I can feel you shiver with anticipation, dear hearts. Enclosed are the last of the Hightower letters I managed to find. The first series is located here: Part 1
J.G.
-
Mssrs. Lopatin and Ivanov,
While I am thankful for your sending Ms. Eunice as my defense lawyer, I must speak plainly. I do not agree with her defense strategy. She insists on my seeing a battery of psychiatrists for the sole purpose of having them diagnose me with a mental illness so I may be committed to Greystone rather than sent to prison.
I am not afraid of prison. I am less afraid of death. What I fear, more than anything, is for this account to be discredited as the ravings of a madman. I am not crazy. I know what I saw, and what I did. I hope that Mr. Ivanov’s asking for my account is not some kind of morbid curiosity; I hope that you, at least, believe my tale.
My work must be completed. The Rack must be destroyed.
The cold clung to me after I pulled myself out of the river. I followed the trail, pausing only to strengthen the tethers of the Shorm Udamma by chewing sharp, cinnamon flavored gum. The cold provided a measure of focus; I used it as best I could.
I find it difficult to describe the island. The Veil is weak there. Paper thin. Dilated, even, as though moments away from birthing something terrible into the world.
The Giganto-Cone Ice Cream Shoppe was the first landmark I reached. The vanilla swirl on top of the building reached up to the starless sky. Moonlight revealed where birds and other animals had made homes in the rusted framework.
The lower part of the building was a stylized cone, covered in graffiti. I let my flashlight illuminate the spray paint markings: a variety of lewd jokes, crude images, and gang signs.
There was also a single phrase, in vivid red paint, right across the door to the facility.
THE RACK AWAITS.
I heard a clatter from inside. I raised my flashlight and my pistol.
“Who’s there?”
There was no answer. I steeled myself for action. The doors had long ago fallen off their hinges. I went into the building, listening for any hint of danger.
Giganto-Cone was arranged with the ice cream counter at the far end of the dining area. Tables and chair stacks lay cluttered about. Most of the ceiling had collapsed. No windows remained unbroken. Mold, mildew, and decay had been both landlord and tenant for decades.
The clatter came again, from the kitchen behind the counter. I hoped it was one of the children I sought. I feared it would be something else.
I passed the ice cream counter, peering inside the vats to satisfy a perverse curiosity. Nothing. Long empty. I saw no footprints in the layer of muck on the ground, nor any sign that the hardy plants growing between the linoleum cracks had been recently trampled.
The door to the kitchen was open. Small clattering noises came from within. I hugged the wall, then swept into the room with my revolver tracking the beam of my flashlight.
The kitchen was in an even greater mess than the dining area. Pots, pans, and utensils were scattered around overturned counters. Rodent droppings and carcasses lay everywhere. Centipedes too large to be natural skittered away from my footsteps.
A woman crouched in the corner. Long blonde hair cascaded down the back of her sharp black dress. She rose, turning to face me, tapping at her arm with a manicured red nail. Her face was the same mask of annoyance she’d worn every day since I’d known her.
“Russel,” my adoptive mother said. “You’ve done it this time.”
She raised her hand. I winced, like I had when I was a child, when those bloody red nails dug so hard into the flesh of my arms that I could see the marks for months to come, when those perfect, pearly white teeth had clicked open to spew the most hateful invective imaginable.
“You’re dead.” My voice was flat. “I was at your funeral.”
“You’re filthy,” she said. “I wish I’d never laid eyes on you. I wish I’d left you to die with your whore mother.”
Her face twisted. Her eyes grew, bulging until they burst. Something unfathomably old regarded me from the empty sockets. It showed me my childhood; the strike of her hand on my face, the cold nothingness she had offered me in place of love for reasons I would never understand.
I squeezed the trigger. The phantom toppled backward, then rose, coming toward me with halting steps. Her flesh sloughed off in stinking loops. Her back hunched, giving my mother a bestial appearance as she screamed, “The Rack awaits, Russell. The Rack for you!”
