Camp damascus, p.18
Camp Damascus, page 18
The metal sheet before me rises inch by inch, gradually revealing the charred body of a humanoid figure curled tightly in a wretched ball. The whole inner chamber is roasted to a crisp, even the dirt itself burnt and ashen.
I crank the panels higher until they lock into position, then step toward the carbonized remains.
“Hot damn,” comes a voice to my left, prompting me to jump in surprise. I turn to find Saul standing in utter shock, his gaze transfixed by the warped figure.
The two of us creep forward until we’re standing directly above Pachid’s toasted corpse, the demon obliterated by flame. In this position her form appears eerily human, other than the bizarrely long digits that can be seen protruding from either hand. As far as her apparel, the only thing left is the iron collar around her neck and the metal name tag that was once pinned to the creature’s red polo shirt. PACHID, it reads.
“You okay?” I ask my friend.
Saul doesn’t answer for a long while.
I don’t mind. While he’s taking a moment to center himself, I appreciate something I haven’t been able to enjoy in a very long time. I think about Willow, not in the usual fleeting moments or fragmented images that keep me safe and sound, but triumphantly diving into the deep end of my mind. I let the patchwork memories I’ve managed to gather overwhelm me, wrapping me in their warm embrace.
Before, this mental realm was prickly and frustrating. I wanted so badly to stay here, and I subconsciously yearned to bask in these thoughts while my consciousness screamed about danger lurking just around the corner. I was laying my mind on a glorious pillow while my body rested across a bed of nails.
But that fear no longer exists within me. I’m free.
“You ever wonder why they wear name tags?” Saul asks, interrupting my thoughts.
It’s a simple query, but shocking in the fact that I hadn’t considered it much until now. I’m aware of the demon’s quirky attire, obviously, but the implications behind it had never really crossed my mind.
I don’t know the answer, and I’m not sure Saul really expects one. He’s grappling with the same thing I did after locking Willow’s demon in my flaming car, coming to terms with the intrusion of something truly bizarre within our own concrete reality. It’s one thing to believe in a collection of intangible supernatural forces floating through the ether, looming just behind the curtain of our world like ghosts, but these demons are not that.
These are mortal beings. While the things they wear and do may seem utterly bizarre, their oddities still weave together in a very real system of rules, regulations, and yes, name tags.
“I don’t know,” I finally reply. “Maybe they’re at work.”
After a long beat, Saul finally turns and begins to move back through the towering metal structures, making his way to the lookout while I follow behind. We move in silence, eventually arriving at a ladder that leads up to the platform above.
The two of us climb quietly and slowly, processing these events at our own pace.
Reaching the top, we find Saul’s extra-large computer monitor and a humming processor tower next to it. He was perched up here for a clear sightline of the hangar down below, but in the sudden darkness this extra effort was nullified. Even his vast assortment of wireless cameras were less useful than we’d hoped.
“Everything crashed when the power surged,” Saul informs me, unusually deadpan as he goes about his business.
He sits down in his chair and gets to work, sorting through a cascade of potentially corrupted files.
Video clips pop onto Saul’s screen, half-finished recordings from various cameras placed around the hangar. I see one from the main entrance of the large metal building, and another directly trained on the trap. Yet another view is angled down a hallway between towering metal shelves.
Saul plays this clip and we watch closely, the lights flickering as a tear in reality begins to appear before our very eyes. Onscreen, the camera is trained directly upon the shimmering line of blue light that quivers in the air with strange, erratic motions.
This is the second time I’ve witnessed this phenomenon. The first was back at Camp Damascus, albeit through a haze of vague memories that wash in and out of my conscious mind.
The tear grows wider and wider until I can see right through it, a stone chamber lurking behind. Somehow, the extremely low temperature of this otherworldly location can be visually observed, a clear shift in the air before the mysterious opening. When Pachid steps through the slit, a faint icy mist billows from her nostrils and mouth.
Pachid exits the wormhole and stops abruptly, smiling as she gazes off into the empty space before her.
The video feed goes dead as the file corrupts.
“That’s where we lost power,” Saul explains.
He opens another recording and presses play. This view is positioned at a random corner of the hangar, far from the action.
“Some of the cameras were picking up intermittent signals,” Saul continues. “You know how horror movies love to have TVs with random creepy imagery? That trope could’ve evolved from a very real phenomenon.”
“I’ve never seen a terror film,” I retort.
Saul frowns. “I guess you’ll just have to trust me. I think demons innately amplify transmissions from … hell, I guess. These aren’t just random images, they’re intercepted audio and video feeds.”
I watch as static begins to overtake Saul’s recording, two sources transposed over each other amid the visual snow. Eventually, the feed finds clarity in a location that’s distinctly familiar.
My breath catches in my throat as I’m transported back to Isaiah’s birthday party, instantly recalling the grotesque imagery that appeared on television while we were playing truth or dare. The recording I now watch is nearly identical, featuring the same shaky handheld camera and blunt lighting.
This video feed offers no sound as it creeps through the darkness of another world, slowly making its way over frigid stone walls in a seemingly endless labyrinth of chambers.
