed and I began to slow down.
While the creatures were relatively slow and, under normal circumstances, easy
to outrun, their persistence was relentless, for they showed no signs of
slowing down or giving up on their single-minded pursuit of me, their prey. I
was hurt, my legs were giving out and my efforts to escape were becoming
increasingly useless. I knew I had little left to give and I wondered how much
my body would take until they froze me to death from the “hits” they took from
my life force.