The sun is particularly bright, the sky a brilliant blue, and the clouds just seemed a little more fluffier than normal as the young boy observes upon his cherry red metallic Schwinn Stingray five-speed bike as he sails in the May breeze. The boy is smiling uncontrollably armed with his Alienware Vindicator Backpack that has his Alienware’ s top of the line laptop within that is also brand new. Today it is his birthday as he is heading to his school of Deadwood Elementary. His light brown shoulder-length hair is flowing in the breeze as he continues peddling down Charles Street just passing the Lead-Deadwood Regional Hospital and Clinic heading wonderfully to Sherman Street.
The young lad looks up on the small mountain to his right where he can see the stark fortress-looking sanitarium. The Whispering Pines where long ago the Mt. Moriah Cemetery once stood nearly a century ago. The young boy glanced up at the facility as his smile left him thinking of the legends, myths, and heresy about the dreadful place where the United States puts its most diabolical of the criminally insane, the very worst of society in which will rot and die living in the belly of the beast. Some of these insane people will never see the light of day again. As he looks up at the high stone walls and razor wire, the young lad can clearly see the green-tinted guard towers. Those in the belly several floors below the emerald yard and concrete walkways is the condemned in which there is no escape from in the spite of the long history of this facility. Historical facts did mention of one inmate who did make it to the top and if this insane man didn’t waste time in dropping on by to see the Warden and Chief Psychiatrist, well, some say that Brandon “The Worm” Reed would have did the impossible – escape. Reed instead had to take valuable time to carve and dismember the good Warden in his office. Reed’s morbid crime would immediately be uncovered and the general alarm was sent off and as for Reed, he was literally chopped down in a blizzard of gunfire.
The boy recalls in his mind of when it was a class project to research and share with the other students findings before the class. The young boy’s topic was on the violent broken mind of none other than Brandon “The Worm” Reed. Evidently, as he suspected, most of the class would share about Scott Solomon Dean who was a demonic-driven mass murderer that obtained a world-record recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records. Scott Solomon was one of a kind as was with Brandon “The Worm” Reed and some others just lurking out of the limelight centered on the world record holder.
As for the young lad’s presentation giving out such accurate and vivid description of all the things leading up the Reed’s arrest and his talents of being an escape artist breaking out of every federal penitentiary and asylum before his re-capture. Reed made a crimson wake through New Mexico, Arkansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Colorado. As the young lad began sharing these exploits in his graphic detail that caused the teacher to blush and rise up stopping the young man from continuing to share before his classmates in the very front of the classroom. Even in the spite of the fact he wasn’t allowed to continue reading from his well-prepared report laced with facts, sources, and pictures of some of Reed’s victims, the lad did receive an “A+” for his troubles.
The boy now turns his attention back to peddling and staying out of the way of traffic and the pedestrians. Today is not only just his twelfth birthday, moreover, it his is last day of his sixth-grade. Next year, the young lad will be in Middle School up in Lead just four miles away, and too far to ride his new bicycle that his mother bought. His favorite uncle, his only uncle in fact bought him the new laptop with everything this youngster needs.
The child on his bike then glides into the Packhorse Convenient Store across the street from the Deadwood Police Station on Sherman Street. He carefully parks his bike on its kickstand and not worrying about someone stealing it, though, he does indeed carry a lock wrapped under the cream-metallic banana seat where the adjustable chrome seating post. He boldly walks in and sees an older grey haired woman behind the cash register talking to one of the local men about her age. The boy then turns his attention to the coolers directly in front of him. He walks up hoping that his favorite energy drink is still on sale, the two-for-one special on Amplified in the 26 ounce cans. To his relief, the sale is still on that raises another smile on his freckled face as his green emerald eyes shine capturing the green glow of the bright L.E.D lights within the cooler. He goes to open the cooler and there in his reflection of the polished glass he catches someone or something standing behind him.
