Simon Rhyes is finding it rather hard to breathe. The undergrowth, here, is not as thick as it is in some areas of the forest, but it is thicker than it would be at any other time of the year, a heavy veil of leaves blanketing the ground and making it extremely difficult for him to maintain any semblance of stealth. Regardless, he is doing a rather good job of it, his tread light and even as he moves in a low crouch, his gun hanging by his side, fingers gripping the handle with ease. The safety, now, is off. Rhyes' limp has been remembered, after the exhilaration of slamming the barrel of his gun into Adam Stone's head had caused him to forget it, and the price of his pace seems to be catching up to him, so his breaths are laboured.
His expression is one of manic determination, a brand of emptiness that is frightening with its intensity. He is a man worn down by spying, kidnapping, and general wrongdoing, but he is a man filled with hope in the form of a bronzed statue with his name on a plaque, or perhaps a medallion of some sort, wrought from the finest gold. Rhyes will accept either. Because he is getting closer; he can feel it.
His feeling is not entirely incorrect. He believes he is moving towards the home of Gertrude Limon, the monster responsible for the horrific murders and subsequent terror that Falridge has suffered, but he is moving towards a place quite different, though it is similarly abandoned by its previous owners. He is going towards this new, different place because of Adam Stone, instructions told before he was knocked unconscious: a hand pointed loosely north, when Hunter's home is actually south of the school. If he'd had any interest in anything other than himself and the monster and his car, Rhyes would know that, but he didn't and he doesn't, and so he is headed in the wrong direction. His ignorance keeps him heading north. One can only conclude that a fool's journey is bound to conclude with a fool's ending.
The house is a small one, the only other in the woods apart from that which previously belonged to Gertrude Limon. It is a hull, a shell, four rooms with nothing inside of them apart from a single crumbling bench top, and the remnants of a bed which appears as if it will collapse with the slightest touch. Three springs protrude from the top left corner, where the fabric is particularly frayed; a strange breed of moss has taken up residence in the adjacent corner, and it threads green tendrils over the mattress, winding along the top and side in a tangle. There is a strange, unidentifiable stain at the centre, which is most likely better off unthought of. The mattress is compacted into the constricting confines of the second room on the right, beside the vacant kitchen, in what appears to have previously been a bathroom. One can only wonder what is it doing there.
The wallpaper is faded and has almost completely cracked away from the walls, the effect consistent throughout the house, though one of the windows has been shattered in the first room, and so the wallpaper there is almost completely gone, scoured away by the wind and small forest creatures. It is a place bleached by sun, tempered to pastel. The only colour comes from the moss on the bed and the flaking wallpaper.
It is by pure chance that Simon Rhyes stumbles upon the house. Unluckier, even, that he trips over a ridge of dirt and debris, and tumbles down a hole in the ground, skidding to the bottom. He lands with an arm awkwardly twisted beneath him; it is likely broken, judging by the snap as he hit the ground, but Rhyes doesn't seem to notice: he rises to his feet and merely places his revolver into his other hand, his eyes wide with macabre wonder as his vision adjusts to the darkness. He is a man obsessed, still.
Beneath the house, there is a burrow, of sorts, and Simon Rhyes has fallen into it. As he blinks his eyes, several things come into view. The first he sees is this: hide upon hide upon hide, leathery swathes of skin arrayed in careful piles. Old and dry to so new that strings of flesh and blood glisten against the wet, ragged edges. Rhyes frowns as he runs his fingertips across a lock of curled brown hair, crusted with blood, the gun dangling from a single finger. It takes him a moment to realise that he is touching what used to be a human scalp, but when he does, he doesn't shy away – his touch glides across the bloody edge of the skin. He lifts his hand and turns it, squinting as he examines his fingers for a moment before continuing his inspection, walking gingerly through the burrow as if it is merely a clothing store instead of the macabre housing for a series of people that the monster wears when it feels the need.
YOU ARE READING
After Dark
Teen Fiction"Falridge was originally called Fall's Ridge, named after a strange phenomenon where many of the town's occupants threw themselves over the edge of the cliff that borders our forest, falling to their deaths on the sharp ridges of rock below..." Sinc...
