1/1

Set I: The Graveyard Shift

In the Brutal depths of an endless- hell: you can either drop dead or keep walking….

From Hell to You

-Harrison Ciccarelli

The black ashen gravel crumbled underfoot as we walked the endless planes. The black cat at my heel scampered to the edge of the ridge and hissed. I watched him disappear over the edge as I strode over to peek down. The rib-bones of some fell beast lie protruding from the cliff, sheltering the pitiful whelp cowering within. I sighed and pulled the spade off my back. Cracking my legs, I leapt over the edge, landing hard at the bottom.

My footbone flew off and I fell to a knee. Omen mewed in exasperation and scampered over to return my footbone. I sat and snapped it back into place, giving it a crack as the thin strands of sinew and marrow began to knit it back into place. I stood up and shook my foot. The jangling noise of calcified bone finally clued in the cowering whelp to our presence.

“Dead? Where? How? Who? GAHAHAHAH! Where…. Bone… Bone BONES!!!!!” The pitiful man screamed and yelled. “GET AWAY!”. I huffed in exasperation and yanked up the whelp. I lifted him a few feet off the ground by the scruff of his neckbone. His feet kicked the air helplessly before going limp: softly sobbing to himself.

I opened my jaw and brought my face close: eye socket to eye socket: “You done screaming yet, bud? Cryin’ aint gonna do nothin’ but sate the sadists….” The mans jaw cracked fully open and began screaming in agony. I sighed. “I know bud, I know…. This is for your sake not mine…”. I grasped the bottom of his jaw and yanked it free. I tossed it to Omen who jumped to catch it and began nibbling on it with his fangs. Unable to undulate, the man thrashed and fought, but it did ‘im no good.

I wasn’t going to fight this one the whole trek back. Nor did I want to carry ‘im. I turned to the beast at my foot nibbling the man’s jaw. “Oi, stop teething and pass me that chain from earlier.” Omen, looked at me with blood red eyes and an unamused expression. He licked his paw, then began to gag as if he were yukking a hairball. Link by link, a metal chain was regurgitated from wherever the ‘soot he stored such things. “That fat bloodskin better pay us right this time Strongback. I tire of catching these petulant souls. Surely his own imps can catch the ones too weak to trek-on or die.”

I began wrapping the poor bastard up in chains with my back to Omen: “It’s about time we were heading on anyhow. When we turn in, we’ll tell the Yardmaster we’re cashing out.” Omen looked unconvinced. “And when he cheaps out again or tells you that you owe him more cadavers for a payout?” I took my spade which was standing in the dirt and smashed it heavily against our captive’s skull. He stopped thrashing. “If it happens again, we take what we’re owed anyways...”

---

The borders of the Yard stretched from Criv Canyon in the West all the way to Mount Divot in the East. No one makes it past the Sticks River south, nor the Redlands up north. In the time I’d been working this stretch, I aint seen nothing worse than strays and servitors. Most Yards I’d worked ‘afore would have all manner of hellspawn and cretins tormenting would be runners. Poor bastards ‘round these parts are so split from their gourd that the sheer terror of looking up at the sky and seeing nothing but blackfire ’s enough to spin ‘em looney. Even the Daemons that spawned from ‘em were pitiful.

I continued dragging the chain behind me. My quarry slid along the ashen soil like a bag of bones… ‘Cept there wasunt no bag; Damn cat lost our only one. I turned to the lazy bastard napping on our prey’s ribcage. I yanked hard on the chain and Omen flew headfirst into a headstone. His legs snapped backwards to land the impact and he rotated onto the ground, paws down. “Oi, time to work! Find this sorry SOD’s patch of Sod.” Omen hissed. I reached for my shove, and he feinted his hiss into a yawn. I gave ‘im an eye and he finally stood to work.

With a snapping, splitting noise the cat’s tail bifurcated and inverted into a pair of fleshy tendrils… The strange appendages began running along the ground, tilling soil like a tractor. He pawed the ground like he was ready to pounce before suddenly darting off to the south, his tails raised like a divining rod. I grabbed the chain and put heel to dirt.

I saw something floating far in the distance… Looked almost like a whisp, but it was singing a fatal aria…. I had a bad feeling the Yardmun would use it as an excuse to make me do one final job. But that was a problem for later…

‘Slackjaw’, as I called ‘im, finally came around just Omen picked out his bed. The soil had been burst through and there were claw marks around the edge of the pit. I had wrapped the chain around his Slacked jaw for better grip; I unwound the chain from the jaw and smacked it back into his head. I grabbed the sorry sod by the neck and hoisted him over the hole.