The child turns quickly as his high-top basketball shoes squeak on the clean floor. He gasps as he holds his breath while his right hand is firmly gripping the cooler door. He sees in an instant that there is no one there behind him, lurking over him. He sees the old grey haired cashier still speaking to the man in his bib overhauls. Seeing this and the fact no one is behind him, he turns once more to open the cooler door when a sharp pain struck him in through his forehead like a bullet that causes him to let go of the cooler door and grab his forehead with both hands and closing his eyes. The pain is intense and he almost calls for help as he is thinking that he could be dying. His young heart is now beating so hard that it seems that in any moment it will explode out of his chest.
“Scotty MacLeod, I know of your kind by the very blood coursing through your veins…” The voice is inside of his head as his sudden headache begins to subside where he felt that any moment he would lose his balance and collapse on the floor. The voice within him was more than just words, young Scotty could feel these words resonate throughout his body, and the resonation is bitterly cold.
“I know you can hear me young Scotty…” The voice from within struck again. The voice, foreign in a dialect the child could not understand. The voice sounded old or ancient Scotty thought in a terrified silence. The young lad without saying a word out loud opened the cooler and got his two large cans of Amplified.
“Brave child you are…” The voice within Scotty’s mind spoke again with a sinister and very troubling laugh mocking the young boy as he walked up in a hurry to the counter fetching his money balled up in his pocket.
“Hello Scotty and happy birthday to you.” The cashier smiled down at him. On her sagging breast was her name tag that simply read, “Coleen.”
Scotty did not smile, he is sweating now with a troubled and confused look upon his face. Still, he knew his manners, “Thank you Coleen. Thank you a lot.” He tried to smile but found it impossible at the moment.
Scotty removed his pack quickly and loaded the two cans safely inside. “Scotty, that is a very beautiful bike.” Coleen smiled looking through the large glass widows of the store.
“My mother got it for me for my birthday, and thank you again.” He smiled this time at her.
“Today is your last day at school too?”
“Yes mam, that it is.” Scotty replied as she gave him his change and his receipt before heading out to get on his bike to peddle as fast as he could away from the little store. He could feel the icy breath upon him by what seems to be for everyone else, totally invisible.
Scotty rationalizes as he carefully waits for the crosswalk light to change allowing him to safely cross over into Pine Street. He has a moment to take in what he heard within him. He comes to the conclusion that it is all his own excitement catching up to him in this very odd way or it may be some sort of ghost. After all, Deadwood is choked full of ghosts and ghost stories from its violent ancient history from back in the days of Calamity Jane and the likes of Wild Bill Hickok.
Scotty heard rumors and stories about the ancient graveyard of Mt. Moriah Cemetery where these two along with a good many other sorts and characters were laid to rest. Then of course, the history of how the Whispering Pines Sanitarium was built upon the graveyard. The official story was when it was constructed in the latter part of the twenty-first century, the historical old Mt. Moriah Cemetery was moved at relocated with all the graves re-interned at the new site to include all of the gravestones. However, the actual graves and those within them were not removed or relocated to the new spot. Scotty believed in this legend that the complex, the Whispering Pines Sanitarium is built upon the dead still there, and their troubled ghosts haunt the place.
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As scotty rode passed the Lawrence County Capital building along the wide sidewalk, he began focusing his attention to all of the festivities of his last and final day at Deadwood Elementary. Already he can see the policemen and women at the crosswalk from Pine Street over Main Street. He had to get off of his bike and walk across the crosswalk under the supervision of the police officers. To his right looking down on Main Street, in the late twentieth Century the city had a multitude of chintzy gambling machines, prostitution that survived the nineteenth century, and hotels to swindle all the people from their money. These places did not exist long after the “Crash of 2008” in which was, as he understood, the fall of the American Empire, and before the invasion of the Chinese that took well over half of the original United States. This was all before young Scotty’s time, in fact, a good full century before him and his mother.
“Hello Scotty, nice bike, buddy.” Scotty looked to the left and it is officer Bob. Officer Bob is a former weekly visitor of his mothers. Scotty didn’t like him and when officer Bob spoke to him, his words were like a whip across the youngsters back.
Fuck you, you goddamned dickweed…Young Scotty thought to himself as he said aloud, “Thank you, Officer Bob.” Scotty couldn’t get across fast enough.
The officer concluded, “Happy birthday too, Scotty. Tell your mother I said ‘hello.’
