Clutching The Darkness

Chapter 9: Streets of Cynicism

Growing up in the grubby gutters of San Francisco, I would always see whiskers poking out through sewage entrances or maybe a tail poking out through a garbage bin. Rats weren't something I was unbeknownst to after all.

But seeing them in the suburbs sent a sense of yuckiness spread throughout me. And my former vomiting episode didn't seem to mix well with the feeling either. My stomach felt like I had drank literal battery acid before guzzling down the sludge that forms in trash bins when it rains. I felt awful.

But it wasn't just because I felt sick, that I began feeling awful. It was my surroundings as well. The constant sound of plastic bags rustling around, crunching between plastics and metal tins, as if something was constantly toying in the dark, waiting to assault me.

But every time I turned to a sound, it would disappear. And then more noises would pop up: the growls of dogs in the background, the rasping of shoes skating across the pebbled floor, car tires crunching on broken beer bottles. Not only could I hear the noises, I could imagine them. And it all felt familiar.

Wait, familiar how?

And I thought for a while. But my brain had become mushy and foggy, leaving me with a dampening sense of lethargy. Why couldn't I think? Why couldn't I remember these noises?

But they repeated, and they felt closer and closer. My eyes couldn't keep up, and my neck ached from twisting multiple times trying to catch a sight of the sound. But no matter how much I processed my head, I couldn't remember. In fact, I couldn't remember some things.

What did we even cover today in class? When did class even end?

Ah, I remember now. The noises sounded so familiar, because they occurred all the time. Every time I would walk around the streets, this clamoring would often echo out during evening. When I would walk here, I often thought it was grating.

And, once I jokingly made the comparison to Nasima, that with all the ruckus, this place felt like what I imagined Tartarus to be.

As I walked around a curbside, some of the whispers began to ramp up. The noises around me began to stir even more frequently, while a cacophony of the town's noises bellowed out. I limped along with the metal rebar still holstered underneath my shoulder, but the stick had started jabbing into my skin.

In the faintest of noises, I heard something amazing. The soft spindling of flesh and fabric, while it all repaired away. And I looked to my legs and saw that like before, when Isaac and Benilde checked up on my arm, my flesh and clothes were beginning to tangle back into their original shape, as if nothing had ever injured them.

But there was one thing that didn't revert back. The stains of dried blood on my white shirt, that was speckling into the size of half a palm.

The whispers hushed and yelled, and they became more frequent and alarmed. They screamed at my ear, as if warning me with terror.

"Flesh..." I heard a woman grumble behind me.

As soon as I turned around, my left eye twitched, and I saw the true form of the person. Another Leper!

I leapt out of the way, and while she initiated her spider-like formation, I swallowed a lump in my throat. Those damn vultures!

She skidded across the floor and rushed at me, but I anticipated her attack. I swerved around and brought the bar across her spine, shattering it and leaving her limp.

She tried to crawl away to turn and bite, but before she could do that, I stabbed the weapon into her skull, ending her movements. I did it! I fought off another one of the distorted!