Story Notes:
I had to re-write this thing. Wolfgang is hopefully more likable, and everyone will be able to experience what he feels during the course of the story. Italics omitted due to invalid formatting.
Archive: Norman Wellshire| Briar Bay Mini-Infirmary| Arc II
Archive: Norman Wellshire| Briar Bay Mini-Infirmary| Arc II
Why didn't I just walk away? Trust me, I tried that. An invisble force would block me, and I would be scared.
My paws made dents in the hardwood floor as I walked back down the hallway where I had come from. My light shone down on the wood and I noticed it had become more decayed than it was when I'd first entered. Before, it was just old and sagged wherever I walked; now, it was very old and moldy and broken. If I didn't watch my step, I might fall through the floor itself. My surroundings had changed slightly since my return, like the broken door was now fixed and barred over with the same cast-iron as the steel door behind me. I also noticed as I walked down the hallway that the moldy closet door was now fixed and replaced with a steel door. I jogged over to it, disregarding the crooked floor for a minute and bent down to examine it. I still had the key from the Bidoof's throat, and hopefully there would be a keyhole down there so I could open more places around the medical complex.
There happened to be, and joy flared through me. In such a strange place, you never know what will happen, and you always want to be prepared. However, said joy soon faded away as I swung the door open, nearly falling into the abyss that awaited me. The drop seemed to be bottomless, despite the fact that there was a floor just behind me and the Briar Bay infirmary had no other stories aside from the first. I looked up and saw a window right at eye-level, letting me get a good look outside. The day had changed and late morning light was starting to filter in. I had to murr in thanks, seeing as I had spent a few hours in darkness. I knew, though, that I'd have to return to said pitch despair after I closed the door. Well, the closet was not an option, and I carefully stepped backward, closing the door behind me.
As I closed the door, I suddenly felt... alone. It was a strange feeling, really. I'd give anything to have someone here to talk to. Anybody. Even Arlen or Cassius would fit the bill. At least they'd be as nervous as I was. Something was probably going to jump around the corner at me, I knew. Maybe not in the nature of the monsters from my dreams, but something. Why expect the unexpected, you may argue? It's true. In reality, expecting it gets you no better off than if it had taken you by surprise; it would still be there, and you'd still need to deal with it. That was another thing! I really wanted a weapon. I mean, it would be unfortunate if some 'mon rounded the corner on me, but at least I would still have the right to defend myself, right? Seriously, any sane person who came to look at this place would agree that nothing added up in this equation. I sat down next to the bottomless room's door, and hugged my knees against my body. Alone... I felt like giving up. I felt foolish for leaving my ePhone back in the car, but it wouldn't help. I felt as though I were removed from reality and into some strange alternate zone of space.
I got up, deciding that feeling sorry for myself wouldn't help, and rounded the corner at one heck of a brisk pace. My flashlight was really helping here; despite it being late morning, there was no light in the building. There were no windows, there were no overhead lights, just foggy decrepit tomby darkness. The floorboards creaked under my weight rapidly and I stopped, and heard it; those were not my footsteps! Someone was coming at me! Someone may have been coming for me. With my mind made up, I gently melted into the wall near the corner, and lay in wait for the creature with my flashlight raised over my head, poised to swing. I could feel my entire frame shaking with anticipation, when the steps slowed down. Judging by how rapid they were, they belonged to a quadruped since they hit the floor in such succession. They'd be at me in three seconds. Two seconds. One second.
"Mister Upton?" My heart caught in my throat like a lump, and I brought the flashlight down to my paws. Yep, it was Arlen. I thought I dropped him off on Ryan? Did he walk all this way? And what about the corpse, then? It wasn't his? More questions and not a single answer. But if he called my name, perhaps he was willing to talk?
"Arlen? Arlen DuVall?" I had to make sure he wasn't a monster, so I backed away slowly, the flashlight trained directly on his pudgy furry face. His eyes were still slanted in hatred, and he must have taken this as an insult somehow. I didn't know anything, he didn't know anything, so I had hoped we were even at this point.
