Tunnels: The Darkest Nexus by Kenneth Neal
“No Idea is too small. All Ideas are Sparks. A Spark can create an Inferno.”
-Kenneth Neal
(c)2011, Kenneth Neal, and its affiliates and assigns and licensors
All rights reserved
Registration Number: TXu 1-707-063
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-Chapter Titles-
Prelude 4
Hide and Seek, Hide and Die 6
Another Night Out 8
Regret and Recovery 10
Sudden Departure 12
Media Blitz 14
Home Invaders 15
Those Goddamn Brats 18
60 Miles An Hour 22
Thank You For Shopping 25
Tunnels and The Soulless 28
Maintain Coexistence 31
Electrical Interference 33
An Angel Descends 35
No Longer Safe 37
Let Them Feed 39
Seal Them! Seal Them All!!! 41
Global Reports Confirmed 43
-- TUNNELS: The Darkest Nexus --
……
Prelude
……
Human beings have always been a curious species. The sight and the sound of something new and unfamiliar outside of the daily drags would spark an innate investigative instinct. Humans have been conditioned to use solid ground to crawl and walk upon, walls made of brick constructed to separate the uninvited. Despite this known fact, folklore has mentioned fragments in time where mortals have been able to traverse through buildings made of stone and granite, passing through without caution or resistance.
Strange apparitions with a blue florescence have been recorded by historians at random points in time. Some have quoted these appearances as a wavering column of light, as the flickering flame atop the wick of a candlestick in past times. Various religious sects have given these rifts many labels, none of them are holy nor sacred.
Scripture can be translated from many of the old books, written in tongues across the planet depicting these gateways as icons to be feared and destroyed. However, modern times have made laws such as these and many others to be considered relics, unconstitutional, and only small pockets in our society would hold these teachings to heart.
These occurrences are rare in frequency and vary in size, deemed to be shimmering spectacles of light coming from the natural order, celebrated as the aurora borealis for some. Taking snapshots and home video of each portal for amusement, ready to post on Facebook pages to share with friends and family, to the point in which being within sight of one would be considered an omen in some cultures.
Leaders in Earth Sciences have attempted to decree a labored theory as a buildup of gases or refractions of light that would explain this phenomena, very few were brave enough to make contact or send human life through one without any initial repercussions.
……
Hide and Seek, Hide and Die
……
A set of kids, between ages of 8 and 12, playing in a Sequoia wooded engaged in a game of “hide and seek”. The kids disperse while the countdown has started leaving the main playground open and deserted with the one exemption of the one now known as “It”. All of their hiding spots are very good, well concealed as they stay motionless one by one, behind these massively branched behemoths. One little boy turns around as the end of the countdown draws near. He is confident that he can find a larger tree for refuge and was able to quickly locate a much older, much grander Sequoia uphill.
He makes the charge against the staggering incline as he is seconds away from being spotted from down below. What he finds is the largest Sequoia in sight as the light cascades between its sky-clearing branches. He reaches his destination, panting from exhaustion, he makes the occasional peak to detect any pursuers following his trail. Resting his back against the bark of the tree, he is completely oblivious of the aura of blue light reflecting off his back, sending off blue lens flares swirling about him.
Embedded within the tree bark, a cavernous void opens behind him, allowing a massive forearm to stretch through, with its scaly clawed hands grasping the little boy shrieking in terror. He is pulled back as the creature’s arms coil around him, jerking his shaking body, while tearing through its vertebrae and torso in a diagonal slash. The kid can be heard screaming across the park, alerting the others scattered about the area, leaving everyone stunned and puzzled of the messy visual before them.
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Another Night Out
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Earth, our rotating planet can be seen from countless miles away and from many vantage points. San Francisco, California, under the nightsky, revealing an eager 28-year old named Daniel in his high-rise condo preparing for a long awaited Friday night out to a poplar nightclub.
He drives down the road with electro-house music (Stephen J Kroos “Distentio”) playing until he reaches his destination. Daniel makes a trip to the men’s room, making sure everything is set right in the mirror, goes to the auto-towel dispenser, waving his hand for a towel. He receives one, but would prefer a second, waving, waving, and waving his hand again until finally another rolls outward. From there, a DJ is spinning with girls and guys dancing enjoying themselves as Daniel rendezvous with the bartender. Ordering a round of his favorite drink, he spots another gentleman next to him as he is enjoying the music and the crowd.