“NO! Wait please! Don’t leave me here!” I shake my head and muter: “Them’s the breaks bud. You didn’t turn straight into a whisp, so that means you got at least a little will in ya. Maybe next time y’ull make it out before breaking down. Or yuh can take the easy route and sleep here until yuh sleep no more. Either way, its no skin off my back…. Er… You know what I mean.” Slackjaws’ mouth went agape and began screaming: “No! I don’t wanna die! I don’t wanna die!” Omen’s fleshy tendrils slapped back into a tail which he used to carve a notch on Slackjaws Ancifix with a rock. “Sorry bud. Rules round here is you either Shit or Get off the pot. Either yuh pass on in this hole or yuh get busy and spend eternity trudging the infinite hellscape with fellas a lot less kind than I….”

I released my grip and Slackjaw tumbled skull over heel into the hole. I untied the Spade from my back and started slinging mud. Slackjaw stopped screaming once his head was under. I put my back into it and topped ‘er off. I flipped the spade over and slammed to compact the soil.

I muttered a soft plea “Sleep damn ‘ye…”

---

To our dismay, things went down exactly as we had expected. The Yardmun was happy to let us go, hell he’d even pay us: So long as we do one final job... Omen was less than pleased. Where’as I was kicking myself for not grabbin’ that whisp when I had the chance ‘tuh. If I had, we mighta been done by now.

“Please, can’t we just kill the Yardmaster and be done with it? The horny wretch has it coming. The adjacent Yardmasters might even reward us for doing it!” Omen bellyached and clung lazily to my shoulder bones like it was a cat tree. I sighed. “Devils ‘ll hold ya to yer word just as sure you can hold ‘em to theirs. Our contract technically isn’t up for another hour. Shitty ‘s it is, we did sign it.” Omen stared unamusedly. “You signed it. Not I.” I turned my head back forward. “Using a bonescratch wrapped in one of yer hairballs.” I added. Omen twisted my skull around with his tail to face him. “So what you’re saying is I can count you as dependant on my next high interest loan as long as I got a toe or tooth?” I picked up the lazy bastard and tucked him under my arm squeezing very tightly. “Ye can run from a loandevil all you want but I’ve always wanted to be a bounty hunter… You gonna make my dream come true all on yer lonesome?” His reply was silent contemplation. After that, the matter was settled.

I strode over the rocky black hills towards the Sticks in the south. Most of the whisps wound up there. Hopefully she wasn’t a wraith, they’re a bitch to deal with… Omens ears perked up and I skid down a gravely slope. “Songs getting closer. Its incoherent, rambling, pleading. Ive never heard of a wraith begging for help before. Must be something else.” At the bottom of the slope I skid to a stop and caught my balance. I scratched my cranium with a boney finger. “If shes singing then you might want ta cover yer ears…” He looked over quizzically. “Why? My form having ears doesn’t make me any more immune to her curses than you.”

I spunk my head around and glared at him riding on my back. “I don’t wanna hear no fussin’ or whining later.” Rolling his eyes Omen leapt from my shoulder and ran ahead along the flat ground towards the river. Stretching out across the Horizon was a soupy aether of miasma and necrosis. Chunks and bits bobbed in the river, casting long shadows and twisting silhouettes. Omen dry heaved at the smell. Without nostrils to burn I walked further towards the Sticks.

The scared cat kept his distance twenty feet from the target; tail raised in high alert. Knelt cross-legged on the shore, singing a soft aria was a Woman, not a whisp. Her long black hair cascaded down her pale back. Her delicate fingers gripped her shoulders as she sat still. She wore a plain black Mourning gown that hugged her curves well and her bare feet dug into the ashen soil. With no notice of us, she sang her mournful song.

I grabbed my spade and set it in the dirt in front of me. I placed both hand onto of the handle. “At’sa lovely song there miss… But if you won’t be swimming across, its time for you to go back…” Her song stopped and slowly she turned to face me. Her eyes were caked in runny mascara like one of them Ruccuoons. Her gentle brown eyes looked from me to the cat and then back to me.