"Yeah, it's Arlen. And you're Wolfgang Upton, no duh. Look, I have some questions for you, adult. Answer truthfully." Whatever happened to the happy-go-lucky Bidoof I used to watch? Or was he only like that around his friends? "First one; what do you know about the present mythology?"
"Uh..." Mythology? What? Did I really look like someone who kept up with the presence of superbeings? I had more important things to do. "Well... according to my, ah, memory... Zangoose the Pokegod and Gyrados the same both raised each a lower-tier Pokemon for themselves... annnnd... um... Arceus came and corrected their mistakes? And Mew, his daughter, gave them both life, and thus two Pikachu were born, or something like that?"
"Mmhm, mmhm," Arlen said dismissively, waving a paw for emphasis, "yeah, yeah, yeah not that. I mean, what do you know about the Triad Universal Cult? I got a key from... a disclosed place, and it has inscriptions on it." The Bidoof pulled the key from the pack he'd been wearing on his back, and it was blue, unlike my green. I bent down to him, and tried to read what it said, but he had the liberty of explaining. "It says; the keeper of the Umberto Triad."
"What does that mean?"
"That would be why I'm asking you, Mister Upton. If you don't know..." He sat down on his rear, thinking. I thought too, for a second, because this was really trumping me. The Sigmund Triad? Was there something we were missing?
"I don't know," I confimed. "Hey, let's walk together. This place is really old and dangerous." Arlen looked up at me with those same dark eyes, but for a second, I saw a twinkle of fondness in them. We rounded the same corner he had come from, and a conversation had sparked up normally. We talked about anything and everything; books, Briar Bay, just whatever came to mind. I learned more about Arlen's domestic abuse, but not enough to make a case. It seemed I was somewhat right about Cassius' neglegence, but as far as I knew, it didn't go farther than verbal abuse. Arlen wanted to become an inventor in Eni-g'ste, and still wants to actually, but Cassius is overall unhappy with this decision. The family business was apparently talk show hosting, but since televisions were still in their primitive stages, even Arlen could tell that such a profession would be slow-going. I'm glad he wants to do something and be somebody, opposed to being a slob like Cassius. This is really what I wanted, someone else. Even a child.
We made our way to the hallway I had come from before, the one with the rusty steel door and the hole in the middle of the further hall. The steel door had been replaced with solid oak, and it looked shiny enough to believe it was safe. The coat of arms that had been previously on the knob of the door was now brightly plated on the face of it, and I walked over to it, placing a paw on the polished surface. Before, it was a bit too decayed to clearly make out. But I could see it clearly, and it had a yellow outline, and a red background. There were two intercrossing Gyrados with a golden Dratini in the middle, and at the bottom BRIAR BAY MEDICAL COMPLEX was written in giant bold letters. As I turned right, I saw that the hole was fixed, which was good. "Arlen, we're heading this way."
We made our way foreward, only to be blocked by some invisible force. It was if there was a wall there. But we could see the hallway stretch on in front of us! True to the nature of pantomimicry, we both placed a paw on the invisible wall, and it seemed to be solid. "Nevermind." We turned around, and I inserted Arlen's key into the knob. It turned easily, and we headed inside. Time seemed to pass on an unstable frequency in this place. The windows we passed showed nothing but pitch blackness and dusky solitude, despite it being early morning. The walls were moldy and green, as if ivy had spread over them like a cancer, despite the door being so shiny. The floor was actually okay, and it barely moved under our combined weight, so I figured we would get a moment of relief. We did, actually, because this hallway seemed to be exactly like the one I saw whilst running toward Cassius. This hallway did not, however, have any closets. Just a door all the way at the other side.
