Infernum

Nestled in the corner of the Honey Lake Valley lay Susanville, a small, quiet country town with a population of 17,500 people; most of them, however, about 10,000 or so, lived as inmates in the two prisons on the outskirts of town. The people who lived there in Susanville loved their scenic surroundings and their time-honored sense of community.

Alexander Thomson, Alex as he preferred to be known, a correctional officer at High Desert State Prison, the newer of the two, took pride in his work and thought of himself as an honest man with a sense of duty and honor in a world that didn’t recognize either trait as being useful. He was a bit on the heavy side at 260 pounds, but he attributed that to his sit-down job at the prison and he didn’t think that was too bad considering he was a very tall six foot five. Maybe one day he would find his way to the gym, but for now he was way too busy working doubles, a side effect of a job that did not care how much time he spent there.

Alex was on his way home from work after a sixteen-hour “double” shift. It was a calm night, cloudless and cool from the snow-covered mountains that surrounded this small valley. With only the eerie glow of orange prison lights and the thousands of stars above to keep him company as his eyelids felt heavy, this Susanville-born man enjoyed his solitary drive. Alexander turned off the main paved road onto Byers Pass, a poorly maintained dirt road that curved up and over Bass Hill, a small mountain in the center of the valley. He reached over and turned on the radio to break up the monotony of his drive home and to wake up a bit as he still had a few miles to go before he got home. There was a click as Alex turned the knob of the radio, turning it on. The voice on the radio grew louder as Alex twisted the knob more, increasing its volume.

“Dr. Fanon, it’s been three months since the successful deployment of the deep core probe, any idea when we can expect any kind of insight on the future of this?”

Never letting go of the knob, Alex turned off the radio. There was only one station worth listening to and he did not like it when talk radio or the news was on, it would make him drowsier and he was already tired enough.

Alex began his ascent up the six-mile dirt road that curved over Bass Hill. His truck began to rattle and shake as it traversed the washboard road. He slowed down a bit to lessen the noise and stay on the road as he made his way past the first two corners. A few miles up the curvy washboard road, his nose tickled with the dust off the road as something caught his eye. A faint orange glow was flickering in the distance, lighting up the area in a large gully between the hills ahead. As Alex got closer, he thought the light could be a wildfire since they were common on this sagebrush-covered mountain, a nuisance that never caused any real damage but made everyone insurance rates go up. Alex was now only a mile or so away from the light that was just on the other side of a small hill that bordered the road. As his truck ascended a small rise in the road he saw a second light moving near the orange glow. It was dimmer and white like a flashlight or a bright lantern. After seeing the white light, Alex knew a fire had started and someone was either trying to put it out or trying to start it.

Fires on this mountain burned fast, getting out of control quickly, making them very dangerous. With no fire trucks in the area to aid, Alex thought whoever was down there might need some help. He parked his truck ensuring he was far enough off the road for a fire truck to get by. He grabbed his bright stinger flashlight from his glove box and stepped out into the cool night air. He then grabbed his shovel from the back of his truck before heading over the hill.

One foot after the other Alex climbed the sage-covered hill until he was at the crest of its peak. Once over the top of the hill, he could see down into the large bowl-shaped gulley, a few hundred yards from where the fire was. He took a whiff of the air expecting to smell the familiar scent of the burning sagebrush, but there was nothing there. At first, Alex did not know what he was looking at; then, as the images sunk into his eyes, he was stricken with the realization that it was not a fire. Alex stood there in shock as his eyes bore witness to what was in front of him.

A religious man would call this a test of one’s faith and a drinking man would call it a good reason to quit, but for Alex it was just an unbelievable hallucination of sorts. A thunderous roar that resembled a cello effect from an old Godzilla movie echoed up the hill. Snapping out of his daze, he looked downhill to confirm what he thought he saw.