I ran. I could feel the Otherworld surge behind me. The air shimmered. The corruption and decay of the building accelerated, causing the walls to crumble and collapse before my eyes.
I threw myself out the front door. I caught a glimpse of something inside the building as I fled; a hungry, bestial presence that wanted nothing more than to devour me.
I ran down the road until my leg muscles burned. I stopped, gasping for air, listening to the sound of nocturnal insects and trying to get my bearings.
The road curved up ahead, then split in two. I looked to my map. One path lead to the very center of the island. The other was a more gradual loop that would take me to the Riverside Saloon.
I had just settled on taking the outer loop when the map began to change. All the icons, except for the dance hall, slowly faded into nothing. I could hear music again, and screams, and what might have been the mad laughter of something hunting among the flames. I shuddered, and closed the map.
The Riverside Saloon was on a small concrete outcropping overlooking the river. It was one of the more expensive restaurants on the island, built after richer visitors grew tired of constantly eating alongside those that had scraped together the money for a ticket.
It’d been beautiful, once. That beauty made me ache, and so much more for the wreck it had become. What was broken seemed impossible to fix: the scars ran too long, and too deep.
I had only begun my approach to the building when I heard a low growl from behind me. I turned to see a furred monstrosity emerging from the woods. It puts its snout close to the ground, growling deep in its cavernous throat, its rotting mouth opening to reveal curled yellow teeth. Its rippling muscles parted under mangy hair.
I recognized the monster at once. It was the dog that had bitten me when I was nine years old, the feral beast on Penitence’s west side that had given me the scars on my right arm.
My pistol thundered in my hand. The round struck the creature in the face. Blood and snot fountained from a pin-sized hole. It howled in pain, then, snarling, charged at me.
I ran again, this time headlong for the opposite side of the road. There was an overgrown park there. Its name was written on a wrought iron archway: FAIRY GARDEN PARK.
The beast gained on me. I floundered in the weeds. I could feel its hot, stinking breath on the back of my neck, and heard its jaws snapping shut as it sought for my flesh.
I dodged through a rusted swing set. The monster shook it apart, barking, snarling. My mother screamed:
“Get back here, you little shit!”
There was a rotted jungle gym up ahead. I dove into one of the smaller tunnels, crawling on my hands and knees. I could hear the beast outside, no longer sounding like a canine at all, yet still hatefully familiar.
It stomped off after a while, rattling the destroyed carcass of the jungle gym in its wake. My breathing slowed. The demon cried out in the distance. The sound was mournful; plaintive, even, born of pain and suffering and heartbreaking confusion.
I stuck my head out of the tunnel. I dared not go back the way I came. Further ahead, just before the center of the island, the rusted hulk of the ferris wheel rose above the treeline.
Not much left remains in my account, gentlemen. I assure you that I intended to have it completed much sooner. It’s telling depletes me, as you know, but the exhaustion that comes with the conclusion is as unexpected as it is severe.
I know I am asking much of you already, but I pray that you might consider providing me with a lawyer other than Ms. Eunice. I’m not rushing toward the electric chair, but I refuse to water down my story or lie about my mental clarity.
Death is nothing compared to the truth.
Sincerely,
R. Hightower
Penitence, Michigan
Booking #4829-71
_
Mr. Lopatin,
When I was a child, I used to steal cigarettes from my mother’s purse. I never took more than three at once. She was a chainsmoker, with an unopened pack ready to go at all times, but she’d still notice if I stole too many.
I’d give them to my friends. We’d sit beneath the Envoy Bridge and watch the oil tankers going out along the river. I’d imagine what it’d be like to be aboard one of those ships: to be sailing far away from my this city, and from the cigarette burn scars my mother left along my arms.
Those scars itched as I headed for the Ferris Wheel. I broke out of the woods, wiping cold sweat from my brow. Dead grass and pieces of broken glass crunched beneath my feet.
