Week 27 - Soul

Soul

Matthew Ryan Fischer

“The boy came to visit again. He sees into my soul and wants more, always more. He is the dangerous sort. Of that much I am sure. Anyone who is able to understand what we are and wishes to know more is the most dangerous sort of all.”  -- From the private journal of Alistair Geoffrey Doyles, September 17, 1846.

Alistair had never been known as a social being. But in that moment, he regretted answering his door more than any other day before. A boy, a madman, came knocking and Alistair had made the mistake of answering. Jonathan had been searching for a long time. Alistair, for his part, had changed his name and moved many times over the years and had previously felt secure in his current life. A foolish desire to live out his final days in one place had proven to be his undoing and most foolish indeed.

The boy had identified Alistair, identified his former life, his former deeds. And despite Alistair’s protestations, he would not be turned away.

Alistair had denied his name and denied any knowledge of what the boy was asking about. But Jonathan produced a copy of the book, of Alistair’s confessions.

That book! He has the book. That accursed wretched awful thing. Why had I written it? A moment of weakness. Desperation. The money earned, spent and gone. The absolution felt, momentary and fleeting. That worthless thing! I wish I had never written it.

Alistair tried to maintain his deception, but his eyes betrayed him. The moment he took his eyes off the boy and gazed at the book, Jonathan knew for sure.

My face had given the truth away. Despite all verbal protestations, this boy knew he had me.

The boy pushed his way inside, as if Alistair had the strength required to stop him. The boy explained he simply wanted to talk. They soon found their way to Alistair’s study, sitting across from one another before the fireplace.

Alistair supplied food and drink; Jonathan supplied ample questions.

Questions, always more questions. Who had I killed? Why had I killed? How had I felt? Why did I write it down? Was that part of the ritual? Was that how I gained their powers, their spirit?

It was folly. Alistair had been born as this something. No amount of questions could make this boy into anything. Still, the boy asked, and still, Alistair knew he must answer. The boy was tough. Dangerous. The boy might not have the gift, but he had the ability to instill fright. That much Alistair was sure of.

Alistair looked towards the fire for a moment. He wasn’t fast enough. He wasn’t strong enough. There would be no way to surprise the boy or force him to the flame. Alistair returned to his drink and pondered his too few options.

I was foolish once as a young man. I have been foolish as an old man. I cannot afford to be foolish anymore. This boy will kill me if given the chance.

“And how many have you killed?” Alistair asked.

“More than enough,” answered Jonathan.

Alistair took note – Was it a threat? Or an egocentric boast? Was Alistair meant to be afraid? More so than he already was? The boy was a third his age – taller, stronger. If the prospect of physical violence wasn’t enough, what would idle braggadocio alter? But perhaps the boy was no more than empty air. He words his claim in such a way that it says nothing or anything, thought Alistair. He comes to me seeking the answer. If he had done any of the things he claims, certainly he wouldn’t need to search down an old man...

Alistair was careful in how to proceed. The boy was conducting an interview, not there to hear an old man confess. Regrets and mistakes would be ignored. Slights or challenges would be seen as an affront or attack. Alistair had decided earlier that he would talk so long as the boy wanted to listen. If they were talking there was less of a chance of violence. Still, it seemed as if that were the boy’s only true predilection. Alistair feared greatly that sooner or later everything would eventually come down to the boy’s desire to see blood.

The boy concluded their first meeting, simply saying “I will return.”

Alistair considered fleeing, but thought better of it. He reminded himself of his old age. His body was failing him and he was unfit for the harsh trek of the open road. Besides, he told himself, the boy found me once. He is wont to do so again. And there is no way of knowing how he would react to an attempted flight.

Alistair decided it best not to provoke the boy to violence. If he was here to conduct an interview, why chance turning it into his own execution? Instead, Alistair resigned himself to a new life of looking over his shoulders and being scared of his own shadows.

The boy had said he would return, and so he did.

The boy came every day after that. They would talk morning until dusk. The boy wanted to know everything. The last thing he spoke, at the end of each meeting, was “I will return.” He always did.

