{ fic: "heaven give me say" - part v }
Title: Heaven Give Me Say
Chapter: Part V
Series: Young Justice / Silent Hill
Rating: R (violence, disturbing imagery)
Word Count: 5,028
Summary: In which the Young Justice team traverses the portals of reality and visits a small town called Silent Hill.
Note: Written for the yj_anon_meme. Loosely inspired by this prompt.
I am so, so unbelievably sorry for the delay! Real life and writer's block had me stuck for a bit, but hopefully the rest of this story is smooth sailing from here on out!
Also, there are numerous Stephen King references in this chapter. Silent Hill's already full of them, and I couldn't resist adding a few more. :)
Part I. checking in
Part II. abandoned streets
Part III. dank corridors
Part IV. that sick room
Heaven Give Me Say
V
(after closing time)
Midwich Elementary School is only a few blocks away from the apartment complex, but it takes them nearly an hour to get there. Many of the main streets have been blocked off, and they’ve been forced to navigate the gated alleyways between the buildings. This is easier said than done, considering the alleys are crawling with monsters. The dogs are the least of their worries, although they prove difficult to avoid.
Upon seeing the one of the emaciated dogs for the first time, M’gann lets out a scream, muffling it quickly. Fortunately, the creature is far enough down the street that it isn’t attracted to the sound. At a loss for words, the only thing she manages to gasp out is, “It does not look like it should be alive!” Conner merely grumbles that they’d better keep moving before dragging her down one of the alleys, Wally following reluctantly.
After her initial shock, though, M’gann does remarkably well at handling the creatures. The shadow babies - or so Wally’s started to think of the translucent, stumbling silhouettes as - are unnerving, to say the least, and the wriggling, armless figure they pass at one point causes his stomach to churn again, but M’gann remains composed. The child-like apparitions don’t seem to bother her, and she barely bats an eyelash at shuffling monster as they run past it, even though it’s inches away from them and separated only by a rusted chain-link fence. It lets out a terrible shriek, and a moment later Wally gets a whiff of something that smells like sulfur and burning metal. M’gann doesn’t miss a step, whereas Wally stumbles and nearly falls flat on his face. Superboy grabs his cowl and steadies him, and they continue to race down the winding, cramped path.
When they come out of the maze, they’re on another deserted street that looks just like the one they’d started on. For a moment, Wally has the terrible thought that they’ve gone in a circle and ended up right back where they’d started. However, a quick glance around shows that the Underwood Apartments are nowhere in sight, and he breathes a sigh of relief.
The other side of the street is lined with more stores. These too have been affected by the same change that’s overcome the rest of the town, but Wally can still make out the names written on the signs above the windows. The one farthest down to the right of them is the LIGHTING CO.; next to it is what looks like a pastry shop, although he’s almost certain it’s not jelly filling slathered all over the windows.
The third sign simply says SOUVENIRS - the irony of it might have made him laugh on any other mission, but on this one, it only unnerves him. Wally can see a rickety frame that might be a rack of postcards in the front window, along with several generic-looking t-shirts that say ‘I ♥ SILENT HILL’ along the front in bold, black letters. There’s also a large stuffed rabbit sitting in the storefront. It’s pink, wearing blue overalls, and its exaggerated, comical grin sends a shiver up Wally’s spine. He finds himself thinking that if Robin were here, the younger boy would make a joke about bringing the rabbit back to add to Wally’s collection.
Just like that, Robin’s absence hits him like a punch to the gut. It makes something in his chest constrict painfully, and for several seconds, he can’t breathe, overwhelmed with terror for his best friend. He doesn’t think he’ll want a souvenir from this trip.
“Look at that,” M’gann says, just loudly enough to shake Wally out of it. Taking another deep breath, he drags his gaze away from the stuffed rabbit’s vacant stare, instead looking in the direction M’gann’s pointing.
Most of the shops on their side of the street are boarded up, but there’s one that’s still occupied - or might have been, under normal circumstances. For a moment, Wally can’t believe his eyes, but even after he rubs at them, the words on the sign don’t change. It still reads RUSSELL FLANNIGAN’S GUN EMPORIUM. The door is plastered with other signs, which say things like LOW LOW PRICES EVERY DAY, NO QUESTIONS ASKED, NO LICENSE CHECKS HERE, and BETTER DEALS THAN YOU’LL FIND AT MELLOW GATES!! Under all the signs are two pictures: one of a large smiley face, and the second of what looks like an eye.
Despite the positive advertising, the shop looks like it’s seen better days. One of the front windows has been smashed in, and the same rust and blood mixture coating the rest of the town has spread inside. But from this angle, Wally can see the black glimmer of metal on the wall, and that’s all he needs to know before he steps out of the alley and heads towards the gun store.
The bell above the door rings dully as he pushes it open, repeating the sound twice more as M’gann and Conner follow him inside. The air in here tastes stale, but it’s not nearly as unpleasant as the apartments had been, which is probably a result of the window being open. Sure enough, the shelves are stocked - not fully, and plenty of the merchandise is scattered across the floor in pieces, but enough of the displays are still intact that Wally’s positive they’ll be able to find something useful.
He’s halfway down one of the aisles, looking at the rifles, when he realizes that the other two haven’t moved from the entrance. Frowning, Wally turns around to see M’gann staring at him warily. Conner’s standing behind her with his arms crossed, glaring at the firearms surrounding them with obvious mistrust.
“What?” Wally prompts, more than a little resentfully.
“I’m not so sure about this,” M’gann answers, glancing towards the rifles behind him.
“What?” he repeats, although this time, he’s just incredulous. “What’s not to be sure about?”
M’gann bites her lip, worrying it nervously with her teeth. “It’s just,” she starts, “have you ever actually used a gun? I haven’t, and I know Superboy hasn’t, so I don’t think now is the best time to start-”
“M’gann, no offense,” Wally interrupts, “but now is the perfect time. We’re stuck in a place that’s crawling with monsters that want to kill us, and we don’t have our powers.”
“Artemis and Robin-,” Superboy begins, irritated, but Wally cuts him off this time.
“-don’t have powers, right, but they do have weapons. We need guns,” he says seriously, but then he forces a laugh, hoping to relieve the sudden tension. “I mean, dude, come on. Haven’t you ever seen a zombie movie? Romero made it pretty clear that guns are the way to go!”