There was someone next to the base of the wheel. A small, thin man in a pair of overalls swept debris away from the ride. He looked up when I approached, then returned to his work, the straws of the push broom shushing against the concrete.
“Come on,” he said. “No line. It’s all yours.”
Band music played softly from nowhere. I looked around, uneasy.
“You scared, little boy?” He asked. “You look scared.”
“I’m looking for some children that might have come this way,” I said. “Have you seen them?”
“Might’ve. Might’ve cleaned up after ‘em, too. I try to keep things tidy, despite…”
Something old and angry roared in the distance. He waved in the general direction without looking up.
“...despite sharing the island with things like that.”
“There are more of those?”
“There are a few, but that’s the one you brought here yourself.”
“The children. Have you-?”
“When people come here, they come because they think things will be better.” The broom shushed across the concrete. “But no matter where you go, you bring your trash with you. They dump it here and give up. Get stuck here. Become...echoes of what they used to be.”
“Is that what you are? An echo of someone that became trapped here?”
He laughed.
“Take a ride on the ferris wheel and tell me what you see.”
“I don’t have time.”
“You got nothin’ but time.” He stopped sweeping and looked up at the moon. “He’s waiting for you.” The caretaker rubbed at his face. A patch of steaming flesh came away on the back of his hand. “He’s always been waiting for you, and the rest of the lost and wounded of this city. He’ll take away your pain. He’ll keep you safe from the monster that’s hunting you. But in return…”
The caretaker straightened. He pushed his fingers against his cheeks. They sank into his flesh with a wet squelching noise. Those bony digits tensed, and then his face was gone, pulled away with a damp ripping noise.
“Ride the wheel,” it said. “See what’s waiting for you.”
I recoiled at the sight, then again at the sound of a rope being pulled taught. There were people in the ferris wheel cars; men, women and children, who leaped without hesitation into the open air, whose eyes bulged from their skulls as the noose tightened.
“An end to pain. An end to suffering!”
My mother stood in one of the cars. She was as I last remembered her; beautiful and terrible, a demon hiding behind a beatific smile.
She held a long brown belt in her hands. The muscles of my throat tensed in sympathy with awful memories.
“For you, Russel! The noose for you! The Rack for you!”
Her mocking laughter followed me as I ran back into the woods, toward what I hoped was another road, until I thought I would drop dead of exhaustion.
My flight was directionless. I half expected to suddenly tumble off a drop and into the frigid river water. I nearly wept with relief when the the tangled, clutching undergrowth of the forest surrendered to the open air.
I still didn’t dare pause. I hurried on until the road took an abrupt turn. The trees drooped their branches down over the road.
That is how I finally laid eyes on the dance hall; through dark and twisted boughs that seemed to stand sentry over a monstrous evil. It was whole. No sign of the fire that I knew had destroyed it. It was on a slight hill, surrounded by clean, well manicured park lawn.
The doors were open. I thought I could see a small figure heading inside. I shouted, but my voice reflected back at me, tossed effortlessly away into the dark.
I cursed the evil of the place, and hurried after. External speakers mounted on towering art deco platforms blared the infernal song to hurry my approach.
I’ll be seeing you...
My tale is drawing close to its conclusion. I will need more time, to collect my thoughts. This brief account alone has made me weary beyond words. I long for the comfort of the Shorm Udamma, for some hope offered at the altar of Saint Josamine, but both comfort and hope elude me. There is only the darkness of my cell, and the laughter of the Rack in my nightmares.
Soon, it will be over.
Sincerely,
R. Hightower
Penitence, Michigan
Booking #4829-71
-
Lopatin,
He’s gone. Jesus, he’s gone, and I don’t know how he did it. The police are frantic. I’m hearing rumors of lynch mobs on the street searching for him. If you’ve talked to him, you have to let me know where he is.
If you’re behind this, and you don’t tell me, so help me god I will sue your ass for every dime you own.
