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Dark Love Eternal – A Horror Story

Prelude: The End

"No man knows till he experiences it, what it is like to feel his own life-blood drawn away into the woman he loves."
Bram Stoker, Dracula

There are no shadows here, no twilight. Shadows would imply there is at least the suggestion of a source of light, perhaps a dull glimmer that would be enough to make the dark stand out. In the stead of such glimmer there is complete, immersive darkness that pervades between those damp, cold walls, hundreds of meters below the spacious castle. No shadows and no despair, for despair would imply that hope is possible. In the stead of despair and hope, there is naught but the certainty of a grim end. For I am about to die if I am lucky or live forever if I’m not. I didn’t choose this fate for myself and now that I think of it I wasn’t given much choice along the way. It all just happened, events piled on one another and a course of action emerged that was completely beyond my control. I would sigh if I had the strength but it is useless, useless…

Suddenly, a sound in the darkness, a muffled voice amidst the deafening quiet, nay, a whisper. “Hissaaaaoooo.” And again, this time closer. “Hissaaaoooo.” I shudder despite myself. I would recognise this voice everywhere, anywhere, forever: the voice of the one and only, my true love and my slayer to be. Emi. I am glad they’ve chosen her, I am glad she will be the one to end it all, at least I can see her again before it’s over, maybe this time I will be able to ignore the pale, uncharacteristic features of her face, the glazed eyes, the blood on her teeth, the death in her breath. I reach for my neck instinctively but my hands are tied. Despite everything I manage a weak smile – what began with a kiss will end with a kiss… I close my eyes and pray for a quick death.

Chapter 1: A perfect day for a picnic.

“Denn die Todten reiten Schnell… (For the dead travel fast…)”
Bram Stoker, Dracula

It was a perfect day for a picnic when we found the first body. I remember now, with some bitter amusement, that my first thought when I woke up on that Sunday was that the day was as idyllic as days are in the beginning of horror films. Well, it turned out I was right, too right.

I woke up, as it was usual for Sundays, a little bit earlier than Emi – Sunday is her day off from running and the day on which she has a lie in as she recovers from her strenuous weekly routine. I took the opportunity to just look at her perfect features for a while – the small, ladylike nose; the lovely lips that could convey so many emotions when she wanted them to – from her puppy-like pouts to her gracious smiles; the faint strawberry smell of her hair; but most of all, the kind, loving, beautiful person that all of these features concealed. So I just stayed there, lain next to my gorgeous girlfriend, feeling the warmth of her body next to mine and daydreaming about our future together. It was promising to be a splendid day – I could see the first rays of the summer sun forming playful patterns on the other side of the curtains and was secretly congratulating myself for choosing this day for our monthly picnic – it would be another fine day in heaven.
“mhrhhmmrph” mumbled Emi in her sleep and then turned to me and cuddled tightly, like a kitten. I couldn’t decide whether that meant that she was having a bad dream or a good one; I hoped that it was the latter and I was glad to observe that lately her dreams had been getting better – the nightmares of old had almost ceased. I started stroking her hair gently – I couldn’t help it, I was overwhelmed by how beautiful she was.
“mmhmhhhrmph”another incoherent sound and suddenly she was awake, just barely. “Bathroom, need bathroom now” she murmured, then opened her eyes, smiled at the realisation that I am there and awake and kissed me. “Good morning Hisao! Have you spent the whole night admiring how beautiful I am?” Well actually I was doing precisely that but I would never admit it, would be too easy of a victory for her. “As if! I was just thinking when you will finally be up and about, so tjat I could have the whole bed to myself”. She nudged me in the ribs, put her tongue out mockingly and then said “You monster. Well it appears you win this time as I really need to go to the bathroom, so enjoy your 5 minutes of bed freedom, before the fearsome Pirate returns and lays siege to this bed”. At which point she got up lazily and yet gracefully, adeptly put on her prosthetic legs and headed for the door. I thought that it was good that we decided to spend the night at her room – it would be awkward if she had to sneak into the boy’s bathroom…

