Take Away the Saints

Where Dreams Die : Ch. 5 & 6 || Andrew John Wood

Fixation On the Darkness

Alec ran into the dark alley and saw nothing but years of accumulated trash and filth. He checked the nearby roofs and again saw nothing. He sighed with frustration and then finally noticed movement.

The woman dressed in black was perched on the wall at the rear of the alley. They both stared at each other in silence and the woman rolled backwards into the unknown.

Alec cursed, ran to where she was perched and leapt over the wall in pursuit.

He fell for a few seconds and landed in the dust and debris.

The woman stood waiting for him, she offered him her hand and pulled him to his feet before taking a swing at his head.

Alec recoiled and watched as her fist glided inches from his face.

The woman laughed, flipped backwards in the air and kicked him in the stomach.

Alec flew backwards into the garbage, winded and red-faced. He felt blood trickle down his arm and prayed to god that it wasn't a needle that had stabbed him.

"You better lick your wounds if you want to catch me..."

She taunted before running into the darkness once more.

Alec lay in the garbage, open-mouthed with rage. This woman was stark raving mad...

He considered just how much of her game he was willing to play... She was toying with him. Yet she held the next piece of the puzzle. So he pulled himself out of trash and tended to his injuries. Helen was why he had come... He couldn't stop now. Not when he was so close.

"Hurry..." Her voice floated from the distance.

Alec pulled a shard of glass from his arm and clenched his fists around it in rage before chasing after her.

He followed her at every step, keeping pace as she led him further from the district to God only knew where.

He paused for breath and watched as she sauntered mockingly into a cracked building that Alec vaguely recollected from his misspent youth.

If he remembered correctly, this was one of the points of access into the city's sewers. He recalled spending many hours with his pals smoking weed and staring into the dark inviting tunnels of the city.

He was never brave enough to walk down into what his friends called the Hell Mouth. Alec remembered the tales they used to share about the city of ruin that lay beneath.

It was all made up of course, there couldn't be a whole city inside the sewers and even now as he entered the building he failed to recall how he and his friends found out about it.

Alec walked and searched the building but he couldn't find the woman or any sign that she was close, it was only when he ventured towards the basement that her voice taunted from below.

"I was starting to think that you'd given up Alec..."

He stared down into the dark entrance to the basement and saw no trace of her. With a curse, he followed. He made it half way through the tunnel when he felt her presence. Standing still, he focused his senses to detect any trace of her, that was when he heard her breathing behind him.

He clenched his fists and turned to take a swing at her, she chuckled, caught his fist in her own and used his own weight to throw him into the concrete wall at their side.

Dazed and more enraged than ever before, he jumped to his feet and charged at her. She stood in the darkness and waited for him. Again, she countered his blow. This time she twisted his arm to the breaking point and kicked him square in the head, then chuckled as she ran deeper into the tunnel.