-K. Eunice
_
Lopatin,
No. Absolutely not. You’re not roping me into this, and I’m absolutely disgusted that you honestly believe any of this bullshit. Mr. Hightower is a very sick man, and your indulging his delusions is irresponsible and evil. I know Mr. Ivanov signs my paychecks, but I cannot, in good conscience, continue to serve as Mr. Hightower’s lawyer if you keep suggesting things like this.
-K. Eunice
_
Mr. Lopatin,
Mr. Ivanov’s offer is extremely generous. I will, of course, accept, and I hope you understand my earlier tone. This is outside my area of expertise, and I maintain my previously stated reservations, but if you honestly think this will help us find and help Mr. Hightower, I’ll play along as you requested.
-K. Eunice
_
For those who follow
The Rack waited for me in the dance hall. That was its heart, and hearth, and center of its being. It was spread across the whole island, or maybe was the whole island, awake and angry and hungry.
It earned its name. Every inch of its tortured flesh was stretched across jumbled bones, splitting and reforming, held in place by rusted staples and toxic sutures. Flames danced in its eyeless sockets. Corpses hung from ropes wrapped around each of its blunted teeth.
Welcome home, it said, and its voice was a promise, an oath of safety. I have called, and you have answered.
The doors to the dance hall flew open behind me. The beast of my nightmares stalked in on the cold. It was my mother and her cold nails and hateful words, the dog that had savaged me as a child, a lifetime of trauma and pain given form by the psychic winds of Bois Blanc.
It will kill you, the Rack said. It will eat you. You can never heal from this. Find shelter with me.
My pistol thundered in my hand. Each round struck the horror stalking toward me. It laughed at my feeble attempts. It swelled in size, towering over me, over the Rack, its brutish head brushing against the darkness of the ceiling. I saw my terrified reflection in its shimmering claws; the wounds of my past made flesh.
“Get back!” It ignored my cries. I found myself retreating toward the Rack. Its arms reached for me, ten thousand limbs waving and grasping, its greedy mouths chittering. “Get away from me!”
I can help you, the Rack whispered behind me. I can save you!
I searched for an escape. There was none. I turned to the Rack. It punished, and it tortured, but maybe that was better than the alternative. Maybe it was what I deserved.
You already know me, it said. I am the needle in your veins. I am the noose around your neck. I am release from pain. I am the Rack.
“You’re a lie,” I shouted.
I am the father of lies.
The horror bore down upon me. I closed my eyes, and sought in desperation for the Silence within me.
I cannot say how long I was in Silence, or when it even began. I know only that, when thought returned, I stood with my arms wrapped tight around the monster that had come to kill me. My face was pressed against its stinking flesh. It looked down at me, the rage in its eyes turning swiftly to sorrow, and then in my arms I held myself, a child of fifteen years, his scars and his pain forming tears that scorched my flesh, his fists clenched as if in anticipation of the needles I would one day slide beneath his skin, of the noose I would tighten around his neck in a desperate attempt to escape my own pain.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s not your fault. It was never your fault.”
I let him go, though it made my arms ache. He was my mother, for a moment, then the slavering dog, and then he was gone in a cloud of ash and embers.
The Rack laughed. I saw in its arms the corpses of the children I had come to find, and the dessicated bodies of those it had slowly eaten over the years. None survived the Rack. Its lies were lethal; its cure to trauma was greater agonies.
I had no weapon that could harm the Rack, but neither could it harm me if I kept outside its embrace. I left its stinking form in the dance hall, which caught fire and burned as I retreated. The Rack’s presence surrounded me, mocking every step I took.
You will never heal. You will never be who you used to be.
I waited on the shore for twelve hours before a fishing boat passed by. Though I was reluctant to draw them into my troubles, I was close to hypothermia, and knew I would not survive for long. I stayed for a long time in the warmth of my truck cabin when I got back, allowing myself to catch a few hours of rest before driving home.