During his many visits, they spoke of many things. The boy was always interested in how Alistair became what he became, not why. Alistair surmised that like himself at that age, the boy had little honor and few pangs of moral conscience. Alistair also surmised that the boy couldn’t exactly do what Alistair had done. The boy wanted to drain his victims, feast on their souls, gain their spirit and their power, but apparently despite his best efforts he had always failed. He asked Alistair again and again “how?” How had he done it? How had he made himself into a soul eater?

“Was it some trick or a spell? A demon’s deal perhaps?”

“I’m no sorcerer’s mage.”

“Don’t tell me you were just a writer, for I know that’s untrue. I’ve learned enough. I’ve traced your steps across the continent. You were a man that death followed.”

“No, it was never anything as simple as a story.”

“Then what did you do to them? How were you able to do the things you claimed? Can you really steal some person’s soul? Or maybe you were just a deviant that enjoyed the kill. And afterwards you searched for words that would help you to justify your actions.”

“I won’t lie and claim the killing didn’t excite me. But that was no pleasure. What I did was very real. And what I gained was as well. The good and the bad.” Mostly bad, he thought, but left that part out. The boy was so fanatical, and harsh truths would fail to dissuade him.

Alistair told him of many kills – why he had chosen them and what he had gained. He spoke of vast fortunes, abilities, energy and excitement. The boy made him talk of love and the losses that came from that. The boy seemed more interested in his pain.

“There was a girl. We were children, but we were grown. I miss her to this day.”

“What became of her? What did you do?”

“She was happy. Always. Always so happy… I wanted her happiness more than I wanted her.”

“So you killed her?”

Alistair was silent. Of course he had killed her. It was the only way.

“You killed her,” Jonathan said.

Finally Alistair nodded in agreement. He didn’t open his mouth to speak. He didn’t trust himself not to cry and he wasn’t going to give this boy that power over him.

“You killed her,” Jonathan persisted.

Alistair wondered why the boy wanted to hear the words. Perhaps he needed to. If he had gained nothing from his own killings, perhaps he took something from the misery of others. If that were true, he had come to the right place – Alistair had misery to spare.

Throughout their many visits, Alistair hated to admit it, but he began to appreciate the way Jonathan looked at him – the look of admiration, reverence. Alistair was no hero, but in the boy’s gaze, he suddenly felt he could have been one. For a moment, he forgot his fear and instead wanted to embrace the boy. Alistair had no family. He had been alone for so long now. A companion suddenly appealed to him and for the first time in a long time he regretted his many decisions to remain alone.

This boy could be my son. He’s certainly young enough, and we share so much already. The boy who could be my heir, my own. But he’s no son. He’s not looking for a father figure; he’s looking for a lesson in the destruction of human life. No one searching that darkness which we are is interested in love or redemption.

Yes, Alistair found that he liked Jonathan’s eyes. He liked the way the boy’s gaze made him feel about himself. He wanted to be as important as he was in those eyes. He wanted to feel like an idol, to be the greatness he had once been. It had been so long since he had been anything other than miserable with a sorry heart. It would be good to become something else once again.

Alistair resolved that he would start with the eyes and capture that gaze. After, he would work his way through the rest of the boy, and see what else he might have to offer.

It would be easy. The boy was there, trying to siphon off his strength, but all he was doing was reminding Alistair what it felt like to be alive. He would live again. The boy saw a weak old man, slowed by time. It would be easy to distract and surprise the boy. It would be easy...

Jonathan looked up at Alistair, his eyes bulging, the life being choked out of him.

“I never sleep well anymore… But tonight… tonight I will truly be free.” Alistair smiled. “Thank you,” he said, “thank you... thank you…”

Jonathan slowly lost his struggle. His life began to dim as Alistair’s grew stronger. The old man was ecstatic. But the boy didn’t look scared, no not at all. He had a solemn calm, a petulant smirk. He stared the old man down, and the last thing he said was “I will return.” For one moment, Alistair felt his grip weaken, for just a moment his resolve faltered, and for that moment he feared the boy just might be a man of his word.