And that’s it, that’s the last fleeting moment of pure, calm happiness I was to experience before the end of it all. Oh well, a moment of perfection is better than no perfection at all I guess.
The proceeding events are all muddled in my memory, it all happened so fast, or at least seemed to happen so fast, the next few hours seemed to pass in the matter of minutes, the shock that we experienced was too strong.
It started with a scream, no, a number of sporadic sharp screams that came out of Emi at the top of her lungs, followed by a long heart-wrenching wail which faded into silence. I immediately jumped out of the bed, put my trousers on clumsily and headed for the door but Emi was faster than me – she had already run back all the distance from the bathroom and presently stormed into the room, closed and locked the door with two swift motions then looked around the place as if she was seeing everything for the first time until her eyes stopped on me, at which point she jumped to me and grabbed me so tightly I thought I was going to suffocate. “Hisaohisaohisaohisaohisaohisaohisaohisao” for some moments that’s all she could say and it appeared she had entered some sort of a catatonic state. “What is it, my love, what happened?” I finally found the courage to ask, as calm as I could – everything about the moment was so surreal, so unexpected amidst this fine morning. “She, Hanakoshe, bathroom, Hanako, she is….is…bathroom, please stay, she is there, dead, there, please stay with me, don’t go, dead.” She almost choked when she pronounced the last word. I could make out most of what she said but the meaning of her words eluded me. Was she really trying to say that Hanako is dead? Impossible… I would think that this was some kind of a bizarre, out of character joke, if she wasn’t so distraught, if she wasn’t quivering so badly. I was torn between the desire to hold her forever and the need to learn what has happened, to see with my eyes the scene that crippled Emi so badly, what if she was, after all, mistaken. I was trying to imagine of what kind of incident had to happen for someone to die in the bathroom, then I remembered an article I had read in the newspaper about the disproportionately large number of people who slip and die in the bathroom or execute themselves by accident in other ways with the help of electrical appliances. I couldn’t stay there anymore, I had to go and see for myself – what if Hanako was badly injured and needed help? “It’s ok, it’s ok, everything is going to be ok” I could hear myself saying, after which I gently led Emi to the bed and wrapped the blanket around her. “Just calm down and stay there, I’ll be right back”.

***
Clean murder. Bloodless. It was not just that there was no blood to be found anywhere around the scene of the crime, there was no blood in the corpse itself – it was completely drained. Horrible, horrible death. The body was sprawled across the bathroom floor, right in front of the sinks. Hanako was in her beige dressing gown which, thankfully, covered most of her body. Yet, I could still see the excessive, unreal paleness of her features, not even a hint of skin colour. There were no visible markings apart from the lack of blood – her body seemed to be intact, there was not even a bruise or a cut. Her scars, they were almost inconspicuous now that there was no blood left to colour them. And her eyes were wide open, looking straight ahead. With a swift movement I closed them, saying a blessing as I did, that was the least I could do.

Most shocking of all was the peaceful smile on her exceedingly pale face, as if she was dreaming of something nice and she was just about to rise from her slumber. And yet, she was never to wake up again, or at least that’s what I thought back then. Who dies with such a smile on their face, isn’t death always painful, especially when it’s a murder? I go back to that word, the most uncomfortable one: “murder”. This wasn’t an accident, it couldn’t have possibly been; it was a carefully executed murder. But who…

Then I noticed the slip of paper, placed carefully on top of her right cheek, the one that was scarred from the burns. I bended carefully, without touching her so that I could make out what was written on it. The handwriting was beautiful, almost regal, four words that said:
“No blood, no pain.”
I shuddered. A riddle on top of a mystery and the death of an innocent girl. Inexplicable, unimaginable, unreal. I couldn’t process any of this, my brain had stopped working, inside I was screaming louder than Emi did but my body remained motionless, my mouth remained shut, I had almost stopped breathing. I sat there stumped for a while not knowing what to do, not thinking straight enough in order to remember that I should call the police immediately. Instead, I thought about Emi and about how scared she must be so, without touching anything, I headed back to her room.