Saul and I are entranced by the transmission, our eyes glued to the recording as our hearts pound away within our chests.
The camera view tightens in on one of the walls, very slowly rolling across the topography of the rough surface. Up close, frost is clearly visible in the space between faded stones.
Eventually, tiny pink roots come into view, hanging across the cold surface and covered with a glistening wet sheen that reflects the light of the camera. As the view moves from root to root, the network rapidly becomes more complex, a cascading pattern of tendrils laid out next to one another and growing in thickness as they drift upward to a central point.
I start drumming my fingers against my leg in a familiar repeating pattern, instinctively struggling to release some of the pressure within as the camera continues onward. Something horrible is coming. My reptilian brain knows this, but I’m too curious to look away.
Movement sweeps across the roots, the quick, repetitive motion of some strictly timed machine. It moves past the camera once, twice, three times, every stroke scheduled to perfection. Meanwhile, the transmission reveals these tangled pink tendrils are pinned to the wall in certain places, a handful connected to plastic tubes of some unknown liquid.
Higher the recording drifts, until finally something familiar and human emerges into view at the top of the screen. It’s blurry and over-lit, but I immediately recognize this pale form as a severed human neck, the bloody carnage exposed while various black tubes push deep within. The roots extending downward are not roots at all, only the stripped-bare web of a fully revealed nervous system with no flesh or bones to protect it.
A startled gasp escapes my throat as the camera pulls back to reveal a writhing, squealing head. The eyes have been removed from their sockets and the mouth is sewn shut, but the subject is very much alive as a macabre contraption pulses back and forth across their exposed nerves. Who knows how long they’ve been hanging here.
The file suddenly glitches and freezes up, our recording interrupted by the power surge.
I stagger back, feeling the powerful urge to vomit as a wave of disgust and nausea washes over me.
“What the … heck are they doing to these people?” I sputter.
“It’s hell,” Saul offers flatly, staring at the frozen screen. He doesn’t need to elaborate any more than that.
* * *
I emerge from the hangar to find myself surrounded by the glorious Montana evening. A breathtaking sunset is already well into its nightly bloom, oranges giving way to deep indigos as the gloaming arrives. The vastness of this world is overwhelming, especially now that I have the freedom to explore it.
It’s a picturesque sight, almost enough to scrub the horrific visions of a literal hell from my mind.
Not quite, though.
I don’t look back as I make my way past abandoned vehicles and pristine, refurbished luxury cars, eventually arriving at the front door of Saul’s old farmhouse. He stayed in the garage to continue fine-tuning our gear.
The farmhouse door is freshly painted in a light, cheerful yellow, the first of many upgrades I’ve started making around here. Fixing the broken dining room window was another.
I know what it’s like to get lost in your own focus, so I don’t blame Saul for the way he’s let this place fall apart. Fortunately, there are two of us living here now.
The second the cozy indoor air hits me I feel a potent surge of relief.
I make my way over to the living room couch and collapse into it, immediately erupting in a fit of tears as I hold the pillow against my face and allow myself a moment to feel.
Once more, I bask in the memories of Willow in all her glory. We’re dancing in an apartment—her apartment—headphones on as she giggles at my awkward moves. She puts an arm around me to show me how it’s done, and in this gesture our eyes lock. We stare at each other, our loving gazes somehow permeating time and space as I watch from my cage of the present.
I’ve been here before, but it’s never been safe enough to let the mental tape play this far.
Our bodies have stopped swaying to the music as our lips curl up in slight, knowing smiles. A bizarre, beautiful standoff is humming with youthful energy between us, every micro-expression tempting the next.
I remember wanting to lean in so badly, but that craving was flanked by a sickening dread of what might happen if I did. Maybe I’d been reading this escalation all wrong, taking a close friendship and blowing it out of proportion in a deeply inappropriate way.
But even then I knew this wasn’t true. I was just making excuses at the edge of a high dive, terrified to jump.
She’s worth the leap, though.
I lean in and kiss Willow, sparks momentarily erupting across the cosmic space between now and then. Somehow I can feel her, the ghost of these memories still hiding within the cells of my body.
I hold this moment for as long as I possibly can, basking in an overwhelming sense of grand belonging that permeates everything. I can’t remember the last time I felt this safe, accepted by Willow without a shred of pretense.
Eventually, however, my recollection starts to fade. Our lips part as Willow drifts away, dissolving into the abyss from which she came.
The tears stop flowing and my body’s natural oxytocin gets to work, endorphins spilling across me from the magical depths of my brain. My heart slows to a reasonable pace and my breathing calms.
I’m just about to fall asleep right there on the couch when, suddenly, a blast of thundering sound prompts me to sit up in alarm.
I’m used to Saul playing his music in the hangar, and by now I’ve memorized most of these wild deathcore thrashers by heart. This, however, is something completely different.
I narrow my eyes and stand up, listening to the thumping beat that rattles through the entire farmhouse. It’s shockingly rhythmic and danceable, an upbeat, major-scale bassline weaving its way through the pattern.
This is pop music.
