When Two Worlds Collide Read online

  1984

  When 2 Worlds Collide

  JEROME SITKO

  Category: Adult/Young Adult

  Genre: Horror

  Copyright © Jerome Sitko 2020

  All rights reserved. The right of Jerome Sitko to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act of 1988.

  No part of this publication may be altered, reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form, by any means, including, but not limited to, scanning, duplicating, uploading, hosting, distributing, or reselling, without the express prior written permissions of the publisher, except in the case of reasonable quotations in features such as reviews, interviews, and certain other non-commercial uses currently permitted by copyright law.

  Disclaimer:

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, locations, and businesses are purely products of the author’s imagination and are entirely fictitious. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, places, or events is completely coincidental.

  1984 When Two Worlds Collide by Jerome Sitko

  ISBN: 978-1-7341459-1-5

  I dedicate this book to my two biggest fans- Bill and Helen Wainscott. They also happen to be the parents of my soulmate, Renee. Without both of your love and support, this book would not be possible.

  CHAPTER 1

  June, 1984

  Drug Den

  The sun melts into the Chicago skyline and a light drizzle begins falling. The heat and sprinkling of rain only make the humidity worse and the already egged-on short tempers become shorter. Ryan is in the drug den getting ready to go out for another night of recruiting for Charlie. The lair is always dark and moldy from the lack of sunlight and the mood from its residents and victims match, dark and rotting. Ryan and the other psychopomps (undead), that Charlie affectionately calls his grouplings, have no trouble seeing in low or no light. It is one of the many perks of being a groupling, right up there with no-free-will. Usually, grouplings are weak-minded or drug-addicted vagrants that were duped into Sheol—Charlie’s name for the hellish alternate world that parallels ours—tricked into living an endless life of servitude for Charlie. They yield their mind and body to Erebus (a council of evil demons) in an unceremonious ritual of death. When someone dies in Sheol, they will be resurrected and brought back in an evolved state of dead-but-not-dead. If they meet their demise in our world, or Adamah as Charlie calls it, it is permanent. Their physical bodies will become worm bedding in the earth’s soil and their souls will either reunite with their loved ones in paradise or suffer in an eternal kiln, smoldering in pain. Their human recruits rely on the grouplings to help them navigate the interior of the building, but they still stumble and trip from the drugs affecting their equilibriums. The drug den is an abandoned three-story brick building with mattresses soaked in blood, urine, semen and vomit. Hypodermic needles litter the floor and the stench of sex and fear hang heavy in the air. Nearly every inch of any walls that are still standing as well as the boards covering the windows are ‘tagged’ with colorful but fading gang graffiti from a time when gangs ruled this part of town. Charlie owns this building now and this is one of his hubs to leap from Sheol to Adamah. His grouplings work Chicago’s inner city, bringing him fresh recruits to build his forces.

  The steel door at the rear of the building is the conduit between the two worlds. When Charlie or his grouplings cross the threshold, they are in Adamah where their powers are limited, but most importantly where if you die you remain dead. This is why Charlie rarely ventures across this or any of the portals; death is eternal. His powers are limited and he feels vulnerable and insecure like when he was alive…human again.

  Charlie hates what his former self represents. Before being converted by Erebus, he was an insecure introvert that preyed on women and feared men. He was an astute serial rapist and killer who officially is credited with seven murders in the states of Washington and Oregon. Only he knows the real truth and the number is in the thirties. Charlie can remember every young girl’s face, body type, and that one thing, the IT factor, that he could not resist. It could be anything; how she smiled, a birthmark, even how she styled her hair, whatever it was that made Charlie tingle down under and report to his brain, that’s the one. He kept every one of them locked away in picture palaces in his mind. When he wanted gratification, he would take a stroll through what he called Skid Row and visit them. If the FBI did not discount him as an obtuse social leper, they would have discovered the other twenty-three victims. He allowed them to incorrectly profile him and relished in their incompetence, but he secretly wanted to be discovered so he could take credit where credit was due. He felt he deserved the notoriety of a Ted Bundy, but he wasn’t going to just hand it over to the imbeciles and let them get the glory. Charlie is omni-powerful in Sheol and can satisfy every sadistic whim that pops in his head, so none of that matters now. Victims (grouplings) are in an endless supply and he can create or recreate any nightmare. Yes, life in Sheol is great for Charlie and he wants to keep it that way, but to do so, he has to finish what he started. He failed to capture Lance and Jeremy and use their mystical blood to syncretize Adamah and Sheol the last time. Lance and Jeremy’s ancestors were so evil and vile a spell was cast on them when they were captured centuries ago. Their blood is the only blood that can merge the two worlds. It was thought the bloodline was extinct until Lance and Jeremy were born. Charlie knows Erebus won’t give him another opportunity, but he has an ace card: Ryan.