I opened the door to find her, in her dishevelled state, sitting on the floor with her hands huddling her knees and a blank expressionless face staring at the floor. She was rhythmically rocking back and forth and repeating:
“wakeupwakeupwakeupwakeupwakeup”
I coughed politely to announce my presence without startling her even more. She looked at me, smiled in a weird, almost hysteric way and said, with all the calm she could muster:
“It is ok Hisao, it is only a bad dream. I will soon wake up and we will go and have our picnic.”
Oh how I wish she was right….
I didn’t reply, didn’t know what to say. Instead I walked to the telephone and picked up the receiver…

I think it is pretty clean, currently, for it is a second draft but I will keep editing it as I add new content. New chapters to follow weekly. Enjoy!

What a coincidence as soon as i start reading Dracula this fic pops up Really liking your story by the way, can't wait to see what happens next!

Oh, a horror story. This is new...fairly. I like horror, kind of. Let's read this.

"No man knows till he experiences it, what it is like to feel his own life-blood drawn away into the woman he loves."
Bram Stoker, Dracula

Well, that's a nice start. Vampires. Why not. I prefer Chtulhu mythos, but vampires are fine too.

Prelude

Good in terms of formatting and in general. Will detail the rest later.

Emi

Oh, okay, Emi's the one, eh? I can live with tha

Hanakoshe, bathroom, Hanako, she is….is…bathroom, please stay, she is there, dead, there, please stay with me, don’t go, dead.

dear god why...okay. Well played, sir, well played.

Bathroom scene

I got a headache from that. That is very well done.


So overall, I do like it a lot. Emphasis on that before I go on.

I do have two significant gripes with your stuff :

- While the prelude is nice and all, it spoils the fact that Emi eventually becomes a vampire. Readers could have hung on to the hope that in the end she wouldn't turn, providing a major, if predictable, kick in the groin when she does. Since kicking one's groin is the prime objective of the horror genre, this feels like a missed opportunity.
Same with clearly identifying the nature of the threat right off the bat. Vampires are things we know about. There could have been other things who could have sucked Hanako dry dear god why, but we know it's vampires outright. It doesn't toy with the reader's imagination. Ever heard of Amnesia? It makes people shit bricks because the nature and abilities of the threats remain shrouded in mystery for the most part.

Overall, the lesson is this : People are notoriously afraid of the unknown. The more you play with this fear, the more uncomfortable they will be. You want your readers to feel uncomfortable.

- Good lord, the formatting in the first chapter. Dem walls of text be nigh impenetrable. The first scene is meant to be slow-paced and peaceful? Well, make it look like that. Add empty lines to reflect it, then make longer block to reflect the tension picking up. At this point, either the reader is hooked and he will tense up as well, and gulp your longer blocks, or he isn't and he probably won't give a shit anyway.

Let me try :

It was a perfect day for a picnic when we found the first body. I remember now, with some bitter amusement, that my first thought when I woke up on that Sunday was that the day was as idyllic as days are in the beginning of horror films. Well, it turned out I was right, too right.

I woke up, as it was usual for Sundays, a little bit earlier than Emi.

Sunday is her day off from running and the day on which she has a lie in as she recovers from her strenuous weekly routine.

I took the opportunity to just look at her perfect features for a while – the small, ladylike nose; the lovely lips that could convey so many emotions when she wanted them to – from her puppy-like pouts to her gracious smiles; the faint strawberry smell of her hair; but most of all, the kind, loving, beautiful person that all of these features concealed.

So I just stayed there, lain next to my gorgeous girlfriend, feeling the warmth of her body next to mine and daydreaming about our future together. It was promising to be a splendid day – I could see the first rays of the summer sun forming playful patterns on the other side of the curtains and was secretly congratulating myself for choosing this day for our monthly picnic – it would be another fine day in heaven.