She parted her lips and softly spoke. “This place…. It’s the river of souls, isn’t it?…”

“Yes, and if you would just take a dip in there we can be done with this matter. Whatddya say lady? Make our lives a little easier wont ya?”

Her lip quivered and the Mourning girl let out a deafening screech. Omen was launched backwards tumbling across the soil until he hit a rock, his neck was at a funny angle and his ears were bleeding. I dug my heels and held my spade. My bones were vibrating and I had to clench my jaw to stop it chattering and shattering. “Lovely voice you got there miss.” I spin my head around to see Omen slowly pulling his neck back into place by the rock. “Fret not bout that, my cats kind’uv an asshole.” She recoils as I step forward and sit next to her in the burnt sand of the Sticks’ shores. Like most who stay in the yard, Im nearly twice her size. I haunch over and stare across the waters of death. I speak softly. “You were right. This is the river of death, river stix, river of time, whatever the ‘soot yer wanna call it. It runs so far and long it loops back on itself. The other shore there is three days swim. If you don’t dissolve into aether by then. If you were ever going to escape the yard, I recommend ya don’t cross here…. Some folks have luck climbing Mt. Divot. But it usually takes them a few centuries to get the guts for it.”

The Mourning girl looked up at me with a somber expression. “You… speak, as if there is some hope of escaping this place?” I scratch my rib bones and try to break it to her. “This place? No. Not a chance. This yard?… You’ll have to find the guts to leave yourself. Thems the breaks. If you wanna give up, you can take a nice nap until you stop napping forever…” She looks up at the blackfire sky. “What’s out there? What hope is there in hell?”

“Hope? Ye wont find delusions like that down here… You either wander. You sever. Or you fade. You’ll only wish you were dead if you serve. The other two choices…. Aint much of a choice… Some of us can’t sleep… I envy the ones who can…”

We sat there for a while, listening to the distant screams of souls escaping and evaporating in the Sticks. I heard the soft patter of something skittering and spun around to see Omen running full speed towards the Mourning girl. He lowered his head with his tendrils split and poised. The girl panicked and stood to her feet. Omen lept at her, trying to push her into the river. She fell off balance as his hard tiny head stuck her with a heavy impact and they both fell back into the Sticks. Immediately, they began to fade, they were engulfed in bubbles and steam as their bodies were dissolved into necril slurry. I dropped my spade beside me and dove in after them.

They call it the Sticks because bones take the longest to dissolve… Still, the infinite black and nerotic green quintessence burned each layer of calcium one by one in utter agony. I kicked off a large shard of bone floating by. Like a forest being washed down river, except the trees are bones of long dead hellspawn. I looked in the murky black and saw them at the bottom, slowly tumbling along the ground deeper and deeper. I looked at my armbones as I swam, they were getting thinner and thinner. Another few seconds and there’d be nothing left.

Finally, I reach them and swing out an arm to grab the girl but my hand goes straight through her. Her body is faded and hardly visible, but even still, she has Omen clutched into her chest. I try one more time to swipe through her when my hand passes clear through her back and into Omens sloughing skin. I pull the damned cat up and out with me and the girl comes with him.

---

I lie face up on the black sandy shores of the Sticks… Beside me Omen is screaming in agony. His skin has been dissolved down to the muscle. I turn to my other side. The girl is silent and prone in the fetal position. Where her skin was pale and white, it is now ethereal and translucent.

“You get what you’re owed” I mumble to Omen. “Sure it hurts, but you’ve grown back skin before, haven’t ye?” “Yaaaaoooooww. Agh…. IT HURTS!” “That sure don’t sound like a thank-ya?” He continued screaming in agony… I ignored him and turned to Mourning girl. I tried to touch my hand to her shaky shoulder, but my bones passed straight through her form with minimal resistance. I sighed. “Sorry miss, looks like yer not long for this world. Spirits don’t last long here, least not intact.”

