The Confluence

The Confluence Part XIV

Suzie followed closely behind him, not standing when she reached the top, and sat down, leaning up against the tall crags of rock as she caught her breath. "Do you see that? Do you see the shit that the sky is doing right now?" Adrian whimpered to Suzie, his voice shaking. Suzie opened her eyes, and saw what looked like the sky itself being pulled towards the top of the mountain. She couldn't see the sky itself move, but it gave the illusion that the very fabric of the night sky seemed lower somehow, closer to her in a way she hadn't experienced before. "Yeah, I can see that. I don't even want to know why that's happening, I've been through enough nightmare shit for one night. You try looking ahead of yourself, cop?" Adrian dragged his eyes away from the unnatural sight in the sky, and saw before him a hole in the side of the mountain. The inside was lit with what appeared to be some kind of rock embedded brazier that held a burning torch. Without even thinking Adrian ambled forward towards the torch, and stood as close as he could without being burned, setting his crowbar down before raising both of his hands to try warming them up. Suzie, who had finally caught her breath, stood up with the shotgun, and followed Adrian into the entrance of the cave. Looking deeper in, she noticed there were more torches lining the cramped walls of the cave. It was substantially warmer inside the cave, away from the wind and with heat from the torches. The smoke from the torches was thin, and not cloying; But the smell was alien to the two of them. There was a vague ozone smell that seemed to radiate off the creatures they had fought, along with a thick scent of incense. For some reason, smelling it seemed to flood their minds with red and dark grey colors, as if the colors were the smell of the incense. The heat was warming them both up considerably, each of them becoming more aware as the coldness fled their bones. The cave was cramped, jutting sharp pieces of rock cutting off their line of sight ahead. Their minds now constantly swirling with the red grayness of the incense. The sound of wind had died the deeper in the went, and now there was only a low humming coming from further within the tunnel. Suzie and Adrian's breath seemed huge and loud in the tiny space of the tunnel, with only the burning sound of the torches right above their heads. Adrian with his wide shoulders and taller frame was having a much more difficult time navigating the tunnel, bumping and scraping him through his thin shirt, peeling layers of his skin back. After climbing over a large chunk of rock, the cave tunnel suddenly yawned wide and deep. There were more torches along the walls in a wide oval shape, illuminating the cave floor. It was covered in sand and small black rocks, and poking out of the sand on the ground were pieces of ancient bones. A femur, a half buried skull with a large cracked hole in the top of the head. There were small bundles of sticks with skulls pierced through their tips, toothy grins locked in eternal screams around the sharpened ends of the sticks. Bathing in the orange glow of the torches, towards the other side of the oval cave at the top of the mountain, was a group of stark naked people. They were all hunched down, heads kissing the sandy and rocky ground, beads of sweat gleaming on their backs. They all had weird red patterns painted all over their bodies, patterns that Adrian actually recognized. The last he had seen these patterns were when they had been strung up with the teeth of a dead man. Adrian then saw something else that made his blood somehow run colder than it had been already. There was a central figure, standing with his back turned to Adrian and Suzie. He stood, with his arms outstretched before the most grotesque statue the two had ever seen. Neither could gaze upon the abomination frozen in stone for long without feeling like their eyes and brains were buzzing with an alien feeling. The statue was formed apparently from the very rock of the mountain, and it seemed to grow out of the rock wall. It had two separate eyes at the end of long stalks that tapered down and split into a huge tooth filled maw at the top of where Adrian guessed the torso began. It seemed less like one whole being, and more like two separate beings that had been melded together with horrendous wrongness. As Adrian gazed slack jawed at the statue, Suzie made her way out into the open, seeing what Adrian saw. She heard the murmured chanting from the huddled naked people, the statue in all its truly awful glory, and the man standing before it finally turned to the pair, his normally cheerful eyes glittering with a black darkness. Despite being naked, with red swirls and strange glyphs painted over every inch of skin, Adrian recognized him. And that recognition blew through his mind like a bullet. Anderson grinned wickedly at his two new guests, dark eyes dancing between the two of them. "Hello again, Adrian. I see you brought your favorite little delinquent as well! How about this for a damn fine reunion!" He bellowed out raucous laughter as the rest of the naked people slowly rose up from prostrating before the statue and followed Anderson's gaze. To her rising horror, Suzie recognized someone herself. A big, burly man, with military tattoos and ice in his eyes. Suzie's father didn't say a word, didn't even twitch at the sight of her. " You two have wandered too far from home." Anderson continued. "This is a holy place none may tread who are not adherents of the Kintarok. This is the place where one of their number entered this world, and where the twin being known as Sa-Dis and Fa-Kaos was driven back into its slumber." As he said this, he motioned to the statue behind him. "They sleep still, and it is here we hail their flesh, turned to the same stone of its mountain home. Just like so many others throughout the ages, your bones will lay before its flesh, and your blood will soak the stone, to help Sa-Dis and Fa-Kaos recall their children here, once again. Neither of you will leave this place alive." With that, he thrust his fist forward, and let out an almost inhuman howl. The small crowd of naked people all growled, baring their grimy teeth. Adrian gripped his crowbar in two hands, and let out a scream of his own. A scream of hate, of fury, against all that had happened to him since arriving in Kennedy. Suzie steeled herself, bringing the shotgun up to her shoulder, gripping it tightly and leaning her shoulder into the stock to compensate for the recoil. The crowd, arming themselves with bones, with the stick spears, and some only their painted hands, surged forward towards the two, with Anderson's howling laughter swirling around the cave.