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- Sep 22, 2020
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Chapter I
The Wanderlust
I do not know why am writing this. Perhaps the insidious grasp of insanity has already shackled me. Perhaps a sliver of sanity remains, and my desperate, recouping mind demands of me that I put my sorrows to the paper. Where to begin? How does one commence when attempting to describe the indescribable? Even now, my very consciousness shakes as I struggle to recall the finer details of that dreadfully dark, rainy January night.
Know that I am by no means a fragile man. For many years now, I have served dutifully within the ranks of Civil Protection and beyond. I have seen countless horrors; the brutality demanded from my colleagues and myself, the foul Xenian parasites that enthrall and devour their pray, and even the dark, primordial magicks of the occasional apostate Vortigaunt. Until that night, that dark, rainy January night, I had thought my paradigms to be too firmly rooted to shift any further. Oh, how wrong I was.
As a man of the baton, I am forbidden from walking freely within the confines of the very City that I protect. Although the iron cage that is my home is by no means inhumane - there is ample entertainment and foodstuffs aplenty - there are some cravings that gnaw at a man's soul until he submits, no matter his fortitude or willpower. My craving was to witness the dark heaven above, to tread the ancient streets of the beautiful city of Geneva, and to do so with my own skin, and not the artificial garb that my profession demands I wear.
Such things, of course, are strictly forbidden, which I was well aware of. Yet as the weeks turned to months, and as the months turned to years, my cravings failed to subside. My sinful desires got the better of me in the second-to-last week of December in the previous year, during the period of the solstice. By the grace of luck, it was revealed to me that a close companion of mine would be surveying the gate that led out of the mansion that night. I approached him before my shift had ended, and after a few minutes of pleading and promises, he agreed to assist me in my efforts.
The first night was intoxicating. Although I had walked the beautifully paved streets of Geneva countless times before, it was not until that first night that I could truly take in the soul of the venerated city. A light drizzle poured from the heavens, and the stars were as bright as they had ever been. I must have wandered for several hours, for when I returned, my companion rebuked me for my tardiness, and hurried me inside. Too filled with joy to respond to his insults in kind, I offered half of my monthly salary to him in exchange for his continued assistance with my nightly ventures. Reluctantly, he concurred with my offer, and what was initially destined to be a one-time occurrence, quickly spiraled into a twice-weekly activity.
Time passed, and every Monday and Thursday, I set off in the nights to sate my wanderlust. I explored every hidden cavity of the city that was accessible to me. After the alleyways and balconies had become all too familiar, I even ventured underground; an act so forbidden in the eyes of the Union, that I had to redouble my efforts to avoid the many cameras that polluted the city corners and rooftops. I, however, never ventured too deep into the bowels of Geneva. It was not the insurgents that I feared, not even the parasitic infestation that everlastingly plague us so, but my fears were of a more.. primordial kind.
The shadows that danced beneath the surface never did quite seem right to me. The light, sometimes luminescent, sometimes dull, seemed inconsistent and unnatural. The sound... God, the sound. In hindsight, I curse myself for disregarding my instincts when the sound first reached my ears. A dull, thumping drum that shook the very junk-stained soil that I trod upon. It roared through the claustrophobic concrete of the hallways I crawled through. In my imagination, I fancied the thumping to be the very heartbeat of some long-forgotten, prehistoric creature that hibernated beneath the venerated city. I now chuckle bitterly, as I realize that my imagination was not too far removed from the unthinkable truth.
Weeks passed, then, that cursed January night approached. The night that will forever leave its mark on my very soul. The night where the wind danced gently through the bends of the street. The night where the idle hum of Combine machinery seemed uncharacteristically absent. The night where it did not drizzle, but pour. The night where no living thing roamed the ancient pavement of Geneva aside from myself and that... thing in the dark coat.
God help me.