Stellar -- Chapter 1: Posessed

Chapter 1 – Possessed




It felt like his eyes had split open and were spilling their liquid contents into the back of his brain. His brain felt like someone had reached inside his head and punched it. He threw back some aspirin. Four, maybe five. He couldn't really tell you. And eased back into his black, flame-accented beanbag chair and took a big breath. The smell of dust filled his nostrils and settled in his lungs. It was incredible!
He never was so excited as the day he found out what dust was: dead skin cells, Fallen off the body. Every day, people breathe in the aroma of death and don't know it. He relishes in it.

This is him. So what is he called? Well some people call him killer.

That's flattering. Some call him son. He doesn’t really know where those people live anymore. Don't really care.

The TV flicker flashed against his corneas and shattered his skull. He grabbed at his hair in a fit to make it stop, noticing the cold sweat that soaked his brow. Groping the ground, he felt for the aspirin bottle. In a fit of panic, he only managed to knock it over and send the pills into an avalanche. He fell to the fetal position and pushed his hands against his ears. The television set sounded like a loudspeaker in his cranium, thumping thunder in his veins like an artificial heart. In place of the one that died last year.

In one last desperate attempt to save his sanity, he grabbed his axe from its leaning position on the wall and drove the blade into the luminescent screen. At once there was a display of shards of glass and showers of sparks. And then it was over.

He tried his very best to be a good quiet soldier. A peaceful soldier. No dice. So he will settle for trying not to scream like a demon. The demon he was. The demon he is. And then he screamed.



^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

“Ciara. Ciara Simons,” she could vaguely make out the sound of a name. Her name, Ciara. Her eyelids flew open and she sat up in her seat. “Ciara Simons, are you in here? I’ve called three times now! You are about to be taken off the signup sheet!” she heard a voice booming into the loudspeaker. It was Marsha, and, boy, did she sound mad.

With a stumbling shove, she fell out of her seat and into the side aisle with a thud! before yelling, “I’m here, I’m here!” to assure them she was not running late. Two years ago she missed the talent show auditions and last year she tried out but fell flat on her face, only not quite as literally as this year, with her nose in a piece of flattened gum that had probably been dropped there some ten years ago. But she was determined. Her fellow student body would see her magic act. They would be amazed.

She jumped up and smoothed down her ashy-gray tutu while straightening her top hat, all before running down the length of the aisle. She wanted to look special for the auditions so she decided to borrow the black blouse with the green vines growing all over it that Kat (one of the few good friends she had) owned.

As she ascended the stairwell on stage right she heard a whisper, faint as it was, from somewhere in the auditorium. As she gripped the railing she heard it vibrating in her mind, “Why does she wear those hideous outfits?” and then a scoff. “Why doesn’t she straighten that hideous frump of hair?” the person beside them replied softly. Ciara found herself frozen, and reached up to touch her curly black hair, feeling her nerve-endings light up with self-consciousness all throughout her body. Somewhere towards the back, someone was muttering “Nice getup, princess.” This compliment was actually meant to hurt, were it meant to be heard. But it wasn’t.

I’m an idiot, aren’t I? Why do I even bother? she asked herself. Am I a freak? But she knew the answer to all three questions quite well. She’d thought them many times.

She swallowed hard, removed the wand from her sleeve, and took to the stage with a look of no fear. Ciara grabbed her leaning card table and the small tote full of tricks that she had set up against the curtain and walked out to center stage.

“Ciara, since you neglected to be ready when your name was called, do try to make the setup quick,” the teacher’s aide whined.

Marsha Borders, for some reason or another, did not like Ciara, and Ciara could not even begin to fathom why. She had always been strenuously nice and invited her to many things at the church she went to, desperately trying to reach out to her. Sometimes, she assumed, people just don’t want to be happy. It both irritated her and gripped her heart in a feeling of sympathetic sorrow. If her heart is hollow, Ciara realized, she can’t be helped.

This would be her year. This would be her year. She kept reminding herself: this would be her year. Things would be different this time. She unfolded the table.

As the house lights dimmed to nothingness and the spotlight zeroed in on her, she breathed deep and asked God for strength. Strength to do this, or get through it, anyways.

Ciara waved her wand above the bag as it sat on the card table and heard her background music come on. It appeared as though all of her things she needed were floating out. Of course it did, though. God had given her this talent and she had worked and worked on her act until her it was seamless.

As she proceeded on with her set, she continued to feel happier and happier until she found a smile on her face by the curtain close. Everything had gone off perfectly!

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Everything went perfectly! She was an amazing girl for sure. After all, Stellar would not be caught at the talent show thingy were it not for her. She was that much worth it.

As he watched the curtains close on her act, stealing away the precious face that haunted his dreams and brought numbness to his nightmares, he wished he could have been sitting near the front, where she would have seen him. Instead, he was three rows up from the back, tucked away in an oddly shaped section of the auditorium. Oh, well. So is the nature of his destiny, he figured.

As he slinked his way out of his seat, he looked back up at the stage, where only seconds before the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen had stood. And then, out of habit, allowed himself to be consumed by a crazed stare and a thought process: he began to mentally undress her, with her curving lines, the pale brown tint of her skin, and the soft scent of her curly black hair. It was unbearably exciting!

She deserves better than this… that stupid small voice said. He hated that small voice that made him feel, well, guilty. There were far worse people out there for him to be worrying about his little acts of pleasure. Now to touch her, that would be—crossing the line, he decided. She deserved better. But that voice was still stupid!

It’s time to go, Stellar. There are things to be done. Now here was a voice he liked better. This voice always agreed with Stellar. With the things Stellar wanted to do.

Stellar decided it was time to go. He had things to do.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

As he walked down O’Brian Avenue that was soaked in the orange glow of the evening sun, with his faded green jacket and the baggy jeans that Adam had given him, he saw them. Were it not for Adam and the other guys that belonged to the Slaughter, Stellar would be alone.

There they go again!

They were in the shadows. They were always in the shadows. Watching him. He caught a glimpse of the crimson-soaked sclera demanding his attention, and when he studied them for a second, he quickly came to understand their meaning. They were pointing.

Stellar visually followed the direction of the eyes into a one-way turnoff that he didn’t recognize, probably not leading to a destination of any decent person’s interest. He shuffled his way in to the ten-foot opening about forty feet and waited. And waited. And waited a good ten minutes before deciding the pills were getting to him and it was time to leave.

As he turned to go back out the alleyway, he noticed the light disappear from behind him. When he turned around. He saw it standing there: seven feet tall and broad-shouldered, eccentric ornamental headdress with beaded strings and deformed dreadlocks pouring out of it, tiki mask that had been painted to look as if it were in mid scream, and a black shroud that enveloped it and formed arm-type tentacles at the end that were writhing around with fury. Another two, slightly less decorated bodies moved in behind it, and Stellar flashed his head around to notice one more making its way down the opposite side, only twenty or so feet from Stellar now.

So Hell had come to pay him a visit…again.