The door was left open, perhaps purposefully, and we discovered there was a small library inside of it. As we cleared the hallway and stepped inside of the padded, insulated room, I realized how hot I was. Arlen went straight to the ebony bookshelf that stared back at us, sniffing it a bit. The room was about as big as a small bedroom, with a small steel ladder going up for acess to the bookshelves at the second story. There was red carpet underfoot, and books of all colors lined the shelves. Normally, I like to read, but in this instance, I didn't think it would help at all. However, a small desk caught my eye. I slid over to it, sitting down at the impossibly small chair, and looked in the book that had been opened for what could only be just for my reading; The Umberto Triad. "Arlen! Hey, Arlen!"
"What, Mister Upton?," I heard the reply, tired and annoyed. He must have been enjoying his book. Nonetheless, I was too excited to care. And not excited as in; "WOW-EE-ZOWEE I GOT A NEW CAR" but more like the kind of unexplainable bad news excitement rush people get. Like when you learn you have cancer or something.
"Listen; the Umberto family was a family of nomads from the olde Hoenn region with a reputation with the occult. It is a documented fact that the olde human who owned the founder of the clan was actually a stark believer in a negative faith. Since the moving of the clan to Tergedelmys, they founded what would be the nicest haven on the new earth- Twilight Glen. Ever since the founding of the county, strange happenings have taken place ranging from murders, to rapes, to sacrifices, and everything in-between. The mysterious nature of Twlight Glen has never been solved, and anyone after the mystery has either died or vanished forever." I put the book down, because right now I was grinning like a maniac. This wasn't 'good news' per se, but it was a lead at least.
"Why are you grinning, Mister Upton?" I shook my head and closed the book, getting from the seat and sitting in a beanbag with books littering the floor around it.
"It's because I can't put together the clues. Alright; we have two keys with something involving the Umberto family. Okay, we know the Umberto clan founded Twilight Glen. But what does this mean? According to the tone of the book, it's a documentary. So, that means that they're all dead, right?"
"Not exactly, Upton," Arlen interjected, placing his book back on the shelf where he got it with some trouble, "they could always still be around. If it were an autobiography, it would be different." I didn't get it, really, but I didn't care. Even with Arlen's advice, the jigsaw was still astray, and it needed to be placed back together at once. The cool air of the room and the relatively mellow atmosphere of it should have to provide a haven for hard thought, but I was a bit too tired to deal with it.
"Well, whatever. Let's just get out of here." I grabbed the flashlight I'd set on the desk and fed more electricity into it. Arlen led the way out of the room, and I joined him to walk side-by-side with the child, directing the way with my light stick. It seemed all the mold and crust had gone away. No, all of it, seriously. The thick fog that clung to my legs was non-existant, and there were windows lining the hallways that showed the time of day; afternoon. It seemed the unnatural timeplane had fooled me into believing we had only spent a couple of hours in here, but really, half the day had passed. Which brought me back to something. "Arlen... how did you get here?"
"I don't know. I went home, wasn't much farther on Ryan from the hotel, and I went to my room. I got in the bed, went to sleep, and woke up here. My dad... I'm sure I heard my dad. He said... he said he loved me. But I didn't believe him, not until he kissed me and tossed himself into the boiler. I managed to drag him out by his tail, and 'it is inside' was inscripted into the flesh. So I reached inside of him and pulled out a key, and here I am."
"Wait! You mean you were in the Boiler House?" I've never been there. I've also heard grisly tales about the workers who used to work there, hence why it was shut down in the first place. The furnace was moved somewhere else, but I hadn't the time to worry about trivial things like that back then.
"Yeah. I was where I woke up."
"So... but wait, he can't be dead! Cassius- I met the guy! Just before I met you! That couldn't have been him. Besides, I saw a Bidoof corpse that looked just like you on a table. Cassius was trying to cut it open. For the key, of course." I didn't mind letting the last part slip, due to my dislike for the man, but he and Arlen lived together. In the end, I was not part of the family equation, and I knew I didn't need to try to put myself where I didn't belong. Though, Arlen and I could seriously have been father and son. The boy had a shield that couldn't be broken by most people, but once he let it down he was actually many things he didn't appear to be. His mind was much more of just a mere child's. He was intelligent, he was headstrong, but he let his feelings get in the way of his actions. He's also indecisive, and he doesn't like judging others without righteous confirmation. I was just too shy to plunge into him and take down that shield he wore, and I'm glad we got a chance to truly bond.