Week 26 - Kill

Kill

Matthew Ryan Fischer

There were times he could look at himself and there were times he had to turn his eyes. He could always see the blood, even when it wasn’t there. It was just a matter of whether or not he could stand to see it, to remember, to fully understand who he was and the things he had done. He could wash himself, and had done so countless times, and yet... And yet the blood never seemed to go away. Not fully anyway.

Alistair lived a simple life in a simple cottage in a simple part of the country. He was away from his fellow man, and yet close enough if he had some need. Farming and farms had never held any interest when he was a younger man, but now he was old and he wanted peace and quiet and to be away from the cities to the west. He wanted to be left alone, to live out his remaining days in peaceful solitude.

He made a life for himself, as well as he could. He learned to grow a few crops and raised a few animals. He could walk to the nearby villages if need be and trade what little he produced. Or he could offer other services. Alistair could hunt and he could butcher. Oh yes, he knew how to properly and effectively kill. As a boy he had been taught well, and worked for years with his father in the slaughter houses. All these years later, he had kept those skills sharp as necessary. He wasn’t fast anymore and he wasn’t as strong, but he was always cunning. Cunning and sharp as needed, and wasn’t afraid of the things in the woods, even as his advancing age. The men in the villages knew his ability and Alistair often found himself helping men half his age, even when they should have already known better. Alistair didn’t mind that. He didn’t judge another man by which set of skills he possessed. Alistair appreciated all men and all skills and knew they all served a purpose.

Besides, he liked feeling useful and liked learning what uses these others had themselves.

As a younger man, Alistair had been jealous of other men. Jealous of their talents, jealous of their station in life, jealous of anything and everything they had that he wanted. He was riddled with envy, paralyzed, unable to function and interact with his fellow man. He was an angry young man, full of resentments and broken by his spite. He could have easily succumbed to the bottle or the violence of the streets. Instead he found an equally dangerous path – he resolved to embrace his base desires and to take from them what he wanted.

A plan is an unfair description of his decisions, as he certainly didn’t think far enough ahead to plan his moves, but instead he acted on instincts. His emotion knew what he wanted and his body knew what to do to get it for him – his brain never figured much into the equation.

At first he was a thief. At night, in the dark, away from his father and few friends. He acted alone and on impulse. He took. It was simple, and while corrupt, he found he liked it. He wasn’t surprised by his sins as much as he was surprised at his lack of concern regarding his actions. He had been raised morally and adhered to the teachings of the church. He expected he would find himself filled with regret and remorse, but instead his indifference fueled him on.

Stealing from his fellow man did little to satisfy him though. He wanted what better men had. He wanted more than money. More than wealth. He wanted opportunity, he wanted success, he wanted fame and power and all the other things that men with no hope or occasion long for. Pennies and trinkets would never be enough. Thievery would never be enough.

Alistair didn’t have many skills, he hadn’t had much training or opportunity to become a better man, but he did have one set of abilities, tools from his father and from the work of his youth. Alistair knew how to butcher. He wasn’t afraid of blood or the stench of death. He could hunt and he could kill and was capable and willing to do that which other men were afraid of. Some men might have been his better, in more ways than one, but he had his ways which would make him more than equal.

To butcher a body was nothing. To take a life was dreadfully easy. Snuffing another human out of existence didn’t give him what was theirs. He was after their luck, their skill, their fated promise. He was after their perfect life and would make it his.

Alistair learned from the sin-eaters. He learned what it took to be inside another man, to weigh his soul and to cast out that which was left wanting. But he had no desire to free other men from their weaknesses. All he cared about was their glory. He learned to identify both, good and bad, sin and virtue, but unlike the other sin-eaters, Alistair spent his time finding the best inside the person and kept it for himself. He ate their souls and was all the better for it.

Alistair had found his secret to the better world, to the good life. And for years, he thrived.

But with it came the weight, a sorrow of sorts, and a wretched sort of madness. He began to despise his fellow man. They were soft, weak. Where once he had found things to envy and lust after, now all he could find was disgust.