“mhrhhmmrph” mumbled Emi in her sleep and then turned to me and cuddled tightly, like a kitten. I couldn’t decide whether that meant that she was having a bad dream or a good one; I hoped that it was the latter and I was glad to observe that lately her dreams had been getting better – the nightmares of old had almost ceased. I started stroking her hair gently – I couldn’t help it, I was overwhelmed by how beautiful she was.

“mmhmhhhrmph”another incoherent sound and suddenly she was awake, just barely. “Bathroom, need bathroom now” she murmured, then opened her eyes, smiled at the realisation that I am there and awake and kissed me.
“Good morning Hisao! Have you spent the whole night admiring how beautiful I am?”

Well actually I was doing precisely that but I would never admit it, would be too easy of a victory for her.

“As if! I was just thinking when you will finally be up and about, so tjhat I could have the whole bed to myself”. She nudged me in the ribs, put her tongue out mockingly and then said “You monster. Well it appears you win this time as I really need to go to the bathroom, so enjoy your 5 minutes of bed freedom, before the fearsome Pirate returns and lays siege to this bed”.
At which point she got up lazily and yet gracefully, adeptly put on her prosthetic legs and headed for the door. I thought that it was good that we decided to spend the night at her room – it would be awkward if she had to sneak into the boy’s bathroom…

And leave the second, more tense scene as it is. It's just, like, my opinion man, but I think it'll improve the reading experience. I also scratched the first line. The title says horror, the prelude has horror. At this point, we know it's horror. No need to shove it down our throats. Oh, and one typo. Happens to the best of us.

And finally, you may want to take into account Emi's locution. She isn't exactly known for long, flowery sentences.


In retrospect, this comment was a bit invasive and on the harsh side. It may show I'm a douche (I try not to be, but the internet has a strange effect on that), but take it more as the sign that I care about this fic.

@FishyBroski:
Glad that I caught your interest! The whole plot is pretty much developed in my head and I am now working on the details, I hope I can keep your interest until the end! Next chapter coming end of the week.


@Ascended Flutist:

Thank you for the extended critique. In retort to your comments:

a) As the story progresses it will become apparent that the Prelude conceals much more than it reveals (I hope) and as a result "the kick in the groin" will come from elsewhere. I actually want to build upon the assumption/knowledge that she becomes a vampire and surprise the reader in other ways. This is a common trick in writing. Off the top of my head, it is very well used in Jasper Fforde's Shades of Grey - he starts his novel with what one assumes to be the end of the story, but when he actually gets to that part of the story all of the assumptions of the reader are shattered.

b) You will notice that I haven't used the word vampire once in the story so far. I have heard of Amnesia. It is a computer game. It is one of a kind.
-If I wanted to write an Amnesia like story it would be a completely different story. I don't want to write a different story as I am satisfied with the one I am writing right now.
-There is a good reason Amnesia's thrills haven't been replicated in any other horror computer game - it builds upon months of research of what makes people scared (the producers of the game commissioned that research themselves if I am not mistaken).
-I am not convinced Amnesia's way of building suspense will work outside of its medium - ie a computer game. The only horror story author who gets close to achieving this in writing is Lovercraft.
-Basically, you can approach any horror piece of writing and say "yeah it's a good one, but it's not like Amnesia" which makes the argument a bit void.
-Ever heard of the book "I Am Legend" (note: the film has nothing to do with the book as it strips it of its basic premise)? The reader knows from point A that the protagonist is facing vampires and yet that doesn't make the story any less horrifying. In the same way, my focus will be elsewhere, the vampires are just a vehicle.

c) The line that you scratched is an allusion to horror films which often start with an idyllic setting where everything is perfect or nearly perfect and things gradually progress to worse. I am quite pleased with it although your argument is valid, will think about it.

d) Emi's line that starts with "You monster..." might be a bit too winded for her, granted. Will take into consideration.

