Silence

This is an experiment. Please post your thoughts.

"Silence"

Darkest thundercloud rumbled angrily overhead as I raced across the prairie. Nothing but endlessly waving fronds of grass as far as the eye could see. Before me, my destination. An ancient farmhouse creaking in the wind.

A barn.

A house.

A metal windmill.

The later of these was spinning wildly as I approached. The rusty contraption's rattling was what had drawn me here in the first place. Or had it? I had the strangest feeling I'd been here before.

I walked up the the house, ignoring the front door. People weren't what I wanted, though I seriously doubted anyone lived here. The peeling paint and umkempt fields, the lack of animals, the general calm and quiet, it all spoke of abandonment.

And I'd been abandoned, too. Even the road I'd been traveling had forsaken me, leaving me lost in this monotonous backwater. No, the farmhouse proper wasnt' what I sought.

The cellar. It drew me. I pulled back the creaky double doors to reveal concrete steps leading into oblivion, into darkness. The fetid stench of dirt and decay immediately hit my nostrils, but I didn't shrink back from the musty odor. Rather I reached into the pocket of my bloodstained jeans and pulled out a flashlight.

My only possession.

Its beam guided me down the stairs and into a room filled with masonry jars. Their glass splintered my flashlight beam, scattering shadows and sunbeams alike. The jars were all disgusting., some filled with dusty water, some filled with black or green goop in varying states of rot. The cellar was huge, with shelves in rows that seemed to go on forever. The walls were thick with the endless toil of generation after generation of spiders, leaving cobwebs hanging everywhere.

As I walked, I heart a scuttling that nearly made my heart stop.

Rats?

I may have lied to you. I had two possessions. The second was a knife. I slowly pulled it from a clip on my belt and flicket it out, ready to fight if the need arose.

I'd forgotten to clean it. Still bloody. It wasn't a rat but a man that I found, behind a shelf. He stood at a work table, with his back to me. A variety of tools were strewn about on the floor. Most, like my knife, were bloodstained. The room had an odd smell here, more like gunpowder. On the table itself, were what looked like a chemist's set. A confusing array of beakers and bottles and tubing.

I thought I'd approached silently, but suddenly the man turned, and raised a finger to his lips. But he didn't speak. I opened my mouth to say something, but he shook his head emphatically, and raised a finger once more. Then the man ran off and grabbed three bottles off three different shelves and placed them on the table.

A bottle of blue liquid.

A bottle of green liquid.

A bottle of red liquid.

Then he backed off and gestured towards the table, as if inviting me to do something. Tired of playing games, I broke the silence. "What? I'm supposed to pick one?"

Instantly his eyes bugged out of his skull. He ran towards me, and wrapped his fingers around my throat. Strangling me. He was strangling me. I wanted to use my knife, but in my shock and confusion, I'd dropped it. All I could do now was try to push him away.


"NOISE!" he roared. "The human voice! It ruins everything!" All around us bottles began to shatter. He reached up and grabbed a bottle of brown goo that had survived all the explosions and smashed it over my head.

I fell backward, and before I knew what was happening, he was forcing some sort of thick, viscous black fluid down my throat. "I know you, killer," he said. I struggled a bit, but he had me as if in a vice. The man barely seemed to even be straining himself.

"I know your name..."he continued. "I know where where you come from and what you done. You coulda been forgiven for the man you murdered, but you ruined it. I'm going to send you back. Make the right choice this time. And keep your mouth shut!"

My eyelids began to close. I felt my conscious mind fading. "I know you...brother. We can fix this. We will fix this...if I have to send you back a hundred times. See you soon."

Far far above, into the sky, the last thing I heard was the sound of rain drumming on the roof of the farmhouse.

It was a humid day, but the wind was picking up. I was covered in sweat when I emerged from the forest and out into the world beyond. My clothes were bloodstained, but I didn't know why. I'd never been here before,but I walked as if on a path. As if with a destination already in mind, despite my lack of memories.

I soon left the forest behind. Good riddance, I thought to myself. I was glad to be free of it.

Darkest thundercloud rumbled angrily overhead as I raced across the prairie. Nothing but endlessly waving fronds of grass as far as the eye could see. Before me, my destination. An ancient farmhouse creaking in the wind.

A barn.

A house.

A metal windmill.

The later of these was spinning wildly as I approached. The rusty contraption's rattling was what had drawn me here in the first place. Or had it? I had the strangest feeling I'd been here before...