I approach the living room window, gazing out across the fleet of vehicles in the yard. Beyond them lies a small patch where the grass is slightly more maintained than the surrounding wilds. It’s just outside the hangar entrance.
By now the sky has darkened enough that I can barely make out the silhouette of Saul as he stands in the middle of this natural stage, completely motionless and staring off into space. He’s got something strapped to his back and holds what appears to be a small tool in his hand.
The music continues at full volume, rumbling across the dark forest around us with bubblegum tones. I was never allowed to listen to secular music at home, but I recognize this song as something I heard friends listen to on rare occasions.
It’s one of those tunes that seeped its way into the popular consciousness, unavoidable to even the congregation’s most overprotected children.
A boy band sings this one.
Johnny or Donnie or Joey or Justin or Nick or AJ or Howie, their names rolling through my mind like secular apostles.
Saul remains motionless for a while, listening to the thunderous pop jam as the darkness blooms around him. The stars are making their grand entrance, just barely twinkling across a glorious cosmic cascade.
But he’s not alone.
A second figure appears in the tall grass, stepping out and revealing their awkward, gangly shape. This is the tallest demon I’ve seen, a rail-thin humanoid with pale skin and long black hair. They’re sporting the same red polo as the others, and based on the proportions of their lanky frame I can only imagine how difficult sizing must’ve been.
My first instinct is to run out and help Saul, to make sure he has all the support he needs while literally facing down his demons, but I don’t move an inch. As crazy as it sounds, giving Saul this space is the most supportive thing I can do, consequences be damned.
If it were up to me, every one of these creatures would be dealt with in a safe, organized system, coaxed into our new machine one by one and dispatched with precision and efficiency. Saul and I are not the same person, however, and his personal journey is not for me to insert myself.
Instead, I watch with rapt attention as these two figures face off, Saul coming to terms with his past as slamming pop music paints the scene with unexpected vibrancy.
Saul is yelling something at the demon now, his face overflowing with emotion as he says his piece.
The particularly tall creature tilts its head to the side, taking Saul in for a moment, then abruptly springs into action. The demon makes its move, striding toward my friend with a sudden conviction that causes my breath to catch.
Saul, however, is ready.
My friend lifts the tool in his hands to reveal its true nature in spectacular fashion, a brilliant orange burst of superheated flame erupting from his grip and engulfing the monster. My eyes go wide as I instinctively pull back from the window, washed in the reflection of this fiery display. The makeshift device, cobbled together from a fuel tank, a large spray nozzle, and an igniter, was a last resort if things went sideways with the trap.
To be honest, I hadn’t really expected the flamethrower to work at all.
The wave of tremendous heat strikes the demon and it crumples to its knees, succumbing to the unrelenting roil that spills across its roasting form. It lets out a frantic shriek, struggling to flee but unable to find its bearings as Saul pushes forward. I can tell the warmth is difficult for Saul to take, even from his side of the device, but his conviction doesn’t waver.
He continues screaming at the demon, his exact words lost in a haze of slamming pop music and rumbling flames, but his intent is coming across just fine.
The demon is crawling away now, dragging itself hand over hand before collapsing, a charred crisp in a metal collar.
Finally, the flames relent.
Saul pulls out his phone and turns off the music. He stands quietly for a moment, then turns to the window, locking eyes with me.
Saul hoists up the homemade flamethrower confidently.
“It works!” my friend calls out.
10
LADY OF THE FLIES
I stare at the rectangular notecard in my hand, this blank space just as vacant as my expression. I’ve been sitting out here on the hood of what I now know is a 1966 Ford Falcon, my legs crossed as I perch quietly upon its rusted metal skeleton.
It’s been long enough—and I’ve been quiet enough—that the prairie dogs have returned from their initial scare, no longer afraid of my presence. One of the creatures pops up from a hole no more than ten feet away, staring right at me in a way that becomes impossibly distracting.
“Hey!” I finally shout, dropping my pen and the empty notecard. “I’m working!”
The prairie dog is unfazed, frozen in place.
This standoff goes on for quite a while, until my opponent abruptly retreats. It’s not my dominance that triggers this move, however, but the arrival of Saul, who’s now strolling down the driveway toward us.
Saul’s tiny earbuds are so loud I can hear him coming. The chaotic sound of tinny blast beats echoes across his property, disrupting the still of the morning as he returns from his routine dawn walk. My friend shuts off his music and pulls out the buds, tucking them away in the pocket of his hoodie.
A few of the prairie dogs still remain, but Saul makes quick work of that. “Yo!” he shouts, immediately causing the stragglers to scatter. He lets out a frustrated sigh, shaking his head. “The animals are taking over. I knocked down some cocoon in the back of the garage, and it was like this big.” Saul holds up his hands, positioning them approximately one foot apart.
I’m trying to be a good friend and react accordingly, but my thoughts are elsewhere.
“You alright?” he asks. “You were in the same spot when I left.”
I glance down at the blank notecard in my hand, then back up at Saul.
His expression is one of deep recognition. “Tonight’s a big night,” my friend acknowledges.
