Camp damascus, p.21
Camp Damascus, page 21
My expression sours with confusion, but as Saul continues on his way it becomes apparent that this is the only hint I’ll get. As my friend leaves he begins to sing, his voice carrying beautifully through the morning air.
“Lord! You’re all that I need! Lord! You’re all that I live for!” he belts, wandering away.
I watch Saul continue into the distance before turning my attention to the left, my gaze falling upon a row of thick trees at the edge of the clearing. There are no cabins on this side, just the darkness of the woods, and it’s this darkness I’m drawn toward.
I stroll down the porch and make my way across the wide open field, marching toward the tree line as a single metal link raps softly against the flagpole.
A distinct chill begins to creep its way across my skin, growing more and more pronounced with every step until I reach the edge of the woods and realize my teeth are chattering.
I stop here, gazing into the forest in an attempt to catch sight of some hidden collection of cabins. Unfortunately, there are none to be found, yet an uncanny psychic pull tempts me onward.
This clearing is to the west of camp center, so the north cabins must lie diagonally through the woods.
I make my way into the thick overgrowth, pushing ferns away as fallen branches and dead leaves crunch underfoot. My eyes are peeled, but I’m following my instincts now, allowing the inertia of my subconscious mind to take hold.
It’s not long before a third clearing comes into view: the north cabins.
Unlike the other sections of Camp Damascus, this one doesn’t feature a flagpole to mark its location. However, every other aspect of the clearing remains eerily similar. The grass is just as neatly trimmed, buildings freshly painted with the same stark white pigment from across the site.
There are ten cabins in all, two rows of five on either side of the clearing.
My heart pounding, I approach the closest structure and make my way onto the porch. I take a moment to peer through the front window, discovering nothing but a dimly lit room identical to the one I woke up in. When I open the door, I find more of the same.
Aside from the breathtakingly low temperatures, there’s not much to see here.
Instead of gradually making my way down each row, I decide to focus my efforts and listen to the voice within, the whispering part of my subconscious brain that has made all this possible.
Returning to the middle of the field, I close my eyes, allowing the swift current of memory to take hold. None of this is real, I remind myself, but deep below these veils of symbolism lies a hidden truth.
It’s not long before a faint, darting buzz draws my attention to the right. I open my eyes and glance over to locate a single mayfly dancing through the air, fluttering this way and that before swooping off toward one of the cabins.
The insect sways with a strange meandering tumble as I follow along, and despite its gradual movement, the general direction is clear. I walk slowly behind the fly’s wandering trail, following across the field until I’m standing directly before the middle cabin on the left side of the clearing.
It’s here my six-legged companion lands on the first wooden step, gazing up at me with its bulging, crystalline eyes as it furiously rubs its dirty little hands together.
I meet the tiny creature’s gaze.
Suddenly, an eruption of caustic, sonic drilling prods me to stumble back in alarm, losing my footing and slamming against the grass as I stare up in disgust at a churning black mass. The cabin is absolutely covered in flies, the creatures swarming so thick they look like a heaving, undulating paste that’s been spread across the entire structure. The sound in my ears is a deafening, overwhelming drone, a horrible sound that fills the clearing as the creatures swirl and pulse, a living tornado of filth. They roll off the cabin like dancing fire, drawn to the rot.
My eyes snap open and I sit up with a gasp, prompting Willow and Saul to pull back in shock. I’ve returned to the warmth of the farmhouse, slamming back into my body with a powerful thud that jerks the air from my lungs.
“You okay?” Willow asks, placing her hand on my back.
“Ye-Yeah,” I stammer, the word tumbling forth awkwardly as I struggle to find my voice. I’m still reeling from what I’ve seen, the rolling boil of mayflies charred across my mind.
Willow gives me a moment to catch my breath.
“Did you remember?” she finally asks.
“I don’t know,” I admit. “Things were pretty … abstract.”
I turn my attention to Saul. “Was there a third set of buildings in the woods?” I ask. “A clearing for the north cabins?”
Saul leans back a bit, his eyes staring off as he struggles to remember. “I think so,” he confirms, “but I never saw them. They were under renovation when I worked at Damascus.”
“I think they were always under renovation,” I say.
Saul locks eyes with me. “Do you know which cabin we need to search?”
I’ve seen the cabin, and while the mass of flies was likely just a symbolic manifestation from the depths of my subconscious, the location itself is clearly marked.
However, the logical, scientifically minded part of my brain pauses. This segment of my personality has been growing stronger every day, and now the sword it wields into psychic battle is dominant. There’s nothing concrete about my findings, and the assertation that any information gleaned from an abstract drug trip holds water is highly suspect.
Sure, there’s plenty of evidence to suggest repressed memories lie dormant in the subconscious, but reading these images like tea leaves is just as silly as the religion I’ve turned my back on.
Is this just a new Trojan horse for faith to use as it creeps back into my life?
Maybe a little faith isn’t so bad, a voice abruptly offers from deep within me, bubbling up from the darkness and making a profoundly simple case.
Find balance.
