Hellspawn - Part 17

Part 17

Original prompt, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15, Part 16

---

A few hours had passed since the darkness had enveloped their part of the world, each passing night a sense of looming threat hung over the cabin. With it, the night brought a lack of knowledge. At any time the monsters could appear from the nights shadows, giving the humans little warning of their approach. All four of them were huddled on the sofas in front of the warming glow of the fireplace; talking about the day’s just past. The nightmares of those days, which they had seen with their own eyes was the only topic on their minds. Nobody dared talk about their former lives, that all seemed irrelevant now and a lifetime ago like they were different people wearing the same skin. It had only been a week, and so much had changed.

Isabella and Daniel were laid on one of the sofas staring at the fire, huddled in each other’s arms watching the fires mesmerising dance giving them the only display of visual entertainment for miles. Julie was bundled up on the other sofa, staring off into the endless void of the fireplace while Patrick had gone down into the bunker to make everyone tea, although the rattling of cups and general kitchenware seemed to have stopped. For now they were not watching their supplies closely enough, they would do a stock check when the place was properly fixed up and everyone was more settled in. Without the need to feed a 5th mouth now they had a few extra months worth of supplies, as horrible as that thought was. Isabella looked from the fireplace and to Julie, her face a glow of orange as the fires light jumped off in different angles every second.

“How long have you been married?” She asked Julie who was sat still with her knees to her chin, her eyes gaze piercing through the fire. Isabella had noticed with concern how often Julie seemed to drift off, now was one of those times. Isabella put it down to Julie’s recent injuries and her journey from the city to here. Patrick had told Isabella about that place, the hanging bodies they had to endure on their way here, the stench of thousands of dead people. It must have been a lot to take in, nobody going to bed that night had a clue what they would be waking up to. “Julie.” Isabella said sharply snapping Julie out of her stupor, she tried to keep her voice calm but she couldn’t help feeling annoyed, even though she had no good reason to.

“Huh?” Julie asked with a confused expression, now looking at Isabella. Her gaze seemed to go right through Isabella.

“How long have you and Patrick been married?” She only wanted to make a bit of small talk, something to lighten the mood. They had all been through so much.

“Oh.” Julie said shifting her gaze back to the flames. “Does it matter?” She said coldly before returning back to her stupor. Isabella decided to stop trying, but there was one thing she had been meaning to say but didn’t have the chance to until now.

“Thank you.” She said to Julie with a smile, which got her attention. She even smiled back, a surprised smile.

“What?” She asked, bewilderment on her face.

“For saving me, for saving Daniel. Without you and Patrick this place wouldn’t even exist, you took us in and you fed us and you even protected us from one of them things, I would most definitely be dead if you didn’t push me out of the way. I’m sorry your arm got hurt because of me. I’m sorry your leg got hurt because of us.” Isabella was looking at Julie sympathetically; it felt much better to get it out.

“I just did what anyone else would do, and you were only lucky you found us here. You were lucky we survived too. And hey, an arm is better than a life, wouldn’t you say?” Julie smiled before turning her attention back to the fireplace, Isabella couldn’t tell if it was a fake smile or if Julie genuinely meant it. She nudged Daniel with her elbow, he looked at her wondering what she was doing when it came to him.

“oh, erm, yeah, thanks Julie.” He said with a forced smile. “Wouldn’t be here without you, certainly wouldn’t have lost just my eye.” Daniel sat staring at Julie for a while after that, only a few seconds but it was enough to tell Isabella what he was thinking, she mimed the word ‘don’t’ with her lips, so Daniel stopped himself from asking a question that might upset things. Isabella wanted to know answers too, they had all been in that jeep, they had all heard what that thing had said. She wasn’t sure if Julie remembered it, but she herself wasn’t going to forget about it.

“Patricks been gone a long time.” Isabella said looking over to the vault door, this seemed to alert Julie who did a quick turn with her body and looked towards the vault door too. They really did love each other, Isabella thought.

“He is making tea for all 4 of us, could just be taking a while.” Daniel remarked.

“Perhaps, but it’s been a while already.” Isabella said, Julie had been silent all this time. Somewhat perched on the sofa and peering down the hall to the bunker, something was on her mind. “Maybe he needs our help?” the more they paid attention, the more things seemed to be getting eerily silent now. In one sudden movement Julie jumped over the sofa and started running for the vault door, seconds later loud screaming came from the bunker.

“NO, GET OUT OF MY HEAD, LEAVE ME ALONE! GO AWAY! GO AWAY!” It was Patrick and he sounded extremely panicked. “PLEASE JUST LEAVE ME ALONE! I WASN’T THINKING PLEASE I WASN’T IN CONTROL PLEASE!” Julie had reached the bunker and was running down the stairs as Patrick shouted more non-sensical ramblings. Isabella looked at Daniel with a raised eyebrow, “what the hell?” he looked at her and shrugged.

