Sombre Read online

  SOMBRE

  S.B. NORTON

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  SOMBRE

  S.B. NORTON

  First published 2020 by Grimprint Publishing

  Copyright © 2020 S.B. Norton

  The right of S.B. Norton to be identified as the author of

  this work has been asserted by him in accordance with

  the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written consent of the publisher S.B. Norton (working as Grimprint Publishing). Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  GRIMPRINT

  PUBLISHING

  Dedicated.

  To the Norton–Wallace’s

  To Michelle for continuing to put up with this longwinded dream of mine.

  To my kids, Spencer and Lucy, for their general good behavior.

  Love you all.

  CHAPTER 1

  The Troubled Sleeper

  “Sombre …

  Hope Kelley let the word hang in the air. She said it again - this time in a whisper, “Sombre.” The whisper gave it shape, something tangible. It made it feel real.

  Sombre deserved at least that.

  Leaning on the bathroom vanity, Hope gazed at her reflection in the mirror. She sighed as she studied the pockmarked paddock across her cheeks and forehead. The pimple rash seemed to be getting worse. Frowning, she grabbed her toothbrush and stared as she cleaned her teeth. Her glasses sucked. Big thick, dorky lenses she was condemned to wear. Hope was born with woeful vision, (‘Myopia’ was the technical term) about as sharp as her grandmothers. Her sight had never gotten any worse, but it would never get any better. Toothbrush protruding from her pursed lips, she pulled her brown hair out of its ponytail and let it hang, framing her face. She didn’t mind her hair; it had its own natural wave thing going on. But lately her complexion was zombified. Complimenting the pimple outbreak, she had dark rings forming under her eyes.

  All of this had to do with her sleep.

  Sleep was exhausting.

  With a spit and rinse, she gave herself a final look in the mirror and left the bathroom. She pulled at her fingers as she crossed the hall; a nervous habit, with her left thumb and index finger she pulled and shook each digit of her right hand one at a time. She would do this often, until she thought she’d better stop, or someone pointed it out making her stop. She entered her room.

  Bed awaited. Her mother believed in buying only the best bedroom linen, and her fluffy and expensive, violet coloured Parisienne quilt sat folded over on one edge, inviting her in.

  Lately, she found the whole ensemble about as inviting as a coffin.

  Resting her glasses on her side table, she slipped under the cover, and let her eyelids collapse. She hoped for a dreamless night tonight. No Sombre. A night of nothing. She needed nothing - just a restful sleep; a wonderful, dreamless sleep.

  It wasn’t to be.

  S

  Pale pink roses and violets filled the room. Her cousin Sophie stood with her soon to be beau, Stuart. The straight-faced best man, Carmine, wearing an olive complexion and oiled black hair, stood two feet away. A smiling Jenny, the bridesmaid, was at Sophie’s back. The elderly celebrant delivered his service in a gentle tone. This was Sophie’s wedding. Hope loved Sophie. And she remembered this being a great day. Hope and her sister Kate had been flower girls.

  It was happening in slow motion, and that was alright, this was a dream.

  This was the rite of passage.

  Hope scanned the church from her vantage point at the front – her mother and father, friends and relatives; all seated in their suits, their ties, their dresses. All were happy, dabbing tears and smiling proud. She turned and looked at Kate. Her sister rolled her eyes, smirked and then shrugged. Kate often thought that she was too cool for just about anything – she would have thought she was too cool for this as well. Kate was thirteen, two years younger than Hope, yet always tried to act at least two years older. Hope saw a trickle of something run from the corner of Kate’s mouth. Her sister’s smile had darkened. She wondered what she could be up to.