Motherfucker, suck my dick, bitch… This thought brought a smile on the youngsters face.
“Such a temper and the language. ‘dickweed’ I do not know of that word. What is of its origin?” The icy gravel voice began to laugh causing Scotty’s hearing to deaden and almost causing the child to cover his own ears.
“Oh, I am sorry about that. I can see into your mind quite deeply and can feel your emotions. You do hate this, this, this policeman. It has been a while, a long while since I have been back here to earth I’m afraid.” The voice grew quieter as Scotty’s eyes began to well up.
“I will take care of this Officer Bob for you. You shall not have to deal with him anymore. You may want to turn and look upon him on last time before he is wiped off the face of this world.” The voice warned.
Scotty didn’t want to turn. Scotty doesn’t want something bad happen to the police officer in the spite of things and before having a chance to say anything through his mind to this entity, a myriad of pictures began crossing the horizons of his mind. Scotty stopped as his eyes began to literally show a dim reflection of what he is seeing as these things began to be vividly clear.
Scotty paused standing on the sidewalk though his mind is somewhere else and as the young lad can see from these strong pictures in his mind is not his own but those of this creature. Scotty could see a strange world filled with hideous impossible to describe beasts and evils beyond his own imagination. Terrorized, Scotty could see what looks like a brilliant arching bright orb with a long tail leave this alien world’s upper green hazing atmosphere. In his mind, he could see in this orb that passes him by as if Scotty is floating in space. He covers his face as he could see an evil-looking creature that does not look like anything human but more like some sort of reptilian type that he has never seen before. Then, without warning Scotty’s mind is above the earth as he could see what looks like a comet swing by him as he could feel the blinding heat and light.
Scotty closed his eyes standing there holding his bike though thousands of miles above the earth. He is about to find out also in another time long forgotten.
In his mind’s eye he could see the comet that is actually the ship of this terrible creature enter the earth’s atmosphere. Again, the scene violently changed to where Scotty is standing firmly on the ground and off to the distance in the sky, the young child could see the comet strike down beyond the village before him. Scotty could not see passed the high wall made of some sort of clay. Then as he noticed the wall and men armed with spears and shields were looking at the brilliant comet as the shockwave like that of a small atomic bomb followed by a fireball rising up to the sky as brilliant as the sun. Though Scotty some distance away from the wall was knocked down to the ground causing him to lose his breath and the pain coming from this. Even in his physical body standing there, his stomach spasms is keeping him from breathing.
“Breath young Scotty…” The voice cut across like thunder in this vision of him lying on the sandy ground.
It took Scotty a few moments to regain his breath and he arose up from his back laying there facing the wall. He noticed that the men, these soldiers or guards missing from their post only moments ago. Scotty can see that the blast must of knocked them down off the wall but he could not see them in the sand. The wall, for Scotty to guess, about forty-feet high. Scotty could not hear enough yet due to the blast though returning enough to clearly hear the voice and some panic within the village.
“Where am I?” Scotty asked in his mind.
“The land called, Sumer, and the time is known to you earthlings as somewhere around the fifth millennium BCE. The village before you is now long gone and forgotten. This place is, or for that matter, was the first settlement that I visited as you can see. I found the Engineers’ work on creating these humans from their own DNA and that of the great apes, the Neanderthals and you may or may not know…”
Scotty turned in his vision to face the voice seemingly behind him expecting to see the specter he glimpsed at the Packhorse. Naturally, there is no one standing behind him. He turns around to face the village.
“This area, this land of Sumer is known later by the Greeks as ‘Mesopotamia.’ A name simply meaning the lands between the Tigress and Euphrates – The golden crescent of fertile land. Egypt, Rome, Greece, and some other cultures do not exist yet. You can say, most of Europe during this time is thawing out as the people there are basically still swinging from tree to tree…” The entity laughed briefly about his evaluation of the Europeans.
“Is this the first place for us humans?” The child asked as he looked up at the fireball fading.
“From Sumer? No, the Sumerians’ ancestors came from the north from the regions of south eastern Turkey. This place I would later come to visit and feed called, “Göbekli Tepe” created around the tenth millennium BCE as your kind knows of time. Though, I was not there when it and those sites around it – Some yet to be discovered by the way, is just a bleak foothold of the beginnings of civilization as you know of it…” The voice sighed heavily and spoke once more.
