Cages and Those Who Hold the Keys

10

The east wall had almost completely collapsed, spewing out wood beams, bricks, and mud. So much mud. And it was moving. “Holy Mother of God,” whispered Grant.

A demon with three bulging red eyes and a four-fanged grin rose up from the muck before us. It was draped in corpse skin and riding a huge black bear. It carried an axe in one hand and a skullcap of blood in the other…and from every side of its form, faces peered out, faces made of black mud, their dark lips working to form words.

I saw them all; Hendrix, Morrison, Garcia, Ms. Holiday, Cobain, all of them.

And I felt the buzz in the center of my head as their words began to come clear.

I Am, I Am, I AM the darkness…I AM, I AM, I AM darkness’s empty belly, the pit at the end of your days…

It rose up to its fullest height, cracking the ceiling with its back, and lumbered forward, blood spilling from the skullcap, snot and foam dripping from the bear’s snout and mouth, smashing holes into the wall with every swing of its axe.

Its eyes glowed brighter with every step.

The Reverend was the first to fire. The bullet slammed into the muck with a loud splat! that did no damage at all. No sooner was the hole made than it oozed closed, healing.

And with every step, the thing grew larger, the singer’s words louder.

I AM, I AM, I AM Kichar Admi, I AM, I AM, I AM the source of all the songs you sing…

Grant McCullers pumped four rounds into it but it would not stop coming.

I AM, I AM, I AM the song the darkness sings, in the pit of my starving belly… We continued backing up, all of us firing into its center, none of the bullets having any effect. The mud dripped and oozed, clumping into the face of a beggar woman, the body of a dead child. The singers continued:

I AM, I AM, I AM what you made me, what you wanted me to be, I AM, I AM, I AM only my song and nothing more… The lights flickered again, and the building shuddered. I ran out of bullets, as did everyone else. And then I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned and saw Byron Knight beside me. His face was a mask of peace and acceptance. I had to watch his lips, because I could no longer hear anything; the roar of the gunfire was still screaming through my head. “I’ve had this appointment for a long time,” he said. “Just…let me go.” Cradling his guitar, he pushed past us and walked forward. The Mudman stopped moving. The singers fell silent. And the bear rose up on its hind legs.

The axe swung down swiftly and surely, deeply burying itself in Knight’s chest. The demon threw back its head and howled with laughter, then pulled Knight from the floor, his legs dangling as blood from his wound pumped down in heavy rivulets, splattering across the floor.

The demon opened its mouth, its jaws dislodging, dropping down, growing wider, until its face was nothing more than slick, dark maw, big enough to swallow a man whole.

Which is what it did.

Then spat out Knight’s guitar, that hit the floor and shattered into half a dozen pieces, the snapping strings a final death groan that echoed against the walls.

The demon turned around and walked toward the collapsed wall, then crouched down and began to move into the mounds of dirt, sludge, and muck, becoming less and less solid until it became what it had been; just mud.

I closed my eyes and began to cry. The Reverend came over and put his arms around me.

It didn’t help much.