Both Superboy and M’gann are obviously confused by the reference, but the clone at least nods and seems to accept it as truth. M’gann still looks concerned, although some of the apprehension has faded from her expression.
“I guess you’re right... but what if someone gets hurt?” she asks, and this time her gaze drifts to the glass cases behind the front counter that hold the ammo. There’s a few certificates displayed alongside them, along with a sign of a dead pig wearing a police cap. The text at the bottom of it asks HOW’S YOUR PORK? Somehow, the humor goes over Wally’s head.
“Look at it this way,” Wally says exasperatedly, tearing his eyes away from the sign, “if one of us tries to go hand-to-hand with one of those dogs, we’re going to get hurt anyways.”
That seems to work for her, and although she doesn’t look entirely thrilled by the idea, she doesn’t protest anymore, not even when Wally grabs a shotgun from one of the shelves and hands it to her. It’s a sawed-off, and according to the tag it’s a resale, but it looks to be in working condition. M’gann shifts it from hand to hand, testing the weight of it as they watch her expectantly.
Eventually, she nods. “I can’t say I like it, but it’ll do,” she says, offering Wally an apologetic smile. He grins in return - that’s good enough for him.
“Great,” he replies. “Now let’s figure out how to load it.”
Superboy wanders off deeper into the store while he and M’gann spend the next few minutes examining the shotgun. It’s a pump-action, judging by the slide under the magazine. However, it doesn’t seem to have much room to load more than four cartridges at a time. Wally can already tell that the limited ammo is going to be a problem, and part of him wants to put this gun back on the shelf and find one that’ll carry more bullets (or at least one with a faster reloading time), but M’gann looks like she’s comfortable with the shotgun, so he figures they’ll just deal with it.
M’gann finds a few boxes of ammo behind the front counter that match the name on the gun’s tag, and they’re busy filling the magazine when Conner comes back. He isn’t holding a gun, but there’s a fireman’s axe clutched firmly in his hand. M’gann eyes the rust-coated blade cautiously, and Superboy frowns.
“What? The sign said ‘in case of emergency’ on it,” he grumbles, and Wally can’t stop himself from letting out a bark of laughter at that.
“It’s okay, Supey, I think it fits you,” he says cheekily. “I mean, I can’t see you waving around a pistol like some Gigantor cowboy.”
Conner only lifts an eyebrow in response, but Wally doesn’t care because he’s feeling better than he has in the past hour or so. The fact that they’re not going to be helpless when facing the monsters from here on out is doing a lot to reassure him; there’s a chance that this mission may not be total disaster.
He has to stop to remind himself that there never was a mission to begin with. Now, the only mission they have to worry about is getting home - alive, and preferably in one piece.
That thought isn’t nearly as comforting, and so Wally leaves the other two at the counter while he goes to find a weapon of his own. There’s a wide selection to choose from; in fact, he’s pretty sure that it isn’t legal to sell some of these guns in this country, at least not to civilians. And especially not in some backwater resort town on the east coast, where the only guns you’d need out here are for hunting.
“Well, I guess this is kind of like hunting,” Wally mutters to himself, but even that humor tastes dry in his mouth.
In the end, he picks out a compact submachine gun. The reloading time is a lot faster than the sawed-off, so he figures he’ll be able to cover M’gann while she’s reloading her gun. Even so, he grabs a Glock 20 as he passes the handgun display on his way back to the front of the store; it won’t hurt to have a back-up if something goes wrong with one of their guns.
They take a few more minutes to load those guns, making sure to stuff as much extra ammunition into the backpack as they can. Superboy shoulders it without a word.
“Sure you can manage that?” Wally says. He tries to make it obvious that he’s teasing, but apparently he’s the only one feeling better now, because Conner glares and brushes past him. The bell jingles again as he opens the door and walks out, axe in hand.
“Sheesh, what’s eating him?” he grumbles, but M’gann only shrugs in response as they follow Conner outside.
Nothing has changed. The buildings are still coated in the same rusty facade, and the same blood-tinted mist curls around their feet, shifting as they start walking. Wally can hear dogs barking nearby, maybe a block or two over; it’s still unsettling, but it doesn’t scare him like it had before, not with the comforting weight of the gun in his hand.
That comfort lasts just long enough for him to glance across the street.
The other storefronts are the same as they had been earlier - except it looks like a bomb has gone off in the souvenir shop. The glass is blown out, scattered over the pavement, and the inside of the store is in disarray. Shelves have been smashed and knocked over, merchandise is strewn about, and there’s the start of a fire crackling in one of the far-left aisles. The store sign has the words HA HA HA! scrawled over it, and by this point, Wally’s been here long enough to know that the garish red letters are written in blood.
The stuffed rabbit is still sitting in the window, only now, it’s fur is mottled, the overalls torn, and its face is smeared with crimson, drawing upwards from the corners of its mouth into a terrifying grin.
He doesn’t realized that he’s frozen until M’gann’s voice reaches him, accompanied by a gentle tug on his hand. “Wally? We have to go, the school’s just up ahead.”
“Yeah,” he says, giving himself a slight shake. It doesn’t help. “Yeah, let’s go.”
It takes a great deal of effort to drag his gaze away from the rabbit, and even when they’re halfway down the street, he knows it’s still watching them.
--
(scuttle in the dark)
A pack of dogs is waiting for them when they round the corner onto Midwich Street. There isn’t anything to hide behind on their side of the street; wordlessly, the three of them freeze, clearly hoping that if they stay still, the dogs won’t notice them right away.
So far, they’ve managed to keep a distance from the dogs while navigating the town. Before now, the only time Wally’s gotten this close to them was when he’d first found Superboy. These dogs are somehow much more hideous than the ones that Conner had taken care of earlier, despite looking nearly identical, and it takes Wally a second or two to realize that it’s because of how they move.
The dogs are prowling back and forth across the street, weaving erratically between a pair of abandoned cars and several knocked-over trashcans. Their legs twitch as if they can’t really control them, which causes their bodies to spasm and jerk in ways that make him cringe instinctually. The leathery, rotted skin stretched over their emaciated forms doesn’t seem to fit right, as if their bones will tear through the thin hides at any moment. Their breathing is strange and raspy, like they’re dehydrated, or like every inhalation requires tremendous effort.