The two greet each other with conversation as Daniel proceeds to gaze at the other gentleman and ask him with false assertiveness, “So, what he is doing later tonight?” The other guy slams his drink down, puzzled, and becomes enflamed with anger. “What did you ask me?” Punches Daniel’s face with a frontal assault, then yelling “You are in the wrong damn club man… “My wife is dancing over there!” Extending his arms pointing to his far left, nearly knocking the drink out of another man’s beer from his hand, “Hey watch it bastard!!!” “Whoa, whoa, whoa fellas!!!” coming from the bartender. Daniel stumbles out of the club leaving the onlookers to gawk at the night’s awkward situation. He wakes up Monday morning in a daze, looking in the mirror taking a glance at the shiner, making a deep sigh, leading up to another corporate workday.
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Regret and Recovery
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Driving into a busy intersection in his sporty sedan again with his electro-house pulsing from his car speakers (most likely a Subaru of some kind), he pulls into the Left-most turning lane and is the last one in line. Braking at the red light, he pulls the rear-view mirror down towards his direction. He takes another look of a reminder of what a fun-filled weekend has in store for someone of his caliber; bruised with shiny reds and purples on the right-side of his face. Into the mirror’s reflection Daniel continues to probe and stare, his “not-quite healed but still very noticeable” bruise on his upper cheek is still throbbing. He notices that the light shifts to green and he begins to build his momentum to follow the herd.
Within the mirror reflection a flickering blue streak can be seen in the distance behind him. A blue streak that starts to mature into the form of a gaping vortex behind Daniel’s line of vision. Nearly three cars can be seen becoming engulfed inside a swirling nebula that has hauntingly materialized in the middle of this city street. Neighboring cars begin to fish-tail and swerve away in a panic, causing an assortment of head-on collisions. Unaware and inattentive, Daniel proceeds to veer onto the speeding on-ramp onto I-80.
Making up to his parking complex, he shuffles into his cubicle, just a
……
Sudden Departure
……
While crossing congested city streets littered with braking cars, with speedy and nimble cycle couriers, all while fighting the after lunch crowd to return to work, a pair of IT reps make their route back to the office building on foot. Engaged in the frantic activity around him with steaming cappuccino in hand, one of the managers receives a mission critical BlackBerry message during the peak of a company wide database upgrade. Without hesitation, while crossing Clay and Montgomery, he grabs his phone from the holster, scrolling/texting on his device in disbelief.
Glancing instinctively upward to avoid collision, completely distracted with his trajectory, takes him straight into one of several stone foundation pillars of his office building. A split-second differential between an impactful face-to-stone injury, a flicker of blue light with the width of his wing span sparks before his eyes, engulfing him into another tunnel-like manifestation.
The sight of the swirling blue flame alerts his senses into panic mode, as these flames do not burn to the touch, instead a surge of wintery breezes chills him to the bone as he arrives to the other side. He emerges onto a grayed barren landscape, flat with minor elevations on the surface, in certain sections having a horizon without end. White searing light casted from above, yet remains forever under a sun-less sky with a billowing of blacken clouds and temperatures frigid in atmosphere as the Northern tundra.
Shivering in his business suit, he turns about in wonder of this difficult environment for any living human life to sustain itself upon. He hears what could be a series of muffled groans, gargled by obstruction to a distant left. He shifts the corner of his eye at a hesitant pace to confirm whatever suspicions his imagination could be presenting to him, however, nothing appears to materialize before him. The only item that is apparent is his leather bound briefcase and the bluish portal that has jettisoned to this destitute world.
Wasting little time, he begins to make his way back through the mysterious exit-point to return to a dimension more familiar and hospitable, just as a score of strange brutish figures step into the absolute foreground. He is shuttled back to the bustling San Francisco streets, punching a hole through reality as the portal closes concentrically onto itself. Onlookers of this phenomenon are in a state of confusion and begin to cautiously circle around the gentleman who appears frostbitten over the majority of his involuntarily shaking body.
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Media Blitz
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Coverage of these events are leaked and simulcast across the media-ways, on CNN, YouTube, and the local news in a media whirlwind. A walking passer-by talking on his cell phone can be heard amongst the inquisitive crowd, giving his friend the general play-by-play while on his way back home. Talking non-stop while on the street, later converging into the driver’s seat of his car, talking feverishly on speakerphone about this freak occurrence. Talking all the way while driving single-hand style until he reaches his destination where his beautiful wife greets him with open arms.
She goes into detail of the coverage that he has missed as she shows him that this made frontline news on multiple TV stations, posted with the late breaking graphics speckled across the TV screen. They soon grow wary of the newscast and begin to look into each other’s eyes, tussling around on the sofa with one another as many couples would after an exhaustive day working abroad.
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Home Invaders
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They're playful actions become more and more intense, leading from the living room into the nearby bedroom, undressing like no tomorrow. After stripping down to the bare minimum, the mount is complete with his body atop hers, pinning her down, brushing his cheek against hers, however she adjusts her body to reverse the position as she prefers to be on top. Her hair cascades downward onto his smiling face, showing appreciation of the effort she displays to hold his arms firmly in place.