To conclude, half of your comments criticize my story for not being another story, the other half assume that it is a final draft, which it is not. In retrospect, my comment was a bit defensive but take that as a sign that I too care about this fic . The contemporary philosopher Slavoj Zizek once said that the way in which politically correct people express their racism is with the statement "I am not a racist, but [racist remark]". In analogy, your comment seems to be the politically correct way to say that you dislike the story, ie "I really like the story, but [reasons for disliking it]". I do hope I am wrong. Still, despite the fact that I disagree with most of your comments they were all quite intelligent and/or provocative! I think this means that we'll either become good friends or bad foes [luckily KS allows one to put people in both categories!], the ball is in your court.
Well that's that.

K.

{Edit: re the editing, good point, it was a direct copy paste from Word, where it looked fine and I didn't expect the transition to be so bad. Will address it soon!]

Kielox wrote: Intricate writing is something I do.

Oh okay. Though that in itself might be revealing a bit too much. :3

Kielox wrote:You will notice that I haven't used the word vampire once in the story so far.

Fair enough. Well played.

Kielox wrote: -If I wanted to write an Amnesia like story it would be a completely different story. I don't want to write a different story as I am satisfied with the one I am writing right now. I am not convinced Amnesia's way of building suspense will work outside of its medium - ie a computer game. The only horror story author who gets close to achieving this in writing is Lovercraft.

Acknowledged and I thought about that, you may very well be right. Though to my credit, I only used Amnesia as an example of the threat being enigmatic, and did not mention its other outstanding features. My only criticism about the tension buildup was just that the first paragraph wasn't exactly digest, when it's supposed to ease the reader into that fleeting idyllic moment that you then proceed to shatter into many sharp and hurtful bits. The shattering process itself was done pretty well, and I did mention it.

Kielox wrote:Basically, you can approach any horror piece of writing and say "yeah it's a good one, but it's not like Amnesia" which makes the argument a bit void.

Wasn't my intent, sorry if it came out that way. That kind of criticism would be silly, agreed. I know there are other equally valid ways of approaching the horror genre. That's actually good that you've chosen to do something different, since that basically tosses me back into the big scary Unknown.

Kielox wrote: To conclude, half of your comments criticize my story for not being another story

An introspective rereading later...I genuinly don't know, maybe it does. Again, sorry if that's the case.

Kielox wrote: the other half assume that it is a final draft, which it is not.

Heh, I can only judge what I can see. But fair point, you did warn about that and I should have noted that I had noted that...yes.

Kielox wrote: Slavoj Zizek once said that the way in which politically correct people express their racism is with the statement "I am not a racist, but [racist remark]". In analogy, your comment seems to be the politically correct way to say that you dislike the story, ie "I really like the story, but [reasons for disliking it]".

I'm aware of that, and I hate politcal correctness with a passion. Granted, my comment does taste a bit like this.

But consider that if I really disliked it that much, I wouldn't have bothered writing a comment at all. I'm not overly fond of trolling/pointless bashing. I'm just eager to see a KS horror fic done right, and the overall first impression was good. Honest.
Plus, your comment seem to indicate you do know what you're doing, and mine got so owned, so congrats, you've convinced me to trust you. :]

I agree with your comment on the setup, the horror film reference might indeed be unnecessary. Thank you for caring and for wanting to improve my story! I think I might have misinterpreted your comments, but your second message sets everything straight I guess... Now I have big shoes to fill! This convo really raised the game, now I can't just blag my way through a semi-interesting story! Please do feel welcome to comment on further chapters as well!

K.
Also, looks like it will be friends after all

Kielox wrote: The contemporary philosopher Slavoj Zizek once said that the way in which politically correct people express their racism is with the statement "I am not a racist, but [racist remark]". In analogy, your comment seems to be the politically correct way to say that you dislike the story, ie "I really like the story, but [reasons for disliking it]".

The analogy is not quite fitting. It is possible to criticize [insert minority of choice] without being racist. It's just that most people who use the disclaimer "I'm not racist, but..." actually are.

In the same way you can still (constructively) criticize a story you like, because nothing is perfect. For example I have never rated any anime I've seen - even my absolute favourites - a hundred per cent.

Nice story so far by the way, even though (hehe) personally I don't really like horror stories in general and KS horror stories in particular. Nothing you can do about that, though so carry on.