Revelation 3

He stepped toward me with his gloved hand extended.

“I’m Jack of the Red Hand,” he said, smiling. “I know of your problem and sympathize. We can protect you.”

“Yeah? Who’s ‘we?’”                                              

He produced a card and handed it to me. “We are the Illumined. We know things no one else knows. We are working for a better future. We can protect you from Her.”

The card looked all fancy and everything, but I wasn’t sold. Who the hell was this guy? How did he know these things? “Why should I believe you? How are you gonna protect me from a poltergeist that tries to kill me through freak accidents?!”

“You will be in our custody,” he said. “And our trained professionals will handle everything. While you’re with us, though, you might even be able to help us attain our goals.”

“I need proof, dude. I’m not just going with some random guy who, for all I know, could be a delusional stalker!”

“Fine, fine.” He absentmindedly stared at his glove. “If you accept the deal, help for help, you’ll have your proof. If it’s not good enough, just say so and the deal’s off.”

He held his gloved hand close, and I shook it. Hey, what else was I going to do? Wait for those idiots outside to come to an obvious solution? I couldn’t call 911 myself, lost my cell phone in one of her “accidents.”

As soon as I shook on the deal, the nail slid painlessly out of the wound and the board flew off to the side somewhere. I could see a faint handprint over the wound, which must have been holding it closed, since I wasn’t bleeding no more.

He helped me to my feet and we walked into a strange corridor I hadn’t noticed before.

It seemed like those underground tunnels under monasteries in Europe, catacombs or whatever. Skulls were embedded in the walls all over the place and there were huge cobwebs in the corners. As I limped along behind Jack, I could see into some other passages opening off on either side. These were full of books. I mean FULL.

I stopped lingering and looking in these rooms after I noticed in one of them were a bunch of gigantic spiders made of bone. Made of fucking bone.

They started skittering after me, and I limped as quick as I could, but it hurt too much. I called to Jack, who turned around and held up his gloved hand. The spiders stopped chasing me, but I was still creeped out. I’ve always hated bugs.

We had walked down these dark, dank pathways for what seemed like hours when I saw a light ahead of us.