  Rings were given and placed gently on fingers. The couple exchanged vows. Bridesmaid Jenny’s eyes welled with tears. On both saying ‘I-do’, loud applause filled the room - the noise unreal and deafening. Hope’s attention swung to the celebrant; he was doing poorly. He was staring in horror at her sister; sweat suddenly running down his cheeks, he began pulling at his face, as if needing to strip the skin from the bone. Like a possessed soprano, the old guy began screaming - high pitched and wet, sounding out like a kettle whistle. Face a furious hellish red, pressure building, his head seemed to be growing. The poor fellows scream changed to an impossible swine-like squeal, then cut off short as his skull combusted in final release. Broken bloody chunks sprayed Sophie’s wedding gown, patterning her elegant white features in a stark, red spatter.

  Hope watched on, horrified as her sister revealed a mouthful of blue liquid. Gasoline! Kate Kelley shut her gob. Puffing up her cheeks, she spat it at the newlyweds in an impossibly long hosing of blue. From under her flower girl skirts, she produced a box of matches, “Ha!” she giggled and feverishly slid the packet open - striking four at a time, she threw the matches at Sophie and Stuart. Mouths agape, clothes burning, the couple fell to the carpet and rolled in each other’s arms. Hope looked to where her mother and father were sitting, they were gone. Her sister was on the move. Hope spotted her on the other side of the chapel, blonde hair out of its carefully coiffured Chignon. She was running, with one hand hitching her dress, the other holding a long knife. Where did she get a knife! Stabbing everyone in her path, screaming, swearing, “Come here, you dusty old fossils! Taste some of this shit! Time to put you all out of your misery!”

  The whole chapel had risen, guests running this way and that way from her knife-wielding sister.

  Hope wasn’t running – she was too stunned to move. Why was her sister doing this? Appearing from nowhere, her mother and father faced her, both wearing the same murderous expression as her sister. “Don’t think you’re getting away Hope!” Her mother screamed. “All of this is your fault!” Eyes wild, she charged, blade held high.

  Hope cried out loud, ‘No! Why?’ Her mother bared down, she swung the blade and although this was a dream, Hope felt it.

  Laughing harder still, her mother slammed the knife into Hope’s mouth.

  For tonight, her rite of passage was complete.

  Hope’s vision went black as her sleeping self was taken on … to Sombre.

  CHAPTER 2

  She Fights In Hell, Denivens Hell

  Its tongue licked at the air. It spat blood at the toes of her boots.

  “Oh, you’re a disgusting thing, aren’t you?” Halliday Knight said sizing up her latest obstacle. The devil-imp was a hideous cross of Neanderthal baby-human and shaven mangy street dog. Claw-like hands scratched at the dirt. A wasted, bony body and leathery, oily skin. Prowling on all fours it coughed and spat more blood.

  Halliday took a smart step back.

  The creature guarded her entry; the foot of a small rising knoll. Sombre had called her to Denivens Hell, a potentially very lethal part of Sombre, even for a Gatherer of her stature. Tying her long blond locks in a knot, she looked onward through the flames and smoke. The place was hot, unbearably so. O
nce past this disgusting first point of contact, she wondered how long she would be able to last without burning to cinder. Dark crawling shapes prowled in the distance, silhouetted by the rising fires. “More of you ugly filthies’ no doubt,” she said reminding the creature again of how vile she found it, “I shall enjoy killing you.”

  It stepped closer in response, its head twisting a full circle, eyes flickering from black to red, then a sickly yellow white.

  Her feet were feeling rather hot in her black boots as she played with the trigger of her Remington. Would a bullet stop this damnable creature? Her sword was sheathed at her back. Maybe that was the go? Lop its head off. She took a step.

  With a low growl the monster gnashed its teeth and lunged, maw wide, exposing its full set of fangs. She pumped the trigger. The bullets punctured the flesh, smashed the Beating Clock face at its chest. It kept coming and she wheeled backward on her hot heels.

  “Oh, you bugger! Now I’ll have to cut you!”

  Spinning almost elegantly in a full 360’ she pulled her sword. With one swift strike, the head went flying. The rest of the monster collapsed.

  Halliday charged into Denivens Hell.

  Trill, overly familiar voices filled her head,

  “The Nightmarer, Halliday! You need to find the Nightmarer! You haven’t forgotten, have you?”