Alex watched in disbelief as a monstrous beast swung its arms at a smaller white light floating in the air beside it. The beast was big, at least thirty feet tall, with broad shoulders and oversized hands and feet that bore long, sharp claws. It stood upright but with a hunch in its back. Its callused dark skin was scorched black as night and seemed to be made of porous lava rock; it was highlighted at every joint by what looked like molten hot lava flowing beneath it emitting a dim orange fiery glow. The beast’s skin seemed to be floating on the lava as if it was not skin at all, but instead a hardened suit of armor or perhaps the lava cooling down and hardening into rock. If this was a suit of armor, however, then what would be its helmet was adorned with two large, spiraling horns curving around its head from back to front curling upward at the front like a ram. The eyeholes in the helmet showed more lava that shined brighter than the rest of its body, almost overpowering the helmet’s skull like half a face that ended at the top of its mouth. The beast’s lower jaw could be seen under the helmet, bright lava seemed to be flowing out of its mouth as it flowed around two large boar-like stone tusks and then down to form its chin and neckline.

The beast swung its large talons at the light just missing it as it darted to one side quickly. The white light quickly moved back toward the beast, as if to strike it. Then, in a blinding flash of light, a bolt of lightning fired out of the center of the white light striking the beast. The beast fell backward to the ground and Alex could feel the ground shake as it hit but could still not believe what was going on in front of him. As the white light floated over the beast, Alex walked closer to the two creatures to get a better look. He watched as the lava inside the beast began to seep from a crack in its chest, its inner light dimming as the lava spilled out. A few moments later, Alex slid down the hill a few feet. As he recovered, the white light began to move away from the beast toward Alex. As the light moved a little closer to him, it slowly began to take shape into something oddly familiar. Then, without notice, the beast flung its clawed hand fiercely at the light. Distracted by Alex, the light was struck by the full strength of the beast, and Alex could tell that this was no light.

The lighted object flew through the air from the impact toward Alex. Alex almost fell over as the object struck the hillside close to where he was standing, just ten or fifteen feet below him down the hill. He could not resist watching as the bright white light flickered then started to dim. As the blinding white light faded, it gave way to a white humanoid creature, adorned with two golden metallic wings on its back. It was about Alex’s size and looked like a man but was devoid of any features; there were eye sockets but no eyes, a nose without nostrils and lips without a mouth. The only features this creature did have were tattoos on its white skin portraying pictures of stars and galaxies that emitted a now faded glow of light. The creature’s large metallic wings looked slightly out of place on its back as they lay sprawled out on the ground beneath it. Alex thought they might have been taken from something else and then reattached to this creature.

Alex hesitantly moved toward the creature going down to one knee by its side. He placed one hand the creature’s shoulder, shook it slightly, and asked it, “Are you okay?”

The creature turned its head slowly and looked at Alex. Then, as if in great pain, it grabbed its side with one hand. Alex could see a gash under its hand; its skin looked torn like a rip in thin fabric and Alex could see muscles tendons and bone as the wound poured out blood. The creature looked at Alex and its white face began to melt away, revealing a human head underneath what Alex figured to be some type of clothing. It looked at Alex for a moment then spoke with a smooth monotone voice.

“It’s still loose… It must be stopped before it’s too late.”

Alex looked back at the beast and watched as it stumbled a few times trying to stand back upright and then back at the creature whose wound was now soaking the ground beneath it with blood. “Are you nuts? I can’t fight that thing!”

The creature stared at Alex for a few moments, sizing him up. “You must… No one can ever find out,” it said, looking back at the beast.

Alex started to shake his head from side to side. “Are you fucking kidding me? No way man! No fucking way!” Alex’s clamoring ended with the creature grabbing his arm tightly. Alex tried to pull away but could not break the man’s grasp.

The man was almost devoid of life as he held Alex’s arm and stared into Alex’s eyes. “Take my ánimam… Destroy the De… Protect the sec…” The creature’s last words trailed off and faded as did the last of its suit’s light. Alex watched as the creature’s golden wings began to dissipate into millions of golden specks of light.