“Now that is enough, more than enough for now. It is time for you to embrace your learning…”
The voice faded away as Scotty’s mind swimming in these powerful visions back safely to the present. Scotty looked around as his eyes cleared and noticed that the time he was away trapped in these visions, only a couple of minutes actually passed. Realizing the fact that he was gone far longer to witness these things, these things that the creature showed of himself and the world at the time he entered it. Scotty rationalizes, This shit cannot be from my own imagination and of my own subconscious. I have never heard of these places and those things I have just seen. I cannot be going crazy as fuck, can I?
While Scotty walked and contemplated these things shaking like a leaf, Scotty is joined by his friends as they all wished him a happy birthday and salutations. They marveled over his bike as he locked it up at the bike rack and testing the lock. Scotty thanked these various classmates of his. Scotty is not only popular amongst his fellow classmates, nevertheless, he is the smartest kid in school, and his S.A.T. scores proves it. His teachers to include Scotty’s family consisting of his mother, her brother in which is Scotty’s uncle, and his grandmother. Scotty never knew of his father first-hand. His mother tried to paint a respectable picture of his father to include a name, occupation, and his death. However, the stories of his father is that of a work of fiction made up by his mother. Scotty’s grandmother, a bitter woman has a story in sharp contrast of his father and the fact that, “The deadbeat died in a shoot-out over a heroin deal that went south. Yeah, only after he knocked your mother up first…” His grandmother’s words are seared into his brain forever. As for his uncle, his uncle painted more of a balanced picture between the two stories. “Yeah, your father, the sperm-donor and not much more did in fact die in a drug deal like grandma says. I don’t know really anything about him other than the fact that for whatever reason, you’re mother got hooked up with him. You know your mom had a drug problem that almost cost her, her own life, right?” His uncle would go on to say, “I guess, your mother owed him, your dad, some money, a drug debt, and she used her body to pay it off. She did that a lot so I have heard. That is how you have become. I am sorry about this, Scotty. I beleive you are old enough to hear the truth…” Scotty was about nine-years old when his uncle sat down on the wooden steps of his deck at the trailer park in Puma.
Scotty’s mother, well, Scotty knew that she recovered from being a junkie and all those things that can be associated with it, to include those stories that grandma brings up unsolicited every so often. Scotty only knows that his mother loves him deeply and takes good care of him. In fact, she is a single parent holds down two part-time jobs to help make ends meet. The both of them live in the same trailer park as his uncle. His uncle is close by, close enough to keep a good eye on Scotty and his mother both.
Everyone to include his grandma is hoping for the best for young Scotty. They hope that he will be the first to go to college and as for Scotty, he is smart enough, in fact, a mental attitude that is several years a head of him. He already knows that the only way we could go into college is on some kind of scholarship. Scotty finds himself worrying over these sorts of things when most kids do not or should not. Still, he frets.
The bell rings outside in the playground and he walks into the building. As he is doing so, he is alone when that sinister voice comes back within him.
“Young Scotty, I can read your thoughts. You’re mother’s a whore according to your grandmother. Your grandmother is the one that was a whore all along. An old whore turning tricks.” Just then Scotty saw mental images of his grandmother performing vivid sexual acts and getting paid for it.
Scotty rubbed his eyes and whispered, “Get out of my head, devil.”
“Devil? I have been called many things, as to this ‘devil’ is one I have not heard. What is the meaning of that word young Scotty – Do tell?”
“You’re evil” Scotty said aloud as a playground monitor was walking up behind him.
“Scotty, who are you calling evil?” The tall old woman asked. It is none other than the notorious playground gestapo, Miss Slaughter who is rumored to be one of the last vestiges from the Third Reich. Just caught in her shadow would put a sudden freeze upon your shoulders as the small hairs on the back of your neck would raise. Of course, by then, it was too late.