She silently sobs and I leave her to calm down… Calcified black flakes start forming on my shoulders. I dunno where the nearest Milkmaid was, but we’d probably have to trek for it. Once Omen’s done his hubris, I’ll have him give me that spectral net, so we can take her back to where she came from. With any luck she’ll have her final rest, and we’ll finish our business with that sulfurous Salaciator. Dainty thing like her deserves to rest. Not wander or serve…

High in the sky above us blares the heralding trumpet of the Yardmaster’s entourage. Above us, a dozen wretched imps carry their bulbous red master through the air, for his wings are too small to fly. Two of them blow into horns to proclaim their master’s descent. The palanquin of bones and brimstone is lowered before us, hovering over the Sticks. In a nasally and pitulent voice the Devil greets me. “Ah. Strongbalkkk. I see you have captured me something… dddddeeeee-lectable.” The fat devil licks his lips as he oogles the Mourning girl. “I sayyyyy, she will make an excellent concubine in my court.” I cut the Yardman off. “Tick tick, big red. Wheres our payout? We done all the work ye asked for and our contracts up here in a sec, so if’ts same with ye, I’ll take my pay and be outta here.” The devil turns from oogling the Girl back to remembering that I’m there. “Dear Stron, my boy, you’ll never ascend the courts with an attitude like that. You oughtta ‘schmmoooze a little. A cunning devil like myself can make great things happen for ya. If you’re lucky, you might even get to serve me as a lesser Devil for all eternity. Dossssent that sound swell oooold boy?” I reach inside my cranial cavity and fish out a scroll of paper. I toss it at the Yardmaster. “Stamp it. Now.”

“My my, you mortals are so short sighted. Fine, if you say you’re done. I’ll cut you loose, with a bonus for bringing me such a delicious prize… But don’t forget, that no matter where you trek to, you won’t find a more beneeeeeviiiiolent master to serve in all the hells. If you’re smart and you last long enough, you’ll come crawling back to meeeee. And I have nothing but time to wait, to help bags of bones like yourself to become something in this infernal land.”

The Yardmaster unrolls my contract and stamps it with a pudgy finger. From under one of his many jiggling folds, he withdraws a small sack and tosses it to me. I snatch it as he throws it and I examine the contents. A dozen pearly white and black beads lie in the bag. I inspect one by biting it before putting it back and shoving the bag in my cranium.

“I’ll Sulfur you no longer Yardmun. I’ll take the great rest before you find me back here… “

I pick up Omen who has mostly calmed down and was hyperventilating. His muscles contract and stick to my bones. I drape him over my shoulder like a steak on a grill and begin trekking off.

I hear the Yardmaster command his minions to bring his new ‘prize’ to him. I keep my eyes on the ground and keep walking. This aint exactly a place of mercy and compassion. Besides, defying a devil lord would be… unwise for our longevity.

I hear a shriek behind me as the Mourning girl is assumedly grabbed by the imps and carried to the Yardmuns litter. The screaming continues and I can hear the Devil lord shouting commands at his minions. I spin my head back to see the wretched imps touching her body, trying to lift her, but their hands slip straight through her ethereal form. “A wraith eh? No matter, there are plenty of ways to grab a spirit.” The foul yardmaster spits a moldy yellow loogie into his hands and rubs them together. He commands his imps forward as he leans over precariously from his seat, not wanting to get off. He touches her leg and his gnarled finger draws blood from her soft skin. Ectoplasma seeps forth in red pools from her as the Yardmun strains himself again to reach out and grab her other ankle.

The Mourning girl kicks and screams for help as the repugnant oaf lifts her up by the legs. Her dress dangling over her head revealing lacey black underwear. I stare at the scene a few moments…. I weigh the gems in my head… I weigh the strength of a Devil. I weight the weight of my remaining soul…

“Damnation….” I mutter. With a wince of pain, I snap my right arm off with the left. I flick my wrist and hurl the arm towards the Yardmun.

My right arm socks the Devil in the face, stunning him for but a moment. His sharp and twisted, phlegm covered nails dig deeper into the girls leg as she kicks helplessly to be free. I start running forward while I will my arm to grab the Yardmun’s horns. Using the horn as an anchor, the elbow snaps back and begins repeatedly bludgeoning the hellspawn in the face with my Humerous. Bashing his face in, the Devil drops his prey; the girl falls head first into the black sand and crumples. Taking strides, I punt the nearest Imp across the Sticks where he lands with a splash and dissolves into a fast slurry. I use my Left arm to pull the Shovel from my back and brain two more pitiful whelps as I charge straight for the Yardmun who’s yelling at his Palanquin bearers. “What are you doing! Move me away from the river. If I should fall--!” To make his worst fears come true, I drop my shove and jump onto the litter, causing it to sway and swing precariously over the Sticks. My humerus ceases its battery and snaps back to my shoulder socket. I yank hard on the Devils horn and pry it free with a satisfying crack.