To be fair, this all-or-nothing approach has been getting exhausting. The further away I get from my time with Kingdom of the Pine, the more I’m realizing it’s not so much the faith I’m upset about, it’s the hate and fear disguised as concern and charity. Faith is just a vessel, and while it can certainly be used to justify truly horrible things, maybe I’m letting the aggressors off the hook by blaming faith itself.
“I have a pretty good idea which cabin to search,” I finally reply, imagining the deluge of swarming flies.
“Good enough to make a run at this?” Saul asks.
The opposing sides of my mind finally collapse into each other, swirling together like buckets of red and yellow paint as they synthesize into a brilliant orange. This new tone floods across everything, igniting a powerful force within me.
“Yeah,” I declare with a nod. “Let’s go back to camp.”
11
STRAIGHT STREET
As Willow’s car winds its way up the hillside, we each begin to prepare in our own way.
In the back seat, Saul reveals a set of wireless headphones and dives into his private concerto of thundering guitars and grinding deathcore rhythms, nodding along to the music.
Willow drives, but her cameras are locked and loaded. There’s even a tiny video recorder strapped to her forehead, endlessly cataloging from Willow’s point of view.
Meanwhile, I’ve pulled out my phone for a last-minute cramming session with all the information at our disposal. I’m going through my old notes, flipping back and forth between personal findings and scans of Saul’s mysterious tome. I’ve gone over this stuff so many times I can recite it by heart, yet I push onward.
Continuing our approach to Camp Damascus, I’m particularly focused on the Prayer for Release, trying my best to memorize the strange pattern of words. These incantations are mostly in Latin, but they also feature lines of a bizarre language I’ve never encountered before. What’s more, these passages don’t read like a traditional prayer. They’re not speaking directly to God for assistance but, instead, coming off like how-to instructions.
It’s utterly bizarre for a religious text, and deeply fascinating.
My fingers tap out various fractal-like patterns as I read, keeping me focused. I don’t even notice I’m doing it until I glance over to catch Willow gazing at me from her place in the driver’s seat.
I stop abruptly, my fingers seizing up as I recall every time my parents scolded me over this habit.
Willow, on the other hand, just smiles.
“It’s okay,” she assures me, reaching out and placing her palm on my leg.
I melt, not just from her physical touch, but from her unquestioning acceptance of the things that make me unique. Willow is incredible, and I can only imagine falling for her a second time has been just as easy as the first.
Still, coming together under such strange and traumatic circumstances is difficult. We’ve held each other, but we still haven’t kissed.
All in due time.
After much debate, the three of us decided to break into Camp Damascus as a unit instead of any one person going alone. Of course, sneaking anywhere is easier when there’s a single individual hoping to remain hidden, but at this point the journey belongs to all of us.
Besides, now we can split the work between three distinct positions.
As the only person with a recollection of the tethering chamber (drug-induced or otherwise), I’m leading the charge and focused solely on getting us to the correct cabin.
Saul, on the other hand, is tasked with keeping us safe.
I glance at the large backpack sitting next to my brilliant friend, the enormous tank of his homemade flamethrower barely fitting inside the canvas. We’ve made a pact not to harm any fellow humans tonight, but demons are another story. Just because we’ve taken care of our own dark passengers, that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty more of them out there.
Meanwhile, Willow is recording every step of the process.
This evidence may or may not come in handy, depending on what we find tonight. Back at Saul’s place we’ve still got the charred body of a literal demon stashed away, but who knows where we can entrust this incredible supernatural evidence.
It wasn’t just Kingdom of the Pine who taught us that demons thrive in fire when it’s actually their greatest weakness, it was the entire Christian establishment over several centuries.
The corruption runs deep.
This fire versus ice discrepancy could’ve started as a little secret between two people several thousand years ago, the liars dying off before they ever had a chance to come clean about their clever switch. Likewise, it could be a clandestine truth that every religious leader, across all denominations, is well aware of.
Is turning Pachid’s body over to the Neverton Police Department going to do much of anything? Or will the corpse just disappear a few hours later as some fixer from Kingdom of the Pine slips out the back door of the morgue?
How about the FBI? How high does the reach of our congregation, or any congregation, go?
I guess we’ll find out.
Suffice to say, we’ve decided to collect as much evidence as possible, then worry about what to do with it later.
I turn and gaze out the car window, watching the lights of Neverton twinkle below in the humble little valley of deep, dark forest. Perched on the mountainside above, Camp Damascus watches over everything.
I find a single tiny light below and focus on it, allowing the distant yellow glow to burn into my gaze.
“Sexual deviance,” I whisper under my breath, repeating the words of my mother on the day I left. “The daughter thinks she’s in love with a beautiful, sweet girl who accepts her exactly the way she is. How do you help her?”
The words are so soft that nobody can hear me, but I give it a moment of consideration all the same.
I didn’t have an answer at the time, but by now an understanding has grown within me. It’s not about the solution, because the question is flawed. There’s nothing deviant about me.