Not to mention there’s five of them.
“Guess they don’t look better alive after all,” Wally mutters, but he regrets it immediately when the closest dog perks its head up and starts growling as soon as it sees them. The other four are quick to join in, attracted by the sound, and he barely has time to lift up the machine gun before all five dogs are barreling towards them at a clumsy, frenetic gait, barking and frothing at the mouth.
The next three minutes pass in a blur that Wally isn’t certain he’d be able to navigate even with his super speed.
Without making the conscious decision, he feels himself depressing the trigger of the machine gun as one of the dogs charges at him. The gun bucks in his hand, jerking as it sprays bullets in a wide arc. The dog lets out a shrill yelp and stumbles, falling to the ground in a twitching heap.
Two of the dogs come at them from the side and duck past the range of Wally’s gun to target Superboy and M’gann. Wally trails the dog on his left, catching it in its haunch so that it staggers. M’gann’s shotgun goes off, followed by a gurgling sound of pain, and he hears a thud as the other creature falls.
Conner charges forward to meet the dog as it continues to drag itself towards him, its left hind leg dangling uselessly behind it. He swings the axe and embeds it in the dog’s side, pinning it to the ground. His booted foot comes to land on its rib cage, and the splintering sound of ribs shattering is echoed by M’gann’s shotgun as she fires at the two remaining dogs.
One goes down with a howl, blood and brain matter streaming from the exit wound in the back of its skull. It collapses mid-run, and the dog behind it trips over the body, giving M’gann just enough time to shoot it twice in the chest. Its legs buckle and it sags over its companion, and the street abruptly returns to that eerie silence as if nothing had happened.
Wally swallows thickly and tries to calm his heart, which is racing as if he’d just run a marathon - a coast-to-coast marathon, maybe. His ears are ringing from the gunfire. M’gann seems to be in a similar state; she has yet to lower the shotgun, and it’s a good thing that the chamber’s empty because she jumps when Superboy splits open the dog’s chest cavity to withdraw his axe.
Making sure his own gun’s safety is on, Wally carefully takes the shotgun from her. She goes to Conner’s side, and he wraps an arm around her shoulders while Wally reloads the gun. He can feel his adrenaline slowly easing away, but he’s still in a state of high-alert. To his credit, though, he manages not to start when Superboy’s voice cuts through the silence.
“The school’s right there,” he says, inclining his head in the direction the dogs had come from.
Wally follows his gaze, and sure enough, Midwich Elementary is looming at the end of the street. Even from here, he can make out the rusted exterior of the building. It’s set back from the road and surrounded by an iron fence. Nothing about it looks remotely inviting, but he’s not exactly expecting a warm welcome from any place in this town.
“Man, and I thought Keystone High was a hellhole.” Wally hands the shotgun back to M’gann; his attempt at humor wins a strained smile from her, so he considers that an accomplishment.
After that, they’re able to move a lot faster. Not having to hide or avoid every creature they come across is making up for some of their lost time - Wally only hopes it’ll be enough and not a case of too little, too late.
One of the flying monsters attacks them when they’re half a block away from the school, announcing its presence with a prehistoric squawk. Wally brings it down with a round of fire from the submachine gun, and Superboy finishes it off with the axe. They reach the driveway leading to the school in a matter of minutes, and fortunately, nothing appears to stop them from making their way up the stone steps that lead to a pair of large wooden doors.
The doors are heavy, and the hinges have long-since stopped working properly, but Conner manages to wrench one of them open. They proceed inside, and Wally immediately regrets not grabbing the flashlight when they were escaping the apartment.
There’s just enough light coming from the half-open door to reveal the interior of the school. It’s similar to the apartment complex, but somehow it’s twice as unnerving. The floor is made up of corroded grates, criss-crossing over each other in a wicked latticework. A large fan takes up most of the wall facing them. Its blades turn slowly with a harsh grinding noise that makes Wally’s hair stand on end. The hallway to the right has been blocked off by a fence; it’s too dark to see where the left hall leads.
As Wally watches, a bug the size of his head crawls across the floor and darts between the blades of the fan, disappearing into the shadows on the other side. He can hear more of them, their many legs making metallic clicking noises against the grates as they scuttle around in the darkness.
“What should we do?” M’gann whispers. She doesn’t sound eager to explore this place without being able to see anything, and frankly, Wally can’t blame her. While not having to see their atrocious surroundings wouldn’t be something he’d necessarily object to, it’d be far too dangerous. There’s no telling what’s lurking in this place - and after seeing that pyramid thing in the apartment, Wally doesn’t want to take any chances.
Before he can suggest they turn around and wait outside, Superboy’s moving towards a desk on their left. It looks like it’s in a severe state of decay, and the surface is covered with wriggling, succulent maggots. Several of them implode as he watches, first expanding before shrinking rapidly as if being sucked dry. He can see what attracted Conner’s attention, though: there’s something glowing under the maggots, flickering faintly so that their writhing bodies look like churning embers atop a fire.
Conner reaches out and starts brushing the maggots off the desk, ignoring M’gann’s choked cry of warning. Wally finds himself trying not to lose his lunch again, but then Superboy unearths an object from the squirming horde and his nausea is promptly forgotten.
It’s one of the team’s flashlights. The ones they’d had with them back in the mill.
The beam is inconsistent at first, but when Superboy hits it against his hand, it evens out. The battery hasn’t drained yet, meaning it can’t have been here for long. No longer than an hour, if that, and while time moves strangely in this town, that’s not enough time to get very far.
An unbidden hope blossoms in his chest, and a second later he’s calling Robin’s name at the top of his lungs. He gets it out twice before M’gann slaps a hand over his mouth, her orange eyes wide and frantic.
“Wally, no!” she hisses, “There might be more here than just our friends!”
The image of the pyramid creature rises again in his mind; a chill runs through him, his voice dying in his throat. The darkness around them suddenly seems twice as menacing, and if he’s not mistaken, the scuttling noises of the bugs have doubled. In his peripheral vision, he catches two of them making their way down the wall to the right, weaving frenetic circles around each other. Three more follow, their communicators giving little bursts of static as more and more bugs appear.
“Come on,” Superboy says, and they hastily head down the left hall, Conner leading them with the flashlight.
