"Now, I want you to start from the beginning," said the deputy over a strained smile, "how many people were you with, and what were you doing in the church?"
"All I remember is screaming," said the young man trembling on the other side of the table. He took a sip of water and a long drag of his cigarette, "there was me, Ed, Tammy, and Jewel. Jewel was... she was my girl friend." He swallowed, and wiped his face with a shaking hand, "the bunch of us were close, like family close, but Jewel was so messed up." He took a tearful drag of his cigarette, "there was something wrong with her...."
******************
"GRAB HER LEGS! HOLD HER!" yelled Ed, trying his best to get a hold on one of the flailing arms of the screeching woman on the ground at his feet. Tammy stepped up, all 250lbs of her, and tried to grab the other arm. The girl on the ground shoved her violently and she flew twenty feet into the mud and muck.
"RRRAAAAAHGGRRHHAAA!!!" pierced the screeching woman's voice, her jaw stretching open like it was breaking.
The sound put ice in David's bones, but he forced himself to move and grab the woman's shoulder, "It's okay sweetheart," he said intently, "I love you! Jewel, I love you! We love you, we need to help you!" As if triggered by his voice, the young woman convulsed and soon after her body relaxed as if asleep. David and Ed were able to get a firm hold of her limbs and Tammy hoisted herself from where she was thrown; the three of them moved her into the old church.
"Why did you pick this place?" asked David as they carried the limp Jewel down the isle. The old building was a type of ruin that only a Catholic church could make. The solid oak pews were rotted in places, missing, or broken where parts of the roof had fallen and crashed into them. The walls held an unsettling set of gilded and broken frames depicting Christ's journey to the cross, the montage terminated at the foot of the stage where the Priest was supposed to give his liturgy and the alter where the acolytes prepared the elements for holy mass. Behind the alter there was erected a large, strangely well-preserved stained glass presenting a macabre and gory crucifixion of Christ. The image gave the authority of violence to anyone speaking in front of it, a fact that the clergy must've used to their benefit in the working days of the church.
"This village is a hub of supernatural power," Tammy said, walking gently on a hurt ankle, "A cannibal was heard to live around here, and the spirit of a woman who was murdered haunts one of these houses. It's like everything that dies here stays here, it's a perfect place t..."
"Let's put her up there." Interrupted Ed.
******************
"Ed was the leader, right?" asked the Deputy, writing notes on a little pad of paper, "Ed Morales?"
David stamped out his cigarette in the little ashtray on the table. He pulled out another from the pack and lit it in one, smooth motion. "We don't have a leader," he said with the lit smoke bobbing between his lips, "we are NOT a cult!"
"Uh-huh," the deputy said, not looking up from his writing.
"But he was in charge, yeah." David slumped in his chair, "he was the only one who knew what was going on, what we were doing..."
******************
"On the alter!" Ed commanded, helping David lift her up. "Tammy, set the candles up. David, hold her. I'll be right back," with that he turned and walked up the aisle and out the front door.
David watched him leave, and then turned to the quietly sleeping young girl on the alter before him. "Oh honey," he said, gently stroking her cheek, "I'm so sorry, it's going to be okay." Her hair blew across her smooth forehead and for a moment, David thought she looked like an angel.
Tammy huffed up the short steps separating the floor from the stage, "Done," she said, catching her breath. Purple candles were now lit and fluttered in places all around the alter. She looked down at Jewel, "It's going to be your love that will save her ya' know, all of our love. That's how you beat evil, that's how we do this." She smiled warmly at David and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. David smiled back, then Jewel began to stir. An inhuman growl began to grow from her throat and her body began to undulate on the alter. "Oh f#ck!" Tammy said.
"TIE HER DOWN!!" Yelled Ed, running back from the broken entrance doors. He angrily threw some rope at David and the two of them got to work. They wrapped the rope over Jewel's body and under the alter three or four times before she began to speak.
"EeegggaaahEEerrROOWwahhgGHUULLL!!!" her voice was low and raspy, it undulated like her body. David looked at her face and her eyes had rolled up into her head and her expression was angry, terrifyingly angry. He froze and his breath stuck in his throat. Jewel gargled and it almost sounded like laughter.
"Hurry!" Tammy yelled as she grabbed the rope from David and began working it over and under with Ed, pulling it tight. They moved quickly and soon Jewel was secured to the alter and struggling against her bonds.
******************
"They uh..." David said, bouncing his leg, "they thought she was possessed," he took a drag from his cigarette. "They had been planning it for months, though I... uhh, I didn't know. Ed had a tape, and he said they, they analyzed her voice, and they said she was speaking like, Latin or something. I don't know, it's not my thing. I just used to like exploring and stuff, they were into the spiritual stuff." The deputy didn't speak.
"Son," the cop finally said, "that chapel was covered in blood when we got there, wall to wall, I hadn't seen nothin' like that in all my life," he slowly stood up and leaned into David, anger showing through his words, "the only reason you are here, is because we don't understand how you were found in the middle of that room and not a SPECK! of blood on you. Can you explain that to me?"