  “You know, I’ would have done, by now. This has been quite the lackluster showing.”

  “I agree. She’s having a go, though. She has a lot to live up to … I was a wonderful Halliday.”

  “Oh, go away, this isn’t helping me!” Halliday snapped at her antagonistic Other-selves. She had four Other-selves, and all four were a constant bane on her existence.

  The devil imps of Denivens Hell were suddenly everywhere, charging in their ten’s and twenties, hot sparks flying at their clawed hands, lunging through the smoke.

  “My god! Are you all breeding?!” she shouted with disbelief. With quick thinking, Halliday used a combination of the butt of the gun to smash them sideways and the razor-edged blade of the sword to slice and stab. The imps smashed into her legs, in a bid to take her off her feet.

  She held strong. Halliday was tough, with a body built to take most things. She had her limits though. Hamish the Mender had warned her of another stroke on her Beating Clock – quite simply, she couldn’t afford one.

  She kicked and sliced with her blade, cracked her gun across snouts. There was blood aplenty - the creatures seemed to have an endless supply in their gullets - most of which was spat at her face. She coughed and gagged and resisted the disturbing urge to lick the foul wet from her lips.

  “Well this is just great isn’t it!? The Nightmarer at the end of this better appreciate that I have suffered a face full of imp blood!” Her anger driving her on, she ramped up the violence and cleared the area. She ran.

  The terrain dipped into a gully full of screaming, metamorphosizing (not to mention, quite naked) men and women, crawling over the fiery dirt.

  “My word! It’s the devil-imp making place!” Repulsed, she stood watching the shaking, growing bodies. This was always tricky. Who were the residents of Sombre and who weren’t? There would only be one, it was rare that there was a second Nightmarer. Halliday looked for the Beating Clocks. Patting a flame out at her hem, licking her dry lips, she crouched down and hurriedly lifted heads so she could see the timepiece in each chest.

  Apparently, it was time for more advice,

  “You know these humans are ready to turn … I’d be careful, Hope’s Halliday!” an Other-self pointed out.

  Another Other-self chimed in. “If it was me, I wouldn’t bother checking … can’t she see the eyes? No pupils, just yellows. They’re all good to take down.” And then another Other’, “She moves like a snail, this one … I wonder if her Hope is the same in the waking world. You have to hurry, Halliday Knight – I can see tails forming!”

  “So, what all of you are saying, in an extremely roundabout sort of way, is go quickly and be careful?” Halliday said through a tight mouth. She began flipping the quivering bodies onto their backs. She registered how helpless they all were – not that they would be for much longer. Skin was burning away rapidly, curling like the edges of lit paper, revealing the devil-imp under their bodies.

  “If you do feel the need to comment … ugh!” There was a sudden, complete metamorphosis from human to imp. Halliday felt a snap of jaws at her hand, she pulled her digits back just in time, “Oooh! Almost got me!” She swung her sword and decapitated the newly formed monster, then finished her train of thought, “Yes, if all of you must comment, don’t just state the bleeding obvious!” Satisfied there was no Nightmarer in the gully, she left the soon-to-be monsters and continued on.

  As she ran, a thought occurred to her. (As thoughts sometimes did when her mind wasn’t being bombarded by her Other-selves) She supposed that the original Nightmarer of this hellhole was either named Deniven or surnamed Deniven, and he had dreamt of his own hell. Sombre thought his nightmare worthy of a spot in its nightmare world. In so many ways Sombre was quite a simple place, just not a nice place.

  She spotted a clumpy shadow in the smoke – a body accompanied with at least three devil-imps. This was her Nightmarer, she was sure of it. He or she had definitely expired.

  She sighed, a little defeated, “Anyway, I got you, I guess.”

  It would be just in the nick of time, as her whole body appeared to be cooking, her pale arms and legs glowing a worrying, heat flushed pink. She wondered, if she boiled, would her skin start to bubble?