As they round the corner, they’re immediately met with the sight of two dead bodies strung up on either side of a blood-stained door. Both corpses are bound in canvas, with wire contraptions imbedded in their gaping mouths. M’gann reels backwards when the smell of rotting flesh hits them, and they turn to their right, intending to continue down the hallway.
Another large gate’s blocking off their path, spanning from the floor to the ceiling. There’s no way past it, short of trying to saw through the chain-link with Superboy’s axe, but the static from their communicators is growing louder, and Wally can hear the clinking of the insects getting closer - it sounds like there’s a swarm of them now. They’re forced to turn around and race back down the hall, and sure enough, the bugs are streaming in from the lobby, piling over one another in a chattering flood. He forgets about the machine gun; he wouldn’t even know where to start shooting anyways.
They’re trapped, they’re completely trapped, trapped by a fence and some bugs and Robin could be here and he’d kill Wally if he found out he got himself eaten by giant cockroaches -
M’gann shoves him aside roughly, darting by the suspended bodies to a door tucked into the back corner of the hallway. Wally hadn’t even seen it earlier, but he follows her blindly. She pushes it open, and he barely catches sight of the sign hanging next to the frame that says WOMEN before he’s going through it, too.
The door slams shut behind Superboy and sure enough, they’re in a women’s bathroom. Another dead end.
“Great, now we’re really trapped,” Wally moans. There’s blood dripping from one of the faucets; the basin is overflowing with it.
“Just hold on,” M’gann assures him, staring at the door warily. Superboy is going to each of the stalls, kicking the doors open to presumably make sure there isn’t anything else in here with them. He comes back soon enough, apparently satisfied that the room is clear.
They wait. The seconds tick by, and then the minutes. Eventually, the scuttling noises outside the door fade away, and they’re left with only the ominous clanking and scraping sounds coming from deep within the building.
M’gann makes them wait another minute or two just to be safe, and when Conner opens the door after she gives the signal, the hallway is empty.
It’s also an entirely different hallway, but Wally’s not one to look a gift horse in the mouth.
There’s no fence blocking the hall here, so they head in that direction, proceeding with as much caution as possible and taking care to tread lightly so that their footsteps don’t echo on the metal grating.
The flashlight beam travels back and forth, falling over molded paneling and slow-turning fans and an abandoned wheelchair sitting stationary against the far wall. The sight of it is horribly unnerving, and Wally tells himself to stop being an idiot, it’s just a wheelchair - but he skirts around it nevertheless.
After turning the corner, they start trying doors again, just as they had in the apartment complex. He tries not to, but with every new door, that same sense of hope from before fills his chest, only to deflate when the room is empty - or, in most cases, when the doorknob doesn’t even turn. Most of what they find are locker rooms, the metallic fronts coated with rust and, of course, a generous helping of blood. One locker in particular is standing open, the insides covered with blood and bits of fur.
Eventually, they come to a room that has four large desks shoved together in the center of it, although Wally thinks they look more like operating tables. A row of lockers lines the right wall, and there’s a small, child-sized chair next to the desks, the seat of it splattered with fresh, crimson liquid.
There are three bright blue rotary telephones sitting on the desks. One is missing the receiver.
Upon seeing the phones, M’gann lets out a moan of dismay and lifts a hand to press against her forehead. “Nothing here makes any sense!”
“We know they’re here,” Superboy says, glancing down at the flashlight he’s holding. “We just have to find them.” He backs up towards the door, apparently dismissing the telephones as useless.
Wally’s about to turn and follow them, but then the phone closest to him starts ringing and he’s picking it up on impulse.
“Hello?” he asks, and he feels ridiculous because this is such a horror movie cliche. He’ll hear heavy breathing on the other end, maybe a creepy chuckle, then the other person will hang up and -
“Wally-help me-”
It’s Robin’s voice.
“-Wally-where are you-?”
“Robin!” Wally shouts into the receiver, but then the phone goes dead and the repetitive beeping of the disconnect tone pulsates in his ear.
Three things happen in rapid succession.
The flashlight flickers weakly and dies, and a moment later, the air raid siren from earlier blares through the school. It rings through his head, the shadows becoming oppressive, and again he feels like he’s suffocating, the darkness crushing him from every side. His hand lashes out, closing around M’gann’s arm, and he can only hope that she’s managed to grab a hold of Conner.
By the time it stops, he’s doubled over on the floor, the telephone receiver dangling off the edge of the desk. A dial tone is coming from it, but someone is yelling out in the hallway and it takes him a second to realize that he recognizes the voice.
“Wally! Hey, you idiot, I know I heard you!”
Artemis.
“Wally! I swear, if you’re still on the other side I’m going to kill you-!”
M’gann manages to push herself up first. She sounds hoarse and close to tears with relief when she calls out. “Artemis! We’re in here!”
“Kaldur! Over here, they’re in this room!”
The archer is closer now. Wally barely has enough time to look around the room to find that it’s transformed, reverting back to a relatively normal decor. The blood is gone from the lockers, and the only thing coating the desks are cobwebs. M’gann’s on her feet and helping Superboy up, both the shotgun and axe lying abandoned on the cement floor. Outside, the fog seems to have return, casting just enough luminescence through the dirty window that they can see without the flashlight.
Then the door is being thrown open, and Artemis is standing there with Kaldur right behind her. Both look more than a little worse for wear; their uniforms are ragged and torn, covered with grime and a few substances that Wally doesn’t want to think about. Artemis has a deep gash on her right shoulder and there are claw marks close to Kaldur’s gills and on one of his cheeks, but they’re alive. Bruised and wounded and tired, but alive.
And there’s no one else with them.
It feels like he can’t get enough air all of a sudden. Artemis comes straight to him and awkwardly embraces him with her left arm; he returns it long enough to verify that yes, she’s here and she’s alright. But then he grips her uninjured shoulder and pulls back, and he has to force the words out because he’s so afraid of what the answer will be.
“Robin’s not with you?” he asks, but the hope he’s been feeling since they’d found the flashlight is already draining away before he even finishes the question.
Artemis’s expression falls, and her eyes dart around to finally take account of the three of them. Comprehension dawns on her face.
“No,” she says, swallowing audibly. “We thought he was with you.”
Wally feels a sickening sensation in his stomach as he realizes that wherever he is, Robin’s alone.