The next thing we knew, we'd already walked to the lobby I'd come in through, and everything was reverting back to normal. The blood and mold and glass was gone entirely, though there was still a small trace of mist on the ground. The floorboards were fixed, but all the doors were blocked off by cast-iron bars; the same door that held our escape. I walked over to it, not so much in 'disbelief' but moreso in anger. How?! Everything was fixed, right? But sure enough, when I put a paw to it, it was real. I used the flashlight to try and break it, but the head of the light broke off. Great. Now we were lightless. But we didn't need it anymore, really, since the natural light of the earth was filtering in through the recent addition of windows.
We walked further down the lobby, briskly getting through the hallway that I'd first seen. It expanded into another lobby complete with couches and fancy tables with built-in ashtrays. But cigarettes were human things, right? Well, wasn't gonna question it. Arlen walked over to a table and sniffed it tentatively, and his tail shot up instantly. "Dad!"
"You smell him?" Without the flashlight, I felt frail and weaponless. I mean, a bonk on the head would allow me some time to run past them, right? That scalpel should've helped, too, but it was long gone. The room was now dancing in yellow, and for a minute, I felt a nice sense of ambience. There were a few hallways that branched off from the lobby we were in, but I could that the doors were barred off. I assumed that the ones that were around the corner were likewise. I sat down, letting my back rest completely against the comfortable couch, and just exhaled a breath. Then, I felt a paw prod me.
"Mister Upton. That door. He's there." I opened my eyes, and saw it; waaay down a long hallway was a single shiny silver steel door, and it was unbarred. It was safe. It was our exit. I felt the pressures of this strange place come back, and could almost see it warp back to it's twisted self again. I was starting to feel alone again. Come to think of it, I've always been alone. My one son died at birth, and I've never held on to a true spouse. All by myself for as long as I could remember.
"Let's go." Arlen and I walked in dedicated silence the rest of the way. Everything was back to normal, nothing was out of place, and I was sure we were going to get out of here. No more fear, no more confinement. I could go back home and sleep all of this away forever. No, first, I'd tell the police about all of this. I'm sure I'd be thrown in the looney bin for it, yeah, but what with the Umberto Triad and all, some aspect of this seemed believeable. This was it, this was the end. The final chapter in this crazy acid trip of a story.
Or so I thought.
We swung the door open, and I expected a gust of fresh wind to come and take me away in it's cold touch, but instead got the same warm air as before. My small, pudgy body slunk into itself as I surveyed where we were. It seemed to be a large auditorium. We were facing a stage with velvety scarlet chairs bolted into the floor doing likewise. The floor was slick and marble, and to our left was a large swing-door. The light outside made me float over to it, and I was walked when Arlen grabbed my footpaw, tugging on it.
"Mister Upton, look." I turned with a stupid look on my face. The look that said, 'I'm done, let's leave into the sunset'. That look faded into... some undescribable face as I saw a Primape be lowered down into the middle of the stage, suspended by ropes and hooks in his skin. His never-ending screams were muffled by the black conducting tape he had around his mouth, and his squirming was painful to watch due to the blood it caused to pool down into his fur. Suddenly, two figures appeared from behind the giant red drape of a curtain before the stage. One was a Nidoking, wearing a black headsman's mask and a kevlar vest, and the other a Spinda, wearing a blue rainjacket with a green duffel bag of stuff in his small paw.
"Ahh... Wolfgang Upton and Arlen DuVall," said the Spinda, stretching his paw out in a welcoming gesture. "You're here."