The golden particles floated up above the creature as they reformed into golden metallic ribbons coiling around for nearly twenty feet before disappearing underneath the creature. The ribbons seemed to have a life of their own, rising into the air above Alex. Hovering above him like a poised cobra, the ribbons curved over his head then struck down at Alex with great ferocity. The ribbons pierced his back cutting deep into Alex’s skin as they entered each side of his spine between his shoulder blades. The force and pain were so great that Alex was knocked forward onto his hands and knees. His breath was taken away from him as the pain was so intense it was all he could do to breathe.

Once through the skin, the golden ribbons forced themselves all the way inside of Alex, wrapping around his spine as they dug their way in. He was screaming in pain, swinging his arms desperately trying to grab the ribbons and pull them out as his back felt like it was on fire—no, more than fire … like hot liquid magma being poured into the openings in his back.

Alex fell to the ground and started rolling back and forth in a desperate attempt to stop the ribbons for what seemed like hours. It was just then that a feeling of calmness washed over him as he rolled over onto his stomach. The ribbons were fully inside removing Alex’s pain and replacing it with a kind of warmth. It was only a few moments but it felt like a lifetime to Alex who was now lying face down in a trance-like state. As he lay there on the cold frozen ground he suddenly had the feeling that he was not alone, like someone else was there with him. Not like the feeling of being watched but more like camping when you sleep in a tent with a lot of other people. Just as Alex was wrapping his head around this new sensation, the golden ribbons re-emerged from his back and began wrapping around the creature on the ground in front of him; they began to glow with white-hot intensity and begun to incinerate it. It only took a few moments, but it was over as quickly as it began leaving nothing but an impression in the ground where the creature once was.

Alex looked up slowly and watched as the massive black beast made its way toward him, each step like a small earthquake. As Alex looked up at the beast, he realized that it was much larger than anything he had ever seen before. He watched in horror as the massive black beast took its final step toward him and raised its giant clawed hand. Alex was helpless against the beast as it swung its clawed hand down at him. Out of instinct, Alex raised his arms to cover his head as he prepared to be struck by the beast. It was at that moment that the golden ribbons effortlessly and painlessly re-emerged from Alex’s back. The ribbons gathered in front of him in a fury of golden light forming a large golden shield in front of him. Alex could not see through the shield with his eyes but knew the beast had struck it as he was knocked down from the impact. The beast struck Alex again with another fierce blow to the ribbons’ protective shield.

Fearing the shield would not hold back another strike Alex gathered all his strength and courage and got up clinching his hand tightly into a fist. The ribbons retreated from their shape and loosely wrapped themselves around Alex’s arm a few times hovering just a few inches above his skin. Thinking if he hit the beast hard enough he might be able to distract it long enough to make an escape, Alex swung at the beast with all his might. Just before his hand made contact with the beast, the ribbons quickly corkscrewed forward past Alex’s hand striking the beast with a blinding flash of light and a thunderous crack. The beast flew back from the impact and landed some twenty feet away; the lava inside the beast was now flowing out of the fresh crack in its armor. As the lava flowed from the beast, pieces of its armor began to crumble off.

Alex did not waste any time as he started running back up the hillside before the beast could get back up. He started down the hill toward his truck, leaping over sagebrush and rocks alike in a beeline to the bottom. Alex jumped in his truck and peeled away down Byers Pass Road, flinging dust and gravel behind him. Looking in his rearview mirror every few seconds to check for the beast, it was miles before Alex felt somewhat safe as he arrived home.

***

Alex went inside his house, still out of breath and locking his door behind him for the first time since he moved in. As the adrenalin faded, he began to get the chills and felt very weak. He could barely manage to walk the sixty feet to his bedroom before he collapsed, landing on the cool, soft sheets of his king-sized bed. Alex drifted to sleep as his exhausted body began to recover from the shock.