Chapter: Part V
Series: Young Justice / Silent Hill
Rating: R (violence, disturbing imagery)
Word Count: 5,028
Summary: In which the Young Justice team traverses the portals of reality and visits a small town called Silent Hill.
Note: Written for the yj_anon_meme. Loosely inspired by this prompt.
I am so, so unbelievably sorry for the delay! Real life and writer's block had me stuck for a bit, but hopefully the rest of this story is smooth sailing from here on out!
Also, there are numerous Stephen King references in this chapter. Silent Hill's already full of them, and I couldn't resist adding a few more. :)
Part I. checking in
Part II. abandoned streets
Part III. dank corridors
Part IV. that sick room
Heaven Give Me Say
V
(after closing time)
Midwich Elementary School is only a few blocks away from the apartment complex, but it takes them nearly an hour to get there. Many of the main streets have been blocked off, and they’ve been forced to navigate the gated alleyways between the buildings. This is easier said than done, considering the alleys are crawling with monsters. The dogs are the least of their worries, although they prove difficult to avoid.
Upon seeing the one of the emaciated dogs for the first time, M’gann lets out a scream, muffling it quickly. Fortunately, the creature is far enough down the street that it isn’t attracted to the sound. At a loss for words, the only thing she manages to gasp out is, “It does not look like it should be alive!” Conner merely grumbles that they’d better keep moving before dragging her down one of the alleys, Wally following reluctantly.
After her initial shock, though, M’gann does remarkably well at handling the creatures. The shadow babies - or so Wally’s started to think of the translucent, stumbling silhouettes as - are unnerving, to say the least, and the wriggling, armless figure they pass at one point causes his stomach to churn again, but M’gann remains composed. The child-like apparitions don’t seem to bother her, and she barely bats an eyelash at shuffling monster as they run past it, even though it’s inches away from them and separated only by a rusted chain-link fence. It lets out a terrible shriek, and a moment later Wally gets a whiff of something that smells like sulfur and burning metal. M’gann doesn’t miss a step, whereas Wally stumbles and nearly falls flat on his face. Superboy grabs his cowl and steadies him, and they continue to race down the winding, cramped path.
When they come out of the maze, they’re on another deserted street that looks just like the one they’d started on. For a moment, Wally has the terrible thought that they’ve gone in a circle and ended up right back where they’d started. However, a quick glance around shows that the Underwood Apartments are nowhere in sight, and he breathes a sigh of relief.
The other side of the street is lined with more stores. These too have been affected by the same change that’s overcome the rest of the town, but Wally can still make out the names written on the signs above the windows. The one farthest down to the right of them is the LIGHTING CO.; next to it is what looks like a pastry shop, although he’s almost certain it’s not jelly filling slathered all over the windows.
The third sign simply says SOUVENIRS - the irony of it might have made him laugh on any other mission, but on this one, it only unnerves him. Wally can see a rickety frame that might be a rack of postcards in the front window, along with several generic-looking t-shirts that say ‘I ♥ SILENT HILL’ along the front in bold, black letters. There’s also a large stuffed rabbit sitting in the storefront. It’s pink, wearing blue overalls, and its exaggerated, comical grin sends a shiver up Wally’s spine. He finds himself thinking that if Robin were here, the younger boy would make a joke about bringing the rabbit back to add to Wally’s collection.
Just like that, Robin’s absence hits him like a punch to the gut. It makes something in his chest constrict painfully, and for several seconds, he can’t breathe, overwhelmed with terror for his best friend. He doesn’t think he’ll want a souvenir from this trip.
“Look at that,” M’gann says, just loudly enough to shake Wally out of it. Taking another deep breath, he drags his gaze away from the stuffed rabbit’s vacant stare, instead looking in the direction M’gann’s pointing.
Most of the shops on their side of the street are boarded up, but there’s one that’s still occupied - or might have been, under normal circumstances. For a moment, Wally can’t believe his eyes, but even after he rubs at them, the words on the sign don’t change. It still reads RUSSELL FLANNIGAN’S GUN EMPORIUM. The door is plastered with other signs, which say things like LOW LOW PRICES EVERY DAY, NO QUESTIONS ASKED, NO LICENSE CHECKS HERE, and BETTER DEALS THAN YOU’LL FIND AT MELLOW GATES!! Under all the signs are two pictures: one of a large smiley face, and the second of what looks like an eye.
Despite the positive advertising, the shop looks like it’s seen better days. One of the front windows has been smashed in, and the same rust and blood mixture coating the rest of the town has spread inside. But from this angle, Wally can see the black glimmer of metal on the wall, and that’s all he needs to know before he steps out of the alley and heads towards the gun store.
The bell above the door rings dully as he pushes it open, repeating the sound twice more as M’gann and Conner follow him inside. The air in here tastes stale, but it’s not nearly as unpleasant as the apartments had been, which is probably a result of the window being open. Sure enough, the shelves are stocked - not fully, and plenty of the merchandise is scattered across the floor in pieces, but enough of the displays are still intact that Wally’s positive they’ll be able to find something useful.
He’s halfway down one of the aisles, looking at the rifles, when he realizes that the other two haven’t moved from the entrance. Frowning, Wally turns around to see M’gann staring at him warily. Conner’s standing behind her with his arms crossed, glaring at the firearms surrounding them with obvious mistrust.
“What?” Wally prompts, more than a little resentfully.
“I’m not so sure about this,” M’gann answers, glancing towards the rifles behind him.
“What?” he repeats, although this time, he’s just incredulous. “What’s not to be sure about?”
M’gann bites her lip, worrying it nervously with her teeth. “It’s just,” she starts, “have you ever actually used a gun? I haven’t, and I know Superboy hasn’t, so I don’t think now is the best time to start-”
“M’gann, no offense,” Wally interrupts, “but now is the perfect time. We’re stuck in a place that’s crawling with monsters that want to kill us, and we don’t have our powers.”
“Artemis and Robin-,” Superboy begins, irritated, but Wally cuts him off this time.
“-don’t have powers, right, but they do have weapons. We need guns,” he says seriously, but then he forces a laugh, hoping to relieve the sudden tension. “I mean, dude, come on. Haven’t you ever seen a zombie movie? Romero made it pretty clear that guns are the way to go!”