  S

  Ryan opens the steel door with his partner Amy in tow, and the Adamah (Chicago) humidity immediately wraps its wet arms around him threatening to place its hand over his nose, denying him air. He draws in a labored breath and begins walking toward the overpass, knowing that the homeless and drug addicts will be clamoring for coveted dry spots for the night. His blonde hair weighed down by the rain cascades over the shoulders of his drab, olive-green Army jacket as he continues on, his head down to avoid the raindrops on his face. He despises Amy for her brutality, but Charlie likes the recruiters to go out in pairs for safety, it’s ironic but true. Charlie would end the life of a groupling out of boredom but wanted them to travel in pairs.

  In Amy’s other life, when she was human, she was a highly successful dominatrix with a well-hidden heroin addiction, living in her glass tower high above the city. Powerful, rich men got their jollies off being bossed and whipped by a petite, wholesome-looking girl and they paid big money for the humiliation. Her previous life is a prelude to her new career and she is one of Charlie’s most sadistic recruiters. She entices both men and women with her sex appeal but takes pleasure torturing and humiliating them. She is a short ginger, about five-foot-two with green/blue eyes and plump breasts that served her well in both lives.

  The rain creates an optical illusion of a mosquito net over the street lights, or possibly a fairy sprinkling her dust cocooning the eerie yellow light underneath. As the two recruiters pass a row of abandoned buildings, their shadows play hide-and-seek, their silent stalkers closely tracking them. In Adamah, Ryan and Amy have the flexibility to make decisions on their own and the freedom to act. As grouplings they are not able to comprehend their current dismal state and cannot remember their lives before they evolved, even in Adamah.

  S

  If Ryan was able to recall his last day before becoming a groupling, he would remember the fun he was having; he met up with his friends Joey, Lance, and Jeremy at their makeshift fort, the ‘cabana,’ and smoked some weed that Joey stole from his older brother. Their plan that night was to go to a party, meet chicks, and stay out until the sun began to rise. On their
way to the party, they got sidetracked by a Thriftway Building Center that was under construction. The teenage boys could not resist the temptation of an unsecured construction site. They found their way to the top of the roof and were pretending they were in Vietnam ambushing the Viet Cong, throwing rocks as grenades. One of them hit a car and they were about to be trapped on top of the building when Jeremy yelled out, “Every man for himself!” They all started running down the stairs.

  They breached the back door of the Thriftway building, one of Charlie’s portals, and collided into Charlie in the alternate world- Sheol, beginning their horrific summertime journey. Of the four boys, Ryan was the only one that did not have a specific purpose for Charlie. So, Charlie melted his brain, figuratively speaking, and forced Joey to murder him in front of the other boys. Charlie had some sort of voodoo magic mind control over Joey making him obey without thinking or questioning him.

  S

  Ryan and Amy continue their walk down the abandoned street in silence. They have only one thing on their mind: to recruit. The overpass was approximately a mile away from the drug den and they walked slowly, taking their time, allowing the eerie darkness to drape the city. They can hear the cars traveling overhead and Amy is perplexed the cars’ occupants are oblivious to what is happening right under their noses. The grouplings target easy prey: the homeless, runaways, and drug-addicted. They can be manipulated with drugs or money and if they come up missing no one will notice or care.

