Chained

Eight

Perfect. "I don't even remember her giving me anything."

"She knows how to administer it to the unsuspecting." A small rattle on the doorknob, as if Michael brushed into it. "Its effects last longer than any hallucinogen you may know. It's different than any hallucinogen you may know."

"Different?"

"Extraordinarily different," Michael says and it feels like doom is woven into those words. "You won't be able to fight it."

"It feels like it's getting worse," I murmur.

"Yes," Michael says, somehow hearing my whispered words. "Have you tried to hurt anyone yet?"

Worms are slipping underneath the door. I want to crush them, but stay still. This isn't real. None of this is real.

Hands around her throat. So much blood.

"I didn't...I-I didn't want to do it," I say shakily.

Silence for a moment. And then Michael knocks firmly on the door, waking me out of my daze. "You have to let me inside now, Jason Hill."

"No!"

"Are you certain that Freddie is still alive?"

That chills me more than the sight of a worm crawling onto my arm.

"Of course she's alive!" I croak as the illusory worm digs into my skin.

No sensation is left in its wake. Despite knowing it isn't real, the image of it tearing into my flesh becomes too much. I reach for it, desperately trying to pull it out. But it remains lodged in my skin. I rip and tear at it frantically, determined to get it out.

"...Jason Hill?"

The words wake me up and my stomach lurches. There is no worm on my hand and no sign of what happened to it. Just a bloody scratch on my hand. I was ripping into my own hand and I didn't realize it.

My hand around Freddie's throat.

"She's fine. She has to be fine," I protest. "You said that she wasn't in the bathroom!"

"I saw her through your window, Jason Hill. When you were upstairs. She waved at me and followed you upstairs."

"No!" I groan, cradling my whirling head. "You're fucking with me, that's what you're doing. She wasn't upstairs. It was upstairs, but not..."

"What was upstairs?"

A skull man. There is no such thing as a skull man and I know it.

"Call the cops," I half-plead. "I can't let you in, you have to know I can't."

"Is that what you want?" Michael asks, his voice carving into my soul. "If Freddie is dead, upstairs, is that what you want this night? Do you think your small authorities would believe that you weren't indulging in an unknown substance? This isn't your first time, is it?"

His words sickened me and I lean over to vomit. Nothing comes out except for a single worm. It slithers in the candlelight, a hideous hallucination that just won't fade.

"And what if something happened?" I ask weakly. "You wouldn't want to call the cops?"

"We take care of our own, Jason Hill," Michael says simply. "We don't want the involvement of outside forces."

There are two worms instead of one. I want to kill them both, but they are burrowing into the hard floor at an impossibly fast pace. I don't know which one that I want to kill more.

"Will you let me inside, Jason Hill?"

"How do you know my name?" I ask woozily. "You're a stranger, right? How do I know you're not just a product of my fucked up mind right now? You can't just know my name. That doesn't make any sense."

"I have a phone, Jason Hill. It didn't take long to track down who lived at this address."

A laugh erupts from me and I bang my head against the door. "I thought this was all supernatural shit. I'm such a fucking moron."

"Our ways can seem greater than the natural, especially when partaking of the higher substance," Michael says, still sounding like a smarmy cult leader. "But everything in life is natural, Jason Hill."

"Call t-the cops," I say shakily.

"Are you sure that's what you want me to do?"

I shut my eyes, but nothing disappears. The darkened house still haunts my closed eyes.

Then something wraps around my leg and begins to pull me down.My eyes fly open to find a chain is wrapped around me. And its pulling me into the ground.

But it isn't real.

I stand up, but it tugs me down. Desperate to break loose, I open the door and Michael blinks at me.

My body shakes. "I'm...I..."

"Yes?"

The chain is gone. But I don't know how much longer this will last. This isn't just a bad trip—this is hell.

"Come inside," I say softly.