Both Superboy and M’gann are obviously confused by the reference, but the clone at least nods and seems to accept it as truth. M’gann still looks concerned, although some of the apprehension has faded from her expression.
“I guess you’re right... but what if someone gets hurt?” she asks, and this time her gaze drifts to the glass cases behind the front counter that hold the ammo. There’s a few certificates displayed alongside them, along with a sign of a dead pig wearing a police cap. The text at the bottom of it asks HOW’S YOUR PORK? Somehow, the humor goes over Wally’s head.
“Look at it this way,” Wally says exasperatedly, tearing his eyes away from the sign, “if one of us tries to go hand-to-hand with one of those dogs, we’re going to get hurt anyways.”
That seems to work for her, and although she doesn’t look entirely thrilled by the idea, she doesn’t protest anymore, not even when Wally grabs a shotgun from one of the shelves and hands it to her. It’s a sawed-off, and according to the tag it’s a resale, but it looks to be in working condition. M’gann shifts it from hand to hand, testing the weight of it as they watch her expectantly.
Eventually, she nods. “I can’t say I like it, but it’ll do,” she says, offering Wally an apologetic smile. He grins in return - that’s good enough for him.
“Great,” he replies. “Now let’s figure out how to load it.”
Superboy wanders off deeper into the store while he and M’gann spend the next few minutes examining the shotgun. It’s a pump-action, judging by the slide under the magazine. However, it doesn’t seem to have much room to load more than four cartridges at a time. Wally can already tell that the limited ammo is going to be a problem, and part of him wants to put this gun back on the shelf and find one that’ll carry more bullets (or at least one with a faster reloading time), but M’gann looks like she’s comfortable with the shotgun, so he figures they’ll just deal with it.
M’gann finds a few boxes of ammo behind the front counter that match the name on the gun’s tag, and they’re busy filling the magazine when Conner comes back. He isn’t holding a gun, but there’s a fireman’s axe clutched firmly in his hand. M’gann eyes the rust-coated blade cautiously, and Superboy frowns.
“What? The sign said ‘in case of emergency’ on it,” he grumbles, and Wally can’t stop himself from letting out a bark of laughter at that.
“It’s okay, Supey, I think it fits you,” he says cheekily. “I mean, I can’t see you waving around a pistol like some Gigantor cowboy.”
Conner only lifts an eyebrow in response, but Wally doesn’t care because he’s feeling better than he has in the past hour or so. The fact that they’re not going to be helpless when facing the monsters from here on out is doing a lot to reassure him; there’s a chance that this mission may not be total disaster.
He has to stop to remind himself that there never was a mission to begin with. Now, the only mission they have to worry about is getting home - alive, and preferably in one piece.
That thought isn’t nearly as comforting, and so Wally leaves the other two at the counter while he goes to find a weapon of his own. There’s a wide selection to choose from; in fact, he’s pretty sure that it isn’t legal to sell some of these guns in this country, at least not to civilians. And especially not in some backwater resort town on the east coast, where the only guns you’d need out here are for hunting.
“Well, I guess this is kind of like hunting,” Wally mutters to himself, but even that humor tastes dry in his mouth.
In the end, he picks out a compact submachine gun. The reloading time is a lot faster than the sawed-off, so he figures he’ll be able to cover M’gann while she’s reloading her gun. Even so, he grabs a Glock 20 as he passes the handgun display on his way back to the front of the store; it won’t hurt to have a back-up if something goes wrong with one of their guns.
They take a few more minutes to load those guns, making sure to stuff as much extra ammunition into the backpack as they can. Superboy shoulders it without a word.
“Sure you can manage that?” Wally says. He tries to make it obvious that he’s teasing, but apparently he’s the only one feeling better now, because Conner glares and brushes past him. The bell jingles again as he opens the door and walks out, axe in hand.
“Sheesh, what’s eating him?” he grumbles, but M’gann only shrugs in response as they follow Conner outside.
Nothing has changed. The buildings are still coated in the same rusty facade, and the same blood-tinted mist curls around their feet, shifting as they start walking. Wally can hear dogs barking nearby, maybe a block or two over; it’s still unsettling, but it doesn’t scare him like it had before, not with the comforting weight of the gun in his hand.
That comfort lasts just long enough for him to glance across the street.
The other storefronts are the same as they had been earlier - except it looks like a bomb has gone off in the souvenir shop. The glass is blown out, scattered over the pavement, and the inside of the store is in disarray. Shelves have been smashed and knocked over, merchandise is strewn about, and there’s the start of a fire crackling in one of the far-left aisles. The store sign has the words HA HA HA! scrawled over it, and by this point, Wally’s been here long enough to know that the garish red letters are written in blood.
The stuffed rabbit is still sitting in the window, only now, it’s fur is mottled, the overalls torn, and its face is smeared with crimson, drawing upwards from the corners of its mouth into a terrifying grin.
He doesn’t realized that he’s frozen until M’gann’s voice reaches him, accompanied by a gentle tug on his hand. “Wally? We have to go, the school’s just up ahead.”
“Yeah,” he says, giving himself a slight shake. It doesn’t help. “Yeah, let’s go.”
It takes a great deal of effort to drag his gaze away from the rabbit, and even when they’re halfway down the street, he knows it’s still watching them.
--
(scuttle in the dark)
A pack of dogs is waiting for them when they round the corner onto Midwich Street. There isn’t anything to hide behind on their side of the street; wordlessly, the three of them freeze, clearly hoping that if they stay still, the dogs won’t notice them right away.
So far, they’ve managed to keep a distance from the dogs while navigating the town. Before now, the only time Wally’s gotten this close to them was when he’d first found Superboy. These dogs are somehow much more hideous than the ones that Conner had taken care of earlier, despite looking nearly identical, and it takes Wally a second or two to realize that it’s because of how they move.
The dogs are prowling back and forth across the street, weaving erratically between a pair of abandoned cars and several knocked-over trashcans. Their legs twitch as if they can’t really control them, which causes their bodies to spasm and jerk in ways that make him cringe instinctually. The leathery, rotted skin stretched over their emaciated forms doesn’t seem to fit right, as if their bones will tear through the thin hides at any moment. Their breathing is strange and raspy, like they’re dehydrated, or like every inhalation requires tremendous effort.