“You saw the same as me.” They both stood up and walked over to the bunker door, listening intently.

“Patrick! Patrick! It’s me! It’s me!” Julie knelt down to him and put both her hands on his face, “What’s wrong? What’s going on?” Patrick was bundled up into the corner with his knees to his chin.

“T-They’re all in here, the children, the soldiers… t- they tell me how much of a disgrace I am, a murderer, a coward.” He had tears running down his face, his face red and warm to the touch and his hair a crumpled mess. Julie looked around, it was all empty apart from herself and Patrick.

“There’s nobody else here dear, it’s all in your head. Morteus is playing tricks on you.” She looked compassionately into his eyes.

“I- I know it’s just so real, he knows how to get to me, how to mess with me.” Patrick put his head in Julie’s arms.

“Morteus? Who’s Morteus?” Daniel asked Isabella who looked at him confusingly and just shrugged.

“Nobody I’ve heard them mention before, do you think… do you think they’re crazy?” Isabella asked, Daniel put on a stupid expression.

“Maybe we weren’t so lucky after all, we’ve ran into a nuthouse in the middle of nowhere,” He laughed. “Don’t ever go crazy on me, ok?” he told Isabella, who laughed and said,

“That will never happen, at least not for a few years.” They heard talking again and went back to listening,

“Patrick.” Julie said guiding Patricks head up gently with her hand to have him look at her, “before, when I wanted to tell you something.”

“You told me you'll tell me when you were ready, when the time was right.” He said, wondering if it made her happy that he remembered something she told him.

“Yeah, I think its best I tell you now. I’m not such an angel myself.” Patrick stopped crying with curiosity taking control instead. Isabella heard footsteps coming up the stairs but before they could move away Julie made an appearance and they looked around pretending they were inspecting the wall. Julie ignored it and just said,

“I’m gonna shut the door guys, we need a private moment.” Isabella tried to look casual as if she hadn’t been listening this whole time.

“Oh, ok, have fun… or something.” Julie closed the door and locked it from the inside, the number pad beeped and changed colour to red to indicate the door was now locked.

---

Julie slowly walked back down the steps, no matter where you were a place would always look different if you were nervous and right now she was very nervous. Luckily Azrael appeared to be sleeping or busy with something else, most likely murdering a group of survivors. Either way, it stopped him talking to her for a while. He had been bullying her about Samantha a lot recently, he was too much of a distraction and she could barely think or have a conversation with someone else without him trying to interrupt or torment her about it.

She slowly walked up to Patrick who had managed to console himself a bit and was now stood up, trying to look manly again with his arms crossed.

“Bit late for that don’t you think?” Julie joked.

“For what?” Patrick asked with a frowny face. “What were you going to tell me?” There was a long pause where Julie just stared Patrick in the face before he spoke again, “you can’t back out now, not this time, not after you just told me you would.” Julie sat down on a chair and Patrick sat down on the small sofa they had down in the bunker, it wasn’t as comfy as the ones upstairs but it was good enough.

“Ok, have I ever mentioned Samantha to you?” Patrick put on a perplexed look, judging by that Julie took it as a no.

“She was a friend of mine that I had in high school, always full of laughter and joy.” Julie sighed and her face seemed less casual now and sadder.

“Ok,” Patrick said. “What about her?” Julie took a deep breath of air.

“We were really good friends, until one day my boyfriend at the time dumped me. I was distraught, he was my first ever experience with boys like that and he left me there humiliated and heart broken. He didn’t even seem to care.” Patrick looked around uneasily,

“You errrm...want a hug?”

“What? No… this is serious Patrick.”

“Sorry.” Patrick said. Julie composed herself and carried on her story.

“Once this happened I confided in Samantha, I was a complete train wreck, my grades were failing and nobody else seemed to care. Samantha was there for me, she helped me through it all but there was one thing that kept bugging me…”

“What’s that?” Patrick asked, what could have possibly bugged her?

“She was still always so… happy. While I was miserable she was just smiling and giggling and laughing and it just… it got under my skin. I didn’t realise it at the time why I hated her, I just know I hated her. Not at first, I just gradually kept getting more and more annoyed at her. Every little thing she did would irritate me to the core to the point that I couldn’t stand being around her anymore.” Julie cleared her throat, Patrick had edged closer to her now and was holding one of her hands with a look of concern and curiosity.

“So… what happened next?” Patrick asked, taking care of what he was saying.

“I distanced myself from her. I stopped inviting her to parties, I stopped meeting up with her. I stopped sitting next to her in class and came up with excuses on our lunch breaks to not be around her. She was still so… happy. She had other friends and it was clear she didn’t need me, but I needed her. I didn’t know that until later of course but it was the reason for what I did, that and her happiness.”