If I had to reply, though, I’d consider the new family I’ve suddenly found myself with, the ones who accept me exactly as I am. I’d consider the way I feel right now in the passenger seat of this car, simmering with joy despite the horrific and dangerous mission I’m about to embark upon.
The answer is simple.
I’d love her.
We pull off the main road, rumbling up onto a sightseeing turnout as gravel crunches softly underneath the car tires. Willow parks, shutting off her headlights and plunging the scene into vast, endless darkness. Up here, the only illumination is the light of a massive full moon that hangs silently above.
We’ve arrived.
“Everybody ready?” I ask.
Willow nods.
Saul stops his music, pulling one of the wireless headphones away from his ear. “Hell yeah.”
“You really think you should be listening to loud songs while we’re trying to stay alert?” I question.
“What’s the point of busting into a conversion camp to slay demons with a flamethrower and smash up their possession machine if you’re not gonna listen to black metal while doing it?” he retorts.
It’s a fair point.
“Fine,” he finally continues, offering a compromise. “I’ll turn it down.”
As we climb from the car I’m immediately bathed in a palpable sense of unease. The air shift is sudden, washing me in the damp coolness of the night, but it’s not just the natural feeling of the forest that’s getting under my skin.
Something is just different about this place, whether it’s a mental trick I’m playing on myself or some strange unknowable phenomenon. We’ve barely touched the edge of the congregation’s property and I can already sense its psychic weight.
There’s no such thing as psychic weight, I remind myself.
“Everyone good?” I ask, pulling out a plastic angel mask and placing it over my face.
My friends nod, following my lead and donning masks of their own.
“Want me to say a prayer?” I joke.
This prompts a chuckle from Willow, but Saul is not impressed.
“Lord, guide us with your hand,” Saul murmurs, more to himself than anyone else. “You are my war club, my weapon for battle—with you I shatter nations, with you I destroy kingdoms.”
While the power of prayer no longer moves me, Saul’s inclusion of Jeremiah 51:20 is admirably fitting.
Willow is less impressed. “Let’s fuck this duck. Amen.”
As the three of us begin our trek into the darkness of the lush woods, I can hear Saul behind me, still mumbling a plea for spiritual protection under his breath.
We creep silently through the forest, eyes darting from side to side as we hike into the wilds. It’s disorienting at first, but eventually we begin to notice the soft lights of Camp Damascus slipping through trees in the distance.
At this late hour, the radiance is much less pronounced than it might usually be. It’s nothing more than a dim glow, small lights around important walkways and structures offering just enough illumination to satisfy the Montana fire and safety code.
These lights also serve as great directional markers.
Soon enough, the trees begin to thin out for a view of the first flagpole from my vision. There’s no safety lighting on the large metal needle protruding from the canopy, but the moon casts everything with just enough silver glow to make out a faint shape as our eyes continue adjusting.
I’m still struggling to gather my bearings, but the longer we travel, the more I find myself tapping into something more powerful than the map Saul and Willow so diligently prepared. There’s a compass hidden deep within me, a transcendent path buried under the ever-present mental fog.
Being here in person, however, is causing the fog to lift.
We pass the first clearing, sneaking along the outer edge and avoiding the main camp facilities. From here I can just barely make out the ominous croaking of frogs as it drifts from the nearby lake, their nightly drone filling the air.
The woods fall away in an abrupt change of scenery, revealing a small clearing lit by nothing more than the celestial bodies above. There’s a path leading to and from this rectangular opening in the forest.
At one end of the clearing an assortment of haybales are stacked, creating square, segmented walls about five feet tall. A large paper target is affixed to each bale in circular red-and-black displays. A bullseye lies at the center of each, and this section of the paper is ripped and torn from multiple arrow piercings.
We’ve stumbled upon the range.
The three of us waste no time crossing this open area, uninterested in the technicalities of the Camp Damascus archery program. Unfortunately, reaching the halfway point triggers an unexpected sound from the forest before us.
I halt in my tracks, the noise so loud that even Saul can hear it through his blaring headphones. The three of us freeze in place, not entirely sure how to react to the unexpected commotion.
Saul’s music stops.
My eyes quickly scan the dark cluster of trees, the hammer of my heart thrusting raw adrenaline through clenched muscles and veins.
Another rustle from the darkness.
Staff members just seeing us would immediately put this mission in jeopardy, not only tonight, but for every night that follows. We’ve gone straight to the source, maintaining the advantage of surprise, but the moment our presence is noticed that edge comes crumbling down.
Of course, this is also predicated on the idea that we can outrun—or outfight—whoever finds us, and this staff is likely well-versed in hunting down runaways.
Another rustle causes my body to clench even tighter, a coil seconds away from popping off and launching me back the way we came.
Suddenly, an enormous stag emerges from the ferns, its antlers regal and sharp. The majestic animal pauses before us, motionless under the light of the moon.
We gaze quietly at each other, each species appreciating the moment, but when the creature continues trotting on its way I can’t help noticing something strange hanging from its hind leg. The shape is unexpected, looking like a deflated balloon, but with nothing more than a brief glimpse through the shadows it’s impossible to tell what it is.
