Specifically I returned to peek at my previous hideout. Why? Well, I knew they'd found where I was, and I knew they'd be back to search it. If I were trying to find me, that's what I'd do. So I'd been keeping watch on it for a while. As predicted, there were two people combing the place over, maybe around 4:00am.
Being robbed a few months back turned out to be a slight blessing here. There really wasn't much for them to find except a few discarded energy bar wrappers, painkillers, a hair comb, an empty lighter, a whetstone, toilet roll and some newspaper. Still, they picked the stuff up, and to my surprise, put it in ziplock bags.
In trying to sniff out my tracks, they neglected to cover their own. As they left I tailed them. I was expecting a safehouse. Instead, they took a dirt lane into some fields, unkempt, with tall grass and dry vegetation, rusting barrels and farming equipment, and then I saw it. A husk of a house, probably built in the 60s or 70s, but long abandoned like the fields, boarded shut. They faltered approaching it, but ultimately went in. It was maybe an hour before they came out again. I stayed in place. I wasn't ready. There could have been anything, anyone in there, and it was a long way from help.
But I took it as a place of interest, and started to scout it out. Returned to keep watch on it a lot. Eventually put together a rough map of the area and the places I'd be best hidden, the easiest escape routes, and of course a vague understanding of the comings and goings. It didn't seem like anyone lived there at all, I would simply see one or two people going into the house from anywhere to half an hour to two hours, then leaving. They'd enter by pulling one of the boards aside. Sometimes they'd have those little ziplock bags. Most of the time they'd have regular bags or bin-bags, but they'd leave with them far less full.
So, eventually I decided to see what was in there. It was obviously not being lived in, and for a while, with old flattened green carpet. But someone was keeping it relatively tidy - there wasn't the usual rubbish, graffiti or used needles you'd expect. There was a bunch of cheap retro furniture inside, dirty mattresses tossed on the floor. But it was pretty bare otherwise, and I checked in all the containers I found, nothing of consequence. Well, there was B&Q receipt from 1997, but that's only mildly interesting because that's the year I was born. The attic was full of spiders, asbestos and little else. If I can credit my life experience with one thing, it's ridding me of my fear of spiders. They're pretty nice beings compared to what's truly out there. Hell, they're pretty nice compared to asbestos.
I continued keeping watch. Again, I would see people go in with things, and leave without. Then I'd go back in and find the place exactly the fucking same. Empty drawers, nothing new. I thought I was going crazy... well, crazier. It was... fucking maddening.
Uncomfortable story short, I ended up punching the wall and left a dent. On one (pretty strong) hand, my training was paying off. On the other, I had now damaged the place in a way that might rouse suspicion, so no time for long term plans now. I kicked over a bedside table and it hit the mattress, and that's when the carpet moved weirdly with it. I lifted up the mattress, and that's when I saw the hole underneath it, cut out of the carpet, floorboards underneath pulled out, and a ladder descending into the black. Used my phone's torch to take a look. It was a cavern of sorts, crudely plastered, supported by beams, with a slice of carpet taken from the house leading to a vague pile, immersed in darkness. Going down the ladder was a surprisingly easy choice. I was kind of buzzing with happiness that I wasn't crazy- crazier. Whatever. Amazing what the smugness of being right can make you do.
It was a shrine to the monster. There were carefully stacked bones, some human I think, but some definitely not. Some branches from various trees, arranged into humanoid, elongated shapes. Masks, knives and hoodies. Erratic drawings and notes, in different frenzied handwriting and papers. An assortment of symbol-etched cups of blood, at varying stages of congealment. And most bizarrely a collection of completely normal but used everyday items - pieces of paper, pens, hair brushes, tissues, condoms, T-shirts, deodorant, toothbrushes. Sifting through all the crap, I saw my hair comb that I'd left, and my whetstone.
I pondered the significance. I even thought of asking you guys, but I didn't have time, and couldn't risk them knowing I'd found this place.
Do they think the monster is some kind of sniffer dog?
Fuck, is the monster some kind of sniffer dog?
I don't know whether it was functional or merely ritualistic, but decided I couldn't risk it existing either way. Now I needed to get rid of it all as quickly as possible.
First thing, tied my jumper over my nose and mouth and ripped out as much asbestos as I could from the attic, dragging it out into the field. Then started pulling up the dry, dead foliage from the field. It took a couple of trips, but eventually I gathered enough to distribute around the house. Tore the boards off the house plus some more out the floor to get the oxygen flowing all through. Got my lighter. Struck it up. Fled.
Ahh. This was honestly one of the few pleasures I've had this year. It put me in a relatively good mood. I love fire. I love fire as much as I reasonably can. I love its light. I love its heat on my face. It cleanses. Breaks and makes molecular bonds. Rends the flesh from the bone. The fire burned bright and beautiful and red like Mars, smoke ascending to the sky.
But I won't get too carried away with the memory. Need to stay guarded.
I've still been trying to get stronger. Standard training. But one of the things I need to do is fill in my weaknesses. I can't get caught off guard when any prat with half a brain cell can hold up their phone and play... that song. Who knows what that would make me do?
I need to fix that. Somehow.