“Oh, nothing. Just thinking out loud, I guess.” Scotty then turned back facing the entrance of the school. This is all he needed was drawing attention from Miss Slaughter and her Nazi Interrogation processes rumored by some troublemakers on the school grounds. It is also rumored that Miss Slaughter is formerly retired from the Whispering Pines Sanitarium that loomed over the entire town. Nevertheless, a daunting scene only amplified by the presence of Miss Slaughter who stood well over six-foot tall and in her late sixties.
“Scotty, what is wrong? Are you afraid to tell Miss Slaughter that you have me inside your head?” Scotty’s young body began to drop in temperature. The young lad could see his own breath inside the hallway of his warm school.
“Miss Slaughter, a German descendant like so many among this region. Alas, this is why I am here…” The voice faded.
“Happy birthday, Scotty.” Miss Slaughter said walking in behind him into the school building.
“You’re here for Miss Slaughter?” Scotty oddly felt somewhat relieved.
“No. However back in her day she had quite the passion of seducing young men in the above-ground facility of that Sanitarium where she worked as a nurse while supplementing her income by performing sexual acts upon those crazy young men…”
The voice opened up Scotty’s mind enough to graciously show him a few vivid moving images of Miss Slaughter in what seemed a couple of decades ago. The vision of her performing fellatio to a couple of patients being orally gratified. The evil voice then presented as vivid as before with additional motion images of Miss Slaughter in the Staff Men’s Room performing various gratuitous acts of various sexual escapades.
“Almost makes you want to seek employment up at the Pines, doesn’t it?” The voice now saturated with sarcasm.
“I don’t need to see this bullshit and you’re fucking making it up!” Scotty defiantly tortes.
“Not at all, these images are directly coming from her mind. Yes, I can see all your thoughts no matter who you are. As for the former whore, Miss Slaughter, she does not know I am in her head at all…”
Scotty could not even turn back to face Miss Slaughter after seeing nothing less than these highly provocative and compromising sexual vexatious acts now forever seared into young Scotty’s mind. This ranks right up there on the top of Scotty’s list of, “Things I truly Do Not Need To Know.”
Scotty slightly turns his head over his right shoulder, “Thank you, Miss Slaughter.”
“You’re evil and perverted…”
“Scotty, you’re right about me being evil and if the word ‘devil’ means this, then, I guess, I am the ‘devil’ as you say. Though, I do feel especially evil right now – “ The voice within Scotty was interrupted abruptly by his own inner voice.
“You’re not real. You’re only a voice inside of me. You are some twisted hallucination I am having. It could be the breakfast I had, bad eggs, or bad bacon, or a whole host of things.” Scotty warned in his thoughts to this source of this voice.
Scotty forced to usurp control of his own thoughts to retaliate to the voice so that Miss Slaughter would not hear and think the young boy is going completely out of his mind.
“Oh, your mind is now stronger. This is good though, it shall not prevail over my control, dear Scotty. If it makes you feel any better into fooling yourself that I am not real and only a figment of your imagination then by all means, keep telling yourself that…” The laughter came back mocking the troubled child.
“Now to prove that I am real and you will see my face once again, and oh yes, I was standing behind you by the way in the store though no one else caught a glimpse of me other than you. This fact alone made you worthy in my eyes to do my bidding…” The color began running out of Scotty as if an avalanche of insurmountable dread came down upon his weaken state.
“I am going to show you how real I am. I am going to blow up the Packhorse and well, in the matter of my evilness today, the entire block, and perhaps more.” The dread is literally beginning to crush the young boy making it nearly impossible for him to breathe.
Scotty turns around sharply and notices that Miss Slaughter has entered the faculty break room as the door slowly closes behind her.
“No, don’t do it! Don’t kill or blow up anyone! Fuck it man, I’ believe you’re real then. Just don’t do it!” Scotty exasperated. Yet, there is no answer from this foreign voice.
For Scotty, it seems like time is dragging on as he walks into his class where the first subject, his favorite, mathematics will begin after home room. Needless to say, Scotty feels like the entire world is on his shoulders as his body is ridden with anxiety. His stress peaks as he continues to become even more peeked. His teacher, Miss Pinkie just got out of college, young, vibrant blonde that turned heads, and also been seen with the science teacher, Dr. Jay Hamilton. Besides, nothing goes unnoticed in this town since people don’t know how to mind their own business. Deadwood is no exception of the small town mentality.