I saw the Rack’s touch all throughout the city in the days that followed. I saw it most of all in one of the cell phone towers located near the harbor terminal. I don’t know how its fell influence interacted with modern technology, but for the first time I saw something that I could effect; something I could destroy to hinder its reach.
I never intended to harm the security guard. He confronted me as I was setting the charges at the base of the tower. If not fearing for the lives of the children the Rack might lure to the island, I’d never have shot him. His blood is nevertheless on my hands. I crafted his destruction, just as I did the cell towers.
I waited for the police. I expected to have to answer for the death of the poor man who thought to hinder me. I did not expect to have to answer for the deaths of the children, whose bodies were found in the ruins of the dance hall. I do not know if suspicion is placed on me because of the city’s desire to find someone to blame, or if there is some malignant and supernatural intelligence at work.
If you read this, then I am long gone from prison. I had intended to stay, to face whatever punishment awaited, but my rescuer convinced me otherwise. “Your work isn’t finished yet,” he said after freeing me. “You cannot rest until it is.” He is right, I fear, and he of all of us knows what it means to be a guardian of this lost city.
The Rack still lives. I might have limited its influence, or at best destroyed its ability to broadcast the Wonder Island game, but it still lurks on that island. It still is the island. The means of its destruction is currently beyond me, but I am a resourceful man. I have read the mad words inscribed in the Malthus Journal before. I must do so again. The means to permanently bind or kill the Rack lies within its cursed pages. I will find the Journal. I will learn what I must to destroy the Rack. I will expose the hideous truth of Bois Blanc island, or die in the attempt.
Mr. Ivanov, if there is any purpose in relating my account, I hope it is in swaying you toward turning your considerable financial (and arcane) assets toward this most righteous cause. You have been kind to me. Be kind, as well, to the lost souls of this forsaken city. Should I die, finish what I started.
God help me.
-R. Hightower
_
,
Dear Hearts,
I want to answer a few of the questions I’ve been getting right off the bat.
I have no clue what the hell Eunice and Lopatin were talking about toward the end. She seemed reluctant as hell to get involved with whatever it was, and that makes me think it had something to do with the “arcane assets” Hightower said Ivanov possessed.
Nobody has a goddamn clue where Hightower went. Last I checked, there’s still a pretty big bounty out for his arrest, but the police had to shut down their tip line after getting nothing but garbage leads for two straight years. Hightower didn’t seem like he was interested in skipping town, but I don’t know how anyone could possibly stay hidden in even a city the size of Penitence for this long.
Oh, and the people these letters were written for, Mr. Lopatin and Mr. Ivanov? Yeah. They don’t exist. Those are fake names. Hightower and Eunice credit them with providing the money for Hightower’s defense, but when I checked Eunice’s firm they denied having any contact with anyone by those names, and produced records showing that she was actually his public defender (paid for with city money).
Speaking of Eunice, nobody knows where the fuck she went, either. She gave a statement after Hightower disappeared, essentially saying that she hoped he’d return and asking him to come back, but after that, she’s a ghost just like he is. According to her old boss, she literally just cleaned out her desk one day and walked out the front door.
And, finally, the biggest mystery to me: who the hell rescued Hightower from prison? Ole’ Russ doesn’t give us much of a description, but I can tell you right now I’ve never met anyone capable of doing the things he had to have done in order to free Hightower (you know what I’m talking about if you’ve read the warden’s report, it is absolutely insane). That said, I’ve been hearing weird whispers and rumors from some of the darker parts of the city. Not much to go off really, but enough to make me wonder if whoever freed Hightower isn’t the same guy responsible for the salt mine “disaster” a few weeks back.
In any case, I’m wrapping my work on this one. I’m gonna take it easy over the next few days before starting my next project. Once again, much love to all of you, my sweet and faithful; I couldn’t do what I do without your support. And, hey, bonus points if you caught the reference to yours truly in one of the letters!
Keep the lights on,
-J.G.
Submitted November 20, 2018 at 10:15PM by AtensLament https://ift.tt/2Q5jOEn
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