  Ryan was the exception; he was at the wrong place at the wrong time. Charlie kept him around to use as bait knowing the boys would eventually figure out that he is still alive. Charlie allowed Lance to see Ryan when he crossed the threshold each night, hoping it would not take Lance long to figure it out and come for him. After Charlie’s plan to use Lance, Jeremy, and Joey to fuse the two worlds together failed, he’s been trying to bait them back into Sheol so he can finish the job. When the boys escaped, they did not know that Ryan was a groupling. They thought Ryan was killed in Adamah and would not be able to come back. After they defeated Charlie, and Ryan was not with them, the kids assumed the worse.

  S

  Ryan and Amy are one block away from the overpass now and can hear the degenerates chattering among themselves like rats in a gutter. Amy shivers but not because she is cold. She shivers because they repulse her and she’s trying to shake their imaginary stench off of her. Someone is playing a guitar and singing an out of tune version of “Hey Jude” at the back of the overpass and another has a battery-powered boom box playing Kenny Loggins’ “Footloose.” Both people are increasing their volume to try and drown out the cars overhead, but the music crescendos into an annoying, nonsensical melody that’s harassing everyone within earshot.

  Amy thinks to herself, Soon there will be a fight. She smiles. She always gets excited when she nears the overpass, close enough to taste them in the air. She knows she will soon find some unwilling lost soul and trick him or her into following her back to the den with the promise of sex or drugs. But Amy will need to satisfy her lust first.

  Ryan will be patient until she does. He will not help her, but he will enable her by looking the other way. He brushes his soaked hair away from his eyes so his view is unobstructed, the overpass is packed tonight. It will be easy pickings, he thinks.

  Ryan is in the lead now, walking in the gutter instead of the sidewalk. He likes the feel of the water as it soaks his feet through his Converse All Stars. It reminds him of something or sometime, but he can’t quite place his finger on it. It doesn’t matter. It’s a simple pleasure and he enjoys it when he can. Ryan is preoccupied with his own thoughts and doesn’t notice Amy turn into the alley and even if he did, he would not care. He knows what she’s going to do and he wants no part of it. He kills for Charlie, but he has no choice. His free will is suppressed and it provides him no enjoyment. He would not do it if given the option. He trudges ahead, enjoying the rain until he reaches the overpass. The first thing he is going to do is find the guitar player and smash her guitar.

  S

  Just short of the overpass, Amy pauses as Ryan continues. She is at the entrance of the pitch-black alley affording herself a few moments to observe her prey. Satisfied, she begins prowling along the wall for concealment, her plump red lips formed into a conniving evil grin. The couple inside continues with their debauchery, oblivious to their new friend. They can’t see her, but she can see them, one on both knees and the other has his back pressed against the wet brick wall, both hands on his amour’s head. She is feet away from them now and can smell the sex in the air, bewildered that they still do not notice her. The groans from the big man remind her of something that she can’t quite place, but it burns in the pit of her stomach. If someone could flip the memory switch ON, she would remember the youth minister of her church group and how he led her behind the bushes of their summer camp cabin to play hide-and-seek. He had a mustache that itched against her skin and he smelled oily like a big, hairy green olive.

  “Excuse me, gentlemen, but do you know where I can find my pussy—cat?” Wordsmithing in her best damsel-in-distress voice, she is now standing directly in front of the two men, legs spread, and her hands on her hips, her black high heels adding at least three inches to her height.

  The big man against the wall opens his eyes in shock. His jeans are gathered down around his ankles and his wrinkled, blue, security-guard shirt pulled up above his big gut.

  “What the fuck, shit,” he blurts with fear in his voice. When he sees Amy, his attitude completely changes and he smirks. He thinks he’s safe. No cops. Just a teeny-tiny little girl. “What ya’ want little girl? Next?”

  His hands are still holding his partner’s head down. His partner giggles against the man’s meaty, hairy thigh.