Killing them was doing them a favor. They were worthless, lesser beings. But without any value, they had nothing to offer him. Everything he had learned, everything he had become, held no reason now. Now it was just killing to end the misery, but even that was no mercy. It was just vile and vitriol. He had been robbed again of his potential, his promise stolen, his fate destroyed. Everything was dark and in the gutter again.

Alistair could no longer stand to look at himself. All he could see was his own emptiness inside, his own failure and a human being. He wanted to dream again. He wanted to have something to aspire to again. But mostly he wanted out of his current miserable life.

He recanted. He changed. He had prayed and meditated and begged for forgiveness.

Alistair returned to the church, returned to the sin-eaters whose craft he had stolen and made his own. He wanted to start over, to be cleansed and absolved. His brothers took pity and gave him a chance at life.

Alistair changed his names. He changed his home. Many times. He wandered throughout Europe, east and west. Still unable to relate to his fellow man, he never stayed in one place very long. Plagued by his memories, haunted in his dreams, he had no peace, no freedoms for a new existence. He had a life back, but never the happiness he had always desired.

Despite being absolved for his sins, Alistair never truly felt forgiven. He went to churches over and over. Repented over and over. He fasted and abstained and learned a new set of skills through flagellation. He had taken so many souls, so many lives; he knew there was no hope of repairing his own. But he tried. Over and over, he tried.

He wrote his confessions. He wrote down his memories and recanted his desires and tried to atone for his sins. The act of putting on paper gave him a greater sense of purpose and absolution than the sin-eaters ever did, as if the act of writing it had actually made it real.

He wrote down his sins and finally felt free. His confessions in fictional form, a warning to others, a morality tale, an education. Alistair hid himself, hid his surname Doyle, and became a new man altogether.

Alistair wanted a quiet life. He wanted to be left alone. He wanted to grow old and be allowed to die, hopefully in peace.

But in too many ways, he had done too much. Peace was possibly too much to ever ask for.

So many different names and faces. So many sins. So many lives ruined. There were so many, he was certain he could never remember them all. But he could still remember far too many.

It was in the past. It was all behind him. That was what he wanted to believe.

Then came the knock on his door and the arrival of a young man calling himself Jonathan – named for one of the characters from Alistair’s writings. The boy seemed capable of seeing into Alistair’s soul. He was a dangerous sort. Anyone who was able to see and understand was dangerous, but the ones that wanted to know more were the most dangerous sorts of all.

Alistair knew this to be true, because at an early point in life, he himself had been that dangerous sort.

The blood on his hands never truly went away. No matter how many times he washed his hands, he could see them, stained, scarred. The blood never really went away, the past was never really forgotten, his sins never fully forgiven. It was then in that moment, gazing into the boy’s sunken and sinister eyes that Alistair realized all men must pay the price for their own sins. Whoever this boy was, Alistair’s own past had brought him here to pass judgment.

And Alistair was fairly certain how he would fare.

Week 25 - Blood

Blood

Matthew Ryan Fischer

Spots on the wall, moving, and dancing about. Blood, dripping down his back.

Jonathan smiled. He was alive. He felt the overwhelming abundance of life and he drank it up inside.

Blood. Dripping. Rolling. Sticking. Sweet disgusting beautiful blood. Life in liquid form. He could sense it. He could always sense it. It was one of the gifts. He could feel it there. He was sure he could smell it, almost taste it, if he just closed his eyes and concentrated enough. The blood wasn’t his, but it was his now. He owned it. He controlled it. He was its master. And the blood would give him its most precious gift.

Spots on the wall. Little things. Blurred, but now focused. It had been dark but suddenly now he was fully awake. He was aware of all that was around him. The first thing he saw were the spots on the wall. Little things. Out of focus. He was sure they had been something more, but their life had been snuffed out. Crushed. Stepped on. Smashed dead. So many things over so many years smashed dead. What was one more? A hundred more? Did it matter anymore at this point? They were just the remains of that which was gone, that which could never be recovered or had again. He was blissfully aware that that was the case. Infinite finality. And he had been the cause.