"All I remember is screaming," David said, his voice breaking, "I don't know what happened sir... oh God... I can still hear them screaming!" he buried his head in his hands and began to weep. "I'll tell you everything..."
******************
Ed pulled a book from his satchel,
The Rite of Exorcism, by the Catholic church. "By the authority of our Lord, Jesus Christ, I command you Demon..." he began to read. Ed believed himself more holy than the priests, and with more authority in the name of God. He had mystical experiences while taking LSD and DMT, and that gave him the impression that he was somehow a prophet. This was
his plan,
his idea, and he knew it would work. He was counting on the fact that this building and this place would suck the demon from the girl, but only if they could weaken its hold on her enough to do it. The Adderall in his bloodstream gave him confidence and mental clarity, he felt in control of the situation.
"Guardian of the North I invoke thee!" cried Tammy at the same time as Ed, "Guardian of the South, I invoke thee!!" Her hands stretched to Heaven as she spoke. She was Wiccan, a priestess who got her official certificate online. She had studied the art of exorcism and felt that she could help free the soul of this woman. Ed brought her in for a second opinion, as if he were a doctor, to validate the possession and the need for an exorcism. The screaming girl before them seemed to prove their theory. Their plan was to perform the exorcism ritual from each of their respective religions like giving a loading dose of antibiotics to combat an infection.
David and Jewel were just a couple of kids in their early 20s. They had taken MDMA with Ed and some other friends and felt the kind of trusting bond that is uniquely expedited by hard core therapy drugs. Jewel had also been taking antipsychotics; Lexapro, Effexor, and others; since she was kid and always felt a little unstable. Earlier this evening her and David had each eaten a bag of psychedelic mushrooms, provided to them by Ed.
The wind was picking up quickly in the church, Ed and Tammy were yelling and Jewel was screeching. David felt useless and stepped away from the alter. "...the POWER of CHRIST!" "...the HOLY GODDESS!!" they yelled.
"What the f#ck!" David said. The wind was growing stronger and harder, like a tornado bombarding the inside of the building. Debris and broken wood began to swirl and crash into the walls and pews. A strange new sound began to echo from the walls; a hollow, grating moan like an animal dying.
"MASSTTAAHHHR!!!" Jewel screeched from the alter, "MASTAHRRR!!" Ed was yelling and savagely flinging water at the spasmodic woman. Tammy was chanting louder and louder, her voice building into an incomprehensible jumble of words as she entered into a state of spiritual ecstasy.
David began to panic. There was something else in the room, something living inside of the mounting bedlam. He stumbled away from alter, which seemed to be the eye of the storm, into the middle row between the pews. As he got further from the shrieking of his friends he began to hear disembodied voices singing rotted church hymns. Strange, pale lights began to float in the pews until they looked like bodies materializing from the dust and smoke of the storm. David's head tried to look in all directions at once, but the howling of the vortex had turned everything into a single mass grey and black.
The last thing he could make out was the bright red of the stained glass behind the alter. The mutilated figure of Christ seemed like it began to move inside of the mural. David could make out the silhouette of Jewel in front of the iridescent bloody glass but by now the other two were lost in the swirling grey of the storm. The mangled figure that was supposed to be Christ ripped itself from the cross and it's mouth opened to reveal an infernal grotto of sharp, glittering teeth. Then it unleashed an agonizing scream that knocked David to the ground. Over the roar of the storm David could feel the scream dig into his soul. He felt the excruciating pleas of people burning to death, the whimpering cries of animals being tortured, so much more he could only experience and not comprehend. The demon in the glass screamed with the voices of all those who had died by violence!
******************
Tammy had been smart enough to tell one of her co-witches from her online coven where she was going and what she was doing, so when she didn't check in in the morning her friend called the police. A local Deputy was sent to follow up and upon surveying the scene radioed in for more cops, an ambulance, and someone from a Federal office to get there ASAP!
An unconscious David was dug out from under an overturned pew. When he woke up he was lying on a gurney surrounded by flashing lights and the noise of rigorous activity. There were EMTs buzzing around him doing some sort of things that EMTs do. The deputy trotted over when he saw David was awake. "It's okay son, you're okay now. You feeling okay?" he said, gripping David's shoulder and inspecting his eyes. "You think you can answer a few questions for me?" David nodded shakily, not sure what was going on.
"Do you have any cigarettes?" David asked. The deputy looked surprised for a moment.
"Sure son, sure." He said, "Let me just go round some up." He turned and disappeared somewhere behind the gurney. David craned his head to see and it looked like the deputy was talking to some paramedics and one of the other cops who was there. After a few moments he came back and helped David to his feet, together they walked over to one of the cabins still on the property near the church. There was a a small table and a couple of chairs that looked like they had just been pulled from someone's trunk. David didn't see who, but someone had put a small glass of water, an open pack of Marlboro's with a lighter, and a small tin ashtray on the table. David sat down and lit a cigarette.
"Now, I want you to start from the beginning," said the deputy over a strained smile, "how many people were you with, and what were you doing in the church?"
by @Maglar
Loksfjoer is a Contest Moderator.
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