With a wave of his hand, Hellish sigils form and morph into a black shadowy tendril which slams me backwards away from the Litter. I land hard in the dirt while the Yardmun screams: “Alright! Alright! I wont stand for such disrespect much longer. Begone from my sight before I have an army sent after you.” The shadow hand continues extending from the Devils hand and pushes me across the dirt, pebbles and scree kicking around my ribcage as I slide. The devil commands his imps to set him down, while he stands to his feet. “My loyal minions will drag you to the border of my yard and you will never return. Consider this my last mercy on a sleepless-shithead!” The remaining imps drop the Palanquin and surround me. I kick at them but they grab my shovel and toss it aside. They get a hand under my ribcage and through my legbones and with the strain of a dozen tiny wings they lift me slowly into the air..

On the ground the Yardmun has lost interest in me and was slowly advancing on the girl. She slowly stirrs as he looms over her. She looks up at me being carried away into the sky and lets out a deafening cry. The Yardmun staggers back and falls on his fat ass. The imps on the other hand, scream and grab their skulls. Using their feet to carry me, they continue flying while the scream shakes my bones to the marrow. The imps heads get larger and larger until they pop with a squelching noise and spray of gore. I fall thirty feet down into a rock landing hard on my back. I roll off to the ground and attempt to stand.

The Yardmun, panicked at the incessant scream and loss of his entrourage, crawls forward to the Screaming girl and clamps her face shut. “Seven HELLS! WILL YOU SHUT UP!” His hands wrap around her mouth and her throat. Silencing her. My bones stop shaking and I press through the agony to stride forward, back hunched over. I grab my spade from the dirt and charge at the Yardmun screaming! With a sharp cleave, I slice one of the Devils hands off, causing him to drop her and roll on the ground in agony. I lunge forward and plunge the spade into his knees, crippling him. With a swipe of his tail he grabs my neckbone and snaps it. My head flies off into the dirt next to the Mourning girl. She stares blankly at the Sticks. Poor thing must be wishing she’d dissolved whole right about now….

The Yardmun sits up and the fat bastard rolls over my body, pinning me flat. He uses his good hand to draw sigils in the air. The devil channels dark energy into his crippled limbs which snap and pop as they slowly right themselves. Unable to act, I will my head to roll forward before my bones are crushed to poweder by gluttony and hedonism. As I feel the darkness encroaching, the light fading and the bonds of my mortal coil being prepared for the final severance. A soft song fills my head. The girl softly sings a dark song of awakening. The waters of the Sticks churn and bubble. Wraiths and spirits emerge in a coagulated slurry of ectoplasma forming tendrils to pierce and grab the Yardmun.

With nothing to do but watch, I witness the tendrils bend and sway to the will of the songstresses’ call. Dark magic is absorbed by the primordial mass stretching free from the river of death. The Yardmun gives his final curses as he is dragged into the Sticks and dissolved to aether…

As soon as he’s gone. The song ceases and the deathly tendrils return down under the river.

I pick my head up and reattach it to the neck. The bones clatter and crunch as they seat where they should be. The girl sits alone, quietly staring at the waters…

I stand behind her… “Im sorry for the trouble miss… Thanks for having my back…”

Wordlessly. The girl stands. She places her hands over her chest and pleas. “You don’t remember your name, do you…” I solemny nod. “None do. Names are for the living and for Hell’s caretakers… Not wayward souls like us…”

She looks into my eye sockets, bearing into my very being. “There will be more like him; wont there?….” I nod.

“Theres no escape but the void; isn’t there?...” I nod.

She considers her next questions carefully.

“Where will you next go?”

I mumble. “Elsewhere. Wherever I can keep busy…”

“Will you go… alone?”

I kneel down to eyelevel with her.

“Like I said. My cats a bit of an asshole. But we’re a team.”

I offer my hand to her. “If you’re an insomniac like us… Well, there’s nothing else in this yard ‘aside from ‘dem bones…”

Smudging her runny mascara, the girl dusts herself off and silently nods.

“I suppose… Sleep is for the dead….” The girl chides demurely.

She gracefully walks over to Omen and picks him up in her ethereal arms. She begins softly singing a lullaby to quell his regenerative agony.

And with that… We trek on…..

\\ To be continued…