  Amy moves closer and places her hands gently on top of his and says, “Yes please.”

  The man’s shit-eating grin grows larger and Amy can see his yellow-stained teeth in the darkness and it angers her. No respectable person would allow their teeth to rot like that, she thinks.

  The man’s partner tries to turn his head to look up at her, tries to get up off his knees. The touch from Amy’s petite hands immobilizes both of them like a blast from a freeze ray gun. She likes her victims this way and now she is going to have her fun.

  “Okay, but it’s going to cost you a cigarette,” she says, kicking at a puddle, splashing water on the smaller man’s backside.

  “Hey, knock that shit off or I’m gonna bitch slap you,” he says, still unable to move.

  “Oh. I don’t think you’re going to do anything but suck that nasty, hairy johnson until I tell you otherwise,” Amy says, turning the young man’s head back into position to service the big man.

  “Why can’t we fuckin’ move, TJ?” the younger one asks with fear in his voice.

  The big man, TJ, begins to realize something isn’t right, and he finds himself in a position he’s not used to. He’s scared.

  “This bitch is some kind of witch.” TJ’s voice is now cracking from fear. “We’re sorry lady; let us go please. I have a wife and daughter, and Darrel’s a Jew.”

  Amy thinks, That makes no fucking sense, and then laughs out loud and starts singing:

  All your life you’ve never seen

  A woman taken by the wind

  Would you stay if she promised you heaven?

  Will you ever win?

  Will you ever win?

  She summons her power and flicks her right hand backward and Darrel’s body awkwardly flies through the air, crashing hard against the wall behind them. TJ can’t believe what he just saw and begins screaming. Amy gives him a school-teacher glare and gestures across her lips as if to zip them closed. TJ instantly shuts up. Unable to open his mouth, unable to talk. Invisible hands sew his lips together and he can feel every needle prick and the thread heat up as it’s pulled taunt. He can only whimper through his
blood-soaked lips. She looks like a little old lady trying to push a refrigerator as she gestures with both hands and TJ slams back into the wall—immobilized.

  Although he can’t speak, he can cry, and seeing the grown man’s tears mix with the rain and run down TJ’s face only heightens Amy’s anger-lust. She feeds off fear, off the pain. She marches over and picks Darrel up by grabbing a handful of hair so he is again on his knees. She cut her eyes over her shoulder to make sure TJ is watching and with one hand hooks his upper jaw (maxilla) and the other below (mandible) and rips Darrel’s jaw apart with ease. His lower jaw hangs exaggeratedly low, connected only by the ripped skin near his ears. The skin is the only thing keeping his chin from resting on his chest. Ignoring his pitiful gurgles, she grabs Darrel by his hair again, his knees hovering above the ground and walks her dog over to TJ. TJ’s puffy, red eyes plead for mercy. He will not receive any tonight. Amy is not in a giving mood. When they are close enough and TJ can see the carnage of Darrel’s face, his breathing grows frantic and he tries to scream, tries to plead, but he can do neither.

  Amy positions Darrel so both of the men are postured as she found them just minutes ago. Like a ventriloquist, she throws her voice while working Darrel’s mutilated mouth, “Do you like the color of my lipstick, big boy?”

  Darrel passed out from the pain.

  S

  Earlier in the night, in his stupid apartment, TJ buttoned his stupid uniform, disgusted that he was only a security guard when he knew deep down he should be a cop. If it wasn’t for his wife, early in their marriage when they were starry-eyed kids, calling the police and accusing him of choking her, and the visible bruising around her eyes and neck, he would be. He was raised abusive, watching his dad blame his mom for all of their problems and taking it out on her. To him beating your wife was part of a normal relationship. So sometimes he drinks a little too much or does a little too much coke or meth and takes it out on her because she deserves it. Tonight was one of those nights for him and on his way to work he stopped at his ‘make me feel better about my miserable life’ spot. He haggled a price for a quick blow job with Darrel, a street whore, who TJ knows he can get a little rough with and let off some steam from both his heads.