Not to mention there’s five of them.
“Guess they don’t look better alive after all,” Wally mutters, but he regrets it immediately when the closest dog perks its head up and starts growling as soon as it sees them. The other four are quick to join in, attracted by the sound, and he barely has time to lift up the machine gun before all five dogs are barreling towards them at a clumsy, frenetic gait, barking and frothing at the mouth.
The next three minutes pass in a blur that Wally isn’t certain he’d be able to navigate even with his super speed.
Without making the conscious decision, he feels himself depressing the trigger of the machine gun as one of the dogs charges at him. The gun bucks in his hand, jerking as it sprays bullets in a wide arc. The dog lets out a shrill yelp and stumbles, falling to the ground in a twitching heap.
Two of the dogs come at them from the side and duck past the range of Wally’s gun to target Superboy and M’gann. Wally trails the dog on his left, catching it in its haunch so that it staggers. M’gann’s shotgun goes off, followed by a gurgling sound of pain, and he hears a thud as the other creature falls.
Conner charges forward to meet the dog as it continues to drag itself towards him, its left hind leg dangling uselessly behind it. He swings the axe and embeds it in the dog’s side, pinning it to the ground. His booted foot comes to land on its rib cage, and the splintering sound of ribs shattering is echoed by M’gann’s shotgun as she fires at the two remaining dogs.
One goes down with a howl, blood and brain matter streaming from the exit wound in the back of its skull. It collapses mid-run, and the dog behind it trips over the body, giving M’gann just enough time to shoot it twice in the chest. Its legs buckle and it sags over its companion, and the street abruptly returns to that eerie silence as if nothing had happened.
Wally swallows thickly and tries to calm his heart, which is racing as if he’d just run a marathon - a coast-to-coast marathon, maybe. His ears are ringing from the gunfire. M’gann seems to be in a similar state; she has yet to lower the shotgun, and it’s a good thing that the chamber’s empty because she jumps when Superboy splits open the dog’s chest cavity to withdraw his axe.
Making sure his own gun’s safety is on, Wally carefully takes the shotgun from her. She goes to Conner’s side, and he wraps an arm around her shoulders while Wally reloads the gun. He can feel his adrenaline slowly easing away, but he’s still in a state of high-alert. To his credit, though, he manages not to start when Superboy’s voice cuts through the silence.
“The school’s right there,” he says, inclining his head in the direction the dogs had come from.
Wally follows his gaze, and sure enough, Midwich Elementary is looming at the end of the street. Even from here, he can make out the rusted exterior of the building. It’s set back from the road and surrounded by an iron fence. Nothing about it looks remotely inviting, but he’s not exactly expecting a warm welcome from any place in this town.
“Man, and I thought Keystone High was a hellhole.” Wally hands the shotgun back to M’gann; his attempt at humor wins a strained smile from her, so he considers that an accomplishment.
After that, they’re able to move a lot faster. Not having to hide or avoid every creature they come across is making up for some of their lost time - Wally only hopes it’ll be enough and not a case of too little, too late.
One of the flying monsters attacks them when they’re half a block away from the school, announcing its presence with a prehistoric squawk. Wally brings it down with a round of fire from the submachine gun, and Superboy finishes it off with the axe. They reach the driveway leading to the school in a matter of minutes, and fortunately, nothing appears to stop them from making their way up the stone steps that lead to a pair of large wooden doors.
The doors are heavy, and the hinges have long-since stopped working properly, but Conner manages to wrench one of them open. They proceed inside, and Wally immediately regrets not grabbing the flashlight when they were escaping the apartment.
There’s just enough light coming from the half-open door to reveal the interior of the school. It’s similar to the apartment complex, but somehow it’s twice as unnerving. The floor is made up of corroded grates, criss-crossing over each other in a wicked latticework. A large fan takes up most of the wall facing them. Its blades turn slowly with a harsh grinding noise that makes Wally’s hair stand on end. The hallway to the right has been blocked off by a fence; it’s too dark to see where the left hall leads.
As Wally watches, a bug the size of his head crawls across the floor and darts between the blades of the fan, disappearing into the shadows on the other side. He can hear more of them, their many legs making metallic clicking noises against the grates as they scuttle around in the darkness.
“What should we do?” M’gann whispers. She doesn’t sound eager to explore this place without being able to see anything, and frankly, Wally can’t blame her. While not having to see their atrocious surroundings wouldn’t be something he’d necessarily object to, it’d be far too dangerous. There’s no telling what’s lurking in this place - and after seeing that pyramid thing in the apartment, Wally doesn’t want to take any chances.
Before he can suggest they turn around and wait outside, Superboy’s moving towards a desk on their left. It looks like it’s in a severe state of decay, and the surface is covered with wriggling, succulent maggots. Several of them implode as he watches, first expanding before shrinking rapidly as if being sucked dry. He can see what attracted Conner’s attention, though: there’s something glowing under the maggots, flickering faintly so that their writhing bodies look like churning embers atop a fire.
Conner reaches out and starts brushing the maggots off the desk, ignoring M’gann’s choked cry of warning. Wally finds himself trying not to lose his lunch again, but then Superboy unearths an object from the squirming horde and his nausea is promptly forgotten.
It’s one of the team’s flashlights. The ones they’d had with them back in the mill.
The beam is inconsistent at first, but when Superboy hits it against his hand, it evens out. The battery hasn’t drained yet, meaning it can’t have been here for long. No longer than an hour, if that, and while time moves strangely in this town, that’s not enough time to get very far.
An unbidden hope blossoms in his chest, and a second later he’s calling Robin’s name at the top of his lungs. He gets it out twice before M’gann slaps a hand over his mouth, her orange eyes wide and frantic.
“Wally, no!” she hisses, “There might be more here than just our friends!”
The image of the pyramid creature rises again in his mind; a chill runs through him, his voice dying in his throat. The darkness around them suddenly seems twice as menacing, and if he’s not mistaken, the scuttling noises of the bugs have doubled. In his peripheral vision, he catches two of them making their way down the wall to the right, weaving frenetic circles around each other. Three more follow, their communicators giving little bursts of static as more and more bugs appear.
“Come on,” Superboy says, and they hastily head down the left hall, Conner leading them with the flashlight.