As he gazes upward into her eyes, he becomes slightly preoccupied as he notices a faint blue streak of light just behind his finance’s head of auburn hair, particularly against the headboard resting on the bedroom wall. The streak grows into a dashing flicker of blue light with the width of his wing span, it appears to be a rip in time and space directly behind her. Out of instinct he screams to catch her attention and yanks her startled body away from questionable harm, as he places his hands around hers, a mammoth sized forearm extends from the portal.
Clawing outward with vicious speed, aligned with fearsome talons made of bone and harden calcification. This growth of what appears to be a stretch of callus starts from the tips of each finger throughout the arm protruding past the elbows. The other arm swings with great reflex, as if this creature is punching through currents of ocean. The claws from its hands smash the bed into splinters as the couple flee for their lifes and jump away for temporary safety.
As its body pieces through the portal, its hulking size sets it apart from any current, living classification, its head nearly scrapping the bedroom ceiling. Scaly grey in color due to life without sunlight, heavily scratched and war-torn, obviously from another time and place.
The couple screams, terrified to their core, they pick themselves off the quaking ground beneath them making every attempt for an escape. The creature lunges forward and the husband places hands onto the dresser closest to the exit door, pulling out the emergency loaded revolver from the top drawer.
The young lady screams at the sight of the invader but looks up to see other sets of swirling blue light populating along the bedroom walls. Like a series of firecrackers multiplying in number, and soon expanding in size stretch across the entire backwall. Each monster, their veins networking throughout their body, glows with a prominent dark turquoise illumination, glowing in the shroud of dim bedroom. Claws, disfigured and mangled, projecting from the swirling blue light in their bedroom.
The second one not as tall, but it is broader in width and girth, both showing what could be considered remnants of human physiology. The boyfriend takes aim and fires half a round into both monsters. To his surprise, the bullets do not puncture nor deflect upon impact. The slugs are absorbed and consumed by the body as they continue their pursuit with knuckle and claw scrapping the floorboards toward the sounds of the running screams that intrigue them.
They collide into whatever obscures their path, four additional creatures emerge from the vortex, all displaying severe visual impairments that could be easily rectified through the raw power of their strength. Running through the foyer, the couple runs hand in hand out of their home while the creatures plow through the walls and bookcases between them. With keys in hand, they bolt into their crossover SUV in the garage, crank the ignition and barrel through the closed garage door, smashing it into pieces, and speeds through the unsuspecting neighborhood.
Both creatures tear through the front of the house in search of their hosts, while belching a wrenched screech. They make their way across the street; the blue tunnel inside the bedroom begins to collapse upon itself. These monsters, six in total, continue their wondering rampage walking the streets, crashing through the adjacent house with screams echoing late into the evening hours.
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Those Goddamn Brats
……
Jetting down the highway, the couple cannot contain composure as they ramble on about this unearthly home invasion. Barely able to maintain his focus while driving the winding roads, he is nearly at the point of hysteria after witnessing what appears to be the same blue funnel he saw
Two high school aged girls sit in the back of the four door sedan, enthusiastic over the events of the highly anticipated rival football match up. The excitement continues on at the top of their inside voices including the way too distracted driver along with the front passenger multitasking on her family plan based cellular. She is playing human telephone telling the rest of her crew who will be showing up at the local BurgerHop, the usual hang-out spot for local teenagers buzzing with after-hours gossip. All of the cars begin to circle the restaurant in a constant flow of pubescent privilege with the sit down booths filling up faster by the minute.
As she grabs her lightweight cardigan from the nearby break room, longtime BurgerHop Server Erma punches her time clock to grab a much derived smokebreak. Amongst the rising decibel levels of clanging silverware and adolescent gossip, Erma makes a desperate attempt to clear her head by walking out of the front door. She steps outside to rendezvous with her fellow co-worker, Leonard, who gives each other the same look of discontent they tend to give each other during hectic late night shifts. Both agree that working at a dump such as this during the town’s homecoming week has stressed them out beyond belief. Erma, solidifying their sentiments by telling Leonard how much she can’t stand to see those Goddamn brats spending “daddy’s” money carefree and with reckless abandon.
Several car screeches can be heard all around the block as two cars punch their accelerators at an adjacent red-light. A pair of sporty sedans driven by spoiled repeat High School Juniors decided to use the parkway as a drag-strip, both with their windows rolled down hooting instinctively at one another down the road. An additional string of high-priced cars erratically accelerate into the drive-thru lane with yet another patty-wagon full of eager youngsters. The line of cars appear to coil around the bustling BurgerHop’s drive thru, one of the cars finally pulls up to the ordering speaker with the dauntingly arranged yet well illuminated menu board.