  There was movement from behind. She swung round.

  The new imps had finished their disgusting metamorphosis and were prowling unsteadily, moaning and coughing up blood as they tested their new hands and feet.

  “Brand new devil-babies,” Halliday surmised.

  They weren’t babies. They would attack. She had to finish up. Turning her back on the next impending invasion, she approached the Nightmarer. Halliday stood over a young policeman lying face down in the fire swirls. Was he a real policeman? Or was he just dreaming of being a policeman? It didn’t really matter.

  She had arrived far too late for this one. Half the skull had been torn open exposing brain matter. The poor fellow’s arms were twisted at wild angles. Three gurgling and giggling imps continued to work the carcass over, claws digging into the flesh, mouths tearing through the clothes and finding bare skin. Bits of snapped rib poked through the clothes. The team of Denivens’ filthy beings had gotten to his insides.

  “Well, I hope you’re proud of yourselves, you scummy things! Look at the mess you’ve made,” she said kicking a gorging imp away from the lower back of the man.

  So very engrossed with feasting on their kill, the other two didn’t even move. This made it quicker. With two sharp blows she severed the heads of the creatures and pushed them off the mauled Nightmarer. The other imp had recovered from Halliday’s size 8 boot kick. Gore filled mouth squealing like a banshee, clawed hands out, it flew at her chest and caught on, fingers and nails tore through her dress, punctured her skin.

  “Oh geez!” somewhat surprised at the ferocity of the imp she dropped her sword, lost her footing and fell backward onto the policeman’s corpse – she was back to back - her back on his.

  “Oh no! Yuck! Yuck! Yuck!” she cried, grabbing the imp’s fat neck with both hands, “Get out of it you devil monkey!”

  The policeman’s corpse felt wet and hot. “Oh, this is beyond the call, surely!” She wrenched the imp’s neck. Its body was heavy. The monster had her in its grip and wouldn’t let go, clinging on, sharp hands and feet doing her all sorts of damage. She felt her dress catch on fire. This was no good at all - she had to do something fast. The imp’s mouth searched for her face and pulled it close to its own. It spat hot blood at her mouth.

  She thought of the gun digging into her hip - she couldn’t reach for it - there was no way she could hold this thing back with one hand.

  “Yo
u’re not costing me a stroke, you ass!” she cried out.

  This was always a last resort.

  But it had to be.

  She engaged her Morphia.

  Halliday completely lost control.

  She was no longer Halliday.

  She was her Morphia.

  Jaw breaking, her mouth transformed, her skin split and cracked open revealing a hideous inner. The Morphia’s body convulsed and muscularized under the devil-imp. Laughing gutturally, her Morphia grabbed the head with both hands and pulled the imp in closer.

  Her monster wanted it close.

  Her now iron-like jaw snapped, biting the creatures face viciously. Her hands ripped its neck open, pulling out the innards. It searched lower, broke and tore the ribcage wide. It slung the abused corpse away like rubbish. Still laughing like a lunatic, it turned and watched the inhabitants of Denivens Hell scatter.

  The Morphia vanished.

  Halliday Knight was left lying on a corpse.

  CHAPTER 3

  The Menders

  Her Other-selves were unsympathetic - plain nasty, really.

  ‘Well, that was quite an ordinary showing.’

  ‘You’re being too kind – it was downright awful! Look at the poor fellow! Hope’s Halliday certainly struggles, doesn’t she?’

  ‘Hamish will be most upset.’

  ‘She had to resort to engaging The Morphia as well! Ha! Very pissy indeed!’

  Dragging the policeman’s corpse through the rest of Denivens Hell, Halliday couldn’t help but agree with them. How could she argue? This mission was a monumental failure. Ahead, she saw a hilltop at the outskirts, with a signpost wrapped in barbed wire protruding from its peak. It looked flame and fire-free enough to call out to her place of employment.

  Scaling the hill, she read the sign, ‘Gavin Denivens Going to Hell’.