As they round the corner, they’re immediately met with the sight of two dead bodies strung up on either side of a blood-stained door. Both corpses are bound in canvas, with wire contraptions imbedded in their gaping mouths. M’gann reels backwards when the smell of rotting flesh hits them, and they turn to their right, intending to continue down the hallway.
Another large gate’s blocking off their path, spanning from the floor to the ceiling. There’s no way past it, short of trying to saw through the chain-link with Superboy’s axe, but the static from their communicators is growing louder, and Wally can hear the clinking of the insects getting closer - it sounds like there’s a swarm of them now. They’re forced to turn around and race back down the hall, and sure enough, the bugs are streaming in from the lobby, piling over one another in a chattering flood. He forgets about the machine gun; he wouldn’t even know where to start shooting anyways.
They’re trapped, they’re completely trapped, trapped by a fence and some bugs and Robin could be here and he’d kill Wally if he found out he got himself eaten by giant cockroaches -
M’gann shoves him aside roughly, darting by the suspended bodies to a door tucked into the back corner of the hallway. Wally hadn’t even seen it earlier, but he follows her blindly. She pushes it open, and he barely catches sight of the sign hanging next to the frame that says WOMEN before he’s going through it, too.
The door slams shut behind Superboy and sure enough, they’re in a women’s bathroom. Another dead end.
“Great, now we’re really trapped,” Wally moans. There’s blood dripping from one of the faucets; the basin is overflowing with it.
“Just hold on,” M’gann assures him, staring at the door warily. Superboy is going to each of the stalls, kicking the doors open to presumably make sure there isn’t anything else in here with them. He comes back soon enough, apparently satisfied that the room is clear.
They wait. The seconds tick by, and then the minutes. Eventually, the scuttling noises outside the door fade away, and they’re left with only the ominous clanking and scraping sounds coming from deep within the building.
M’gann makes them wait another minute or two just to be safe, and when Conner opens the door after she gives the signal, the hallway is empty.
It’s also an entirely different hallway, but Wally’s not one to look a gift horse in the mouth.
There’s no fence blocking the hall here, so they head in that direction, proceeding with as much caution as possible and taking care to tread lightly so that their footsteps don’t echo on the metal grating.
The flashlight beam travels back and forth, falling over molded paneling and slow-turning fans and an abandoned wheelchair sitting stationary against the far wall. The sight of it is horribly unnerving, and Wally tells himself to stop being an idiot, it’s just a wheelchair - but he skirts around it nevertheless.
After turning the corner, they start trying doors again, just as they had in the apartment complex. He tries not to, but with every new door, that same sense of hope from before fills his chest, only to deflate when the room is empty - or, in most cases, when the doorknob doesn’t even turn. Most of what they find are locker rooms, the metallic fronts coated with rust and, of course, a generous helping of blood. One locker in particular is standing open, the insides covered with blood and bits of fur.
Eventually, they come to a room that has four large desks shoved together in the center of it, although Wally thinks they look more like operating tables. A row of lockers lines the right wall, and there’s a small, child-sized chair next to the desks, the seat of it splattered with fresh, crimson liquid.
There are three bright blue rotary telephones sitting on the desks. One is missing the receiver.
Upon seeing the phones, M’gann lets out a moan of dismay and lifts a hand to press against her forehead. “Nothing here makes any sense!”
“We know they’re here,” Superboy says, glancing down at the flashlight he’s holding. “We just have to find them.” He backs up towards the door, apparently dismissing the telephones as useless.
Wally’s about to turn and follow them, but then the phone closest to him starts ringing and he’s picking it up on impulse.
“Hello?” he asks, and he feels ridiculous because this is such a horror movie cliche. He’ll hear heavy breathing on the other end, maybe a creepy chuckle, then the other person will hang up and -
“Wally-help me-”
It’s Robin’s voice.
“-Wally-where are you-?”
“Robin!” Wally shouts into the receiver, but then the phone goes dead and the repetitive beeping of the disconnect tone pulsates in his ear.
Three things happen in rapid succession.
The flashlight flickers weakly and dies, and a moment later, the air raid siren from earlier blares through the school. It rings through his head, the shadows becoming oppressive, and again he feels like he’s suffocating, the darkness crushing him from every side. His hand lashes out, closing around M’gann’s arm, and he can only hope that she’s managed to grab a hold of Conner.
By the time it stops, he’s doubled over on the floor, the telephone receiver dangling off the edge of the desk. A dial tone is coming from it, but someone is yelling out in the hallway and it takes him a second to realize that he recognizes the voice.
“Wally! Hey, you idiot, I know I heard you!”
Artemis.
“Wally! I swear, if you’re still on the other side I’m going to kill you-!”
M’gann manages to push herself up first. She sounds hoarse and close to tears with relief when she calls out. “Artemis! We’re in here!”
“Kaldur! Over here, they’re in this room!”
The archer is closer now. Wally barely has enough time to look around the room to find that it’s transformed, reverting back to a relatively normal decor. The blood is gone from the lockers, and the only thing coating the desks are cobwebs. M’gann’s on her feet and helping Superboy up, both the shotgun and axe lying abandoned on the cement floor. Outside, the fog seems to have return, casting just enough luminescence through the dirty window that they can see without the flashlight.
Then the door is being thrown open, and Artemis is standing there with Kaldur right behind her. Both look more than a little worse for wear; their uniforms are ragged and torn, covered with grime and a few substances that Wally doesn’t want to think about. Artemis has a deep gash on her right shoulder and there are claw marks close to Kaldur’s gills and on one of his cheeks, but they’re alive. Bruised and wounded and tired, but alive.
And there’s no one else with them.
It feels like he can’t get enough air all of a sudden. Artemis comes straight to him and awkwardly embraces him with her left arm; he returns it long enough to verify that yes, she’s here and she’s alright. But then he grips her uninjured shoulder and pulls back, and he has to force the words out because he’s so afraid of what the answer will be.
“Robin’s not with you?” he asks, but the hope he’s been feeling since they’d found the flashlight is already draining away before he even finishes the question.
Artemis’s expression falls, and her eyes dart around to finally take account of the three of them. Comprehension dawns on her face.
“No,” she says, swallowing audibly. “We thought he was with you.”
Wally feels a sickening sensation in his stomach as he realizes that wherever he is, Robin’s alone.