He smiled at that. He felt power, somewhere within that. Somewhere, he was God, and his arrival harbingered death.

Sebastian by birth, but he had since changed to Jonathan because he hated his parents for many reasons, the name being the least of them. Jonathan because he had read it in a novel and he felt it suited his baser nature. Sebastian of history had been a saint, dying for his pointless convictions, and as far as Jonathan could tell, he was no saint, nor did he have any desire to become one. Sebastian would never do. Jonathan fit better. Jonathan was a dark name. Darker was better. Darker was always better.

Sebastian had been fascinated by death from an early age. There were two constants in the world, birth and death, and it was fairly obvious which one of the two won in the end. Death overwhelmed the strong, it stole the young, it felled those in their prime. Death was tricky and sneaky and it couldn’t be beaten. Death came for all and all the same. No one could deny that. Death was fair and Death was even. Death was justice. Death didn’t care if someone was grand or poor or weak or strong or brave or a coward. Death was equal. No one could say that of birth. Birth played games, it picked winners and losers. Birth could plan destinies and choose fates, but Death would eventually overwhelm all. That was true power.

True power was what Sebastian was after.

He found kinship in a book about death. A diary. A journal, depicting the path to enlightenment. He believed he had found a brother, a comrade, a mentor. The book taught him the lesson of life versus death and power over his fellow man. The book showed him who was the master and who was the slave. Sebastian had no plans on being a slave. The book told him the secrets of the power, the ways to harness it, the only way to gain control. And Sebastian believed what he read and read about the man in the book named Jonathan. Character Jonathan spoke to him. Not the author, but the character. He spoke to him in a way that no stranger in life ever had. Life was not Jonathan’s fault. It was the fault of those around him. Power and position and money and fame were all within reach, if only he had the courage to take it. If only he was willing to reach out and take it from another. Sebastian read it all and took Jonathan at his word.

And so he took the name to honor his favorite character and thus Sebastian disappeared and Jonathan was reborn. Birthed from his own death. Reborn, better, stronger. Reborn with the purpose to kill.

Reborn Jonathan wanted to feel the power for himself. He took a life. Strangled it right out of existence. His fingers ached and the muscles in his arms were sore and he was short of breath by the time it was all over. But he felt nothing. There was no release, no energy, nothing different at all. It made no sense. He had done as he was supposed to do, what the book told him to do. He had taken a life. But his own existence was no different.

He gave it time, but that did nothing either.

Jonathan didn’t understand. Nothing worked the way it was supposed to. It was all laid out, clear in front of him. He had his plan. He had achieved his goal. But his rewards were missing. The spirit inside him, their soul destroyed. It was to be his. Their fate, their destiny, their reward. All of it was supposed to be his now. His to do with as he pleased.

And yet, he was denied.

He had been promised, in intimate detail. And he had followed through. Precisely. He had done exactly what he had been told to do.

And yet, nothing.

His friend had lied and his friend must be punished.  But his friend was only a character and as a character only spoke the words he had been told to speak. He only spoke the words that his writer had told him to day. Jonathan the character couldn’t help it if he had betrayed Reborn Sebastian-Jonathan. The secret was still out there. The good life was his by right and it could still be granted. But not by some character in a book. Not by the blood and death of the innocent and the stranger. The journal, the confessions, the truth had been written by a man. And that man needed to be punished. That man needed to be held to account. Geoffrey Doyle wrote down his sins, his sinister skills, and Jonathan had read them and expected payment.

Jonathan smiled at this. He hadn’t failed. Not yet anyway. He hadn’t failed, he had been failed. Failed by a man that kept the true secret for himself, while only writing down false promises. But Jonathan could make amends. He could get it right. He could learn the truth this time and reclaim that which was rightfully his. Whether he was aware of it or not, Geoffrey Doyle had written down a promise to Jonathan. It was a promise of power, a promise that was going to have to be kept. Jonathan would see to that. Oh yes, he bloody would indeed.