“What did you do? This just sounds like typical high school drama.” Patrick didn’t seem so concerned at first, he wondered if she had just confessed to something that wasn’t actually that bad.

“It was, until I started bullying her.” Patrick raised an eyebrow.

“You bullied her?”

“Yeah, for a long time… every time I saw her I insulted her. It didn’t start off so bad at first, I would show my annoyance at her every time she brushed past me. After a few months I got worse, I would insult her for her choice of clothes, the way she wore her hair, the makeup she put on. Anything I could find about her I would insult it.” Julie took a deep breath again, she never wanted to speak about this to anyone. She had forgotten about it a long time ago and her brain had shut it out of her mind as if it had never happened, straining to remember it all brought all the pain back that she had managed to cover up all those years ago.

“Why wouldn’t she just go to the headmaster? People get bullied all the time but bullies grow out of it, you can’t beat yourself up about it.” Patrick still didn’t seem to be taking this seriously.

“It got worse, I would always mock her for her grades. I would always go out of my way to attack her verbally, sometimes physically. I would steal her dinner, I would knock it out of her hands. I would find her alone and pull her hair and tell her she’s worthless and that she should kill herself.” Julie gulped, Patrick was now on the edge of his seat listening intently.

“Julie… she didn’t…”

“This carried on for a while,” Julie interrupted. “I just… I wouldn’t stop, I hated seeing her smile. I wanted to just wipe it off of her face, it had gone beyond petty and into downright psychotic. Then one day, I see her talking to my ex. Laughing, joking, smiling… touching.” Julie’s face seemed to show a hint of anger which she quickly realised and snapped out of.

“People get jealous all the time, its natural.” Patrick said trying to help, he knew nothing he said would change what happened but he tried anyway. Julie started crying as she kept talking,

“and then… and then after school that day I followed her, I knew her route home and I… I waited until we were walking down a dark pathway and I… I punched her, I kept punching her and pulling on her hair until she sank to the floor begging me to stop.” Julie was streaming tears now, she could barely get her words out. Before Patrick could speak again she carried on, “Then I kicked her, and I kicked her and I kicked her while she cried out in tears and pain. I told her to stay away from him, stay away from my ex. I told her that if I caught her with him again then I’d kill her.”

“Jesus… you didn’t mean it.” Patrick said in a questioning tone.

“Of course I didn’t, I went home that night smug with myself that I had wiped that smile off her face. I acted as if nothing had ever happened and slept soundly. The next morning I woke up and I found she had… she had hung herself and her family had found her that morning.”

“Oh my god,” Patrick said, he stood up and started pacing up and down the room. “She… she killed herself?!” Julie looked up to Patrick with apologetic eyes.

“Y-yes.” Patrick kept pacing, he couldn’t think straight. He knows he had straight up murdered a 13 year old child but, this was driving a girl to suicide. He was pushed to the edge before he killed that child, Julie must have been clear headed for the years she tormented Samantha… or maybe not, maybe that was the problem.

“What happened to you?” he asked her, a slight look of anger in his face, how could he be angry at her after what he did himself?

“I was a minor and my dad is… was a lawyer so… I was let off with a caution, it wasn’t straight up murder and it was never my intention so there was some leniency there too… I still have to live with it.” Patrick wanted to say Samantha didn’t even have her life, but he held his tongue. Especially given their current situation.

“I forgive you.” He didn’t know where that came from, but he had his reasons.

“W-what?” She asked, surprised at this sudden response.

“I forgive you, I told you my secret you told me yours, and we’re both being tormented for it. Even though the world is about to end anyway.” Morteus didn’t say anything to that, he hadn’t said anything for the past few minutes now. Then Patrick had a sudden realisation.

“Has Azrael been speaking to you?” He asked Julie.

“Wha… yes but, not since I came down here and…”

“Did you close the vault door?”

“Yes.” Julie said who was now curiously eyeing up Patrick, the tears had stopped.

“Try talking to Azrael.”

“what?”

“Just do it.” There was silence as both of them tried talking to their demonic counterparts, they were met with nothing but silence. “This bunker.” Patrick weighed in, “It cuts their link, they can’t speak to us while we’re sealed down here!” Julie’s eyes shot open.

“You’re right!” she shouted with a smile, Patrick tried getting a response from Morteus again but he was once again met with silence.

“Get the others,” Patrick said grinning, “It’s time to tell them about the monsters.”

---

Took me a while to get this one out, I've been super tired since monday evening now I've started cycling to and from work again and I've been doing a lot of heavy lifting at work too. It's all added up to me being exhausted in the evenings and I didn't want to push out a half-assed part, anyway I hope you enjoyed it and check back later for Part 18 :)