Again for Scotty, time seemed to drag on as he entered the classroom only to find out he still had a few seconds left before the tardy bell rang. He quickly took his seat after carefully sitting his Alienware Backpack down next to his chair as all the students turned to face him. In unison, all cheerfully shouted, “Happy Birthday, Scotty!”
Scotty embarrassed as his face reddened and pretended to give an earnest smile under the turbulent sea of anxiety, “Thanks everyone.” He returned making eye contact with only a couple of his fellow students.
“Good you made it in here. Now since you are on the other side of the building, this shouldn’t effect you too much…” The voice within warned.
“Please, you don’t have to do this. Please no…” Scotty tries to reason with the sinister voice. There is no answer as Miss Pinkie bends over to pick up the scripto marker for the large whiteboard. Her heart-shaped sculptured ass bled through ever so slightly under her sheer lime-green slacks.
“Damn…” Scotty thought to himself.
“Damn indeed…” The voice within the young boy concurred.
“Oh, there is one in your class called, “Donna?” The sinister voice is especially cold and calculating.
“Why, why do you want to know that?” Scotty could feel the presences of this creature leave him ever so slightly as if it were like an invisible fog over the back of the classroom drifting in the slightest as it sought out the young brunette twelve-year-old girl in a single pony tail. Scotty could not look at her, he felt in doing so would give her away to the lingering wisp of fog that outstretched like a wicked hand as its own index finger gently tapped the top of her head. Scotty could see it is all too late. The creature in this dreadful and egregious act found her out.
“Not to worry young Scotty. I can find those that belong to me on my own without any assistance of your mind. Though, I do find your interesting. Now forgive me while I embrace her mind…”
Terrified as his eyes reflected the horror began to engulf him as he could see Donna’s steel blue eyes roll up to the top of her head as her body stiffened. More of this evil energy is leaving Scotty as his eyes welled up for the sake of Donna which he has known since his first year of school. To his continued horror, the being mostly with Donna now making her rise up in from her desk and walk right out of the classroom in its control without the teacher or the other students even noticing as if she is just as invisible as the one controlling her.
“God, leave her alone!” Scotty attempts to plead again.
“God is right. Now you shall mind your own and this little one belongs to me. Her soul, spirit, and her body belongs to me, not you, not anyone or anything else. Now, enjoy the show as it begins to unfold…” The voice fades away from Scotty’s mind as Donna under the wicked spell walks down the hallway turning the corner on her left. The mental contact is gone, Scotty cannot see any longer in his mind’s eye as to what will happen to Donna’s own fate.
Scotty’s young heart is about to explode as he bursts out aloud freezing the teacher dead in her tracks, “Miss Pinkie something very bad is about to happen to Donna!” Scotty rises up suddenly.
Shocked in his outburst as the students all turn to look as oddly at him as the teacher is right now. “Scotty, whatever you mean?” she says sternly.
“Something bad is controlling her. It means to do her harm!” He turns to point at her vacant desk, “You see, she’s fucking gone!” he blurts out as the oxygen leaves the room through the monumental chorus of gasps fills the gaping stunning mouths of everyone to include his teacher in the classroom.
“Scotty Andrew MacLeod!” The teacher exasperated as some of the students began to giggle at his outburst.
“She just left and none of you seen her go!” Scotty yelps as the teacher puts both her hands firmly on her hips.
“No one has seen Donna because she did not come in this morning. Her parents called in and said she is ill!” She allowed young Scotty to attempt to process this new information in.
“I saw what I saw, and I know that something god-awful is going to happen to her!”
“Okay, that is more than enough out of you young man. To the Principal’s Office you go now and take your stuff. Shame on you!” Scotty is beyond confused. He does as he is told as his mind and that of the reality around him just went completely sideways as he leaves under a cloud of laughter.
For Scotty, this is not the first time he has visited Donald Perry, the Principal of this school. With any luck since this is the last day, it will be the last time he shall see Principal Perry – So he hopes.
He begins his long walk down the hall in the opposite direction as Donna went. “Donna was here, she was, and you fucking got her you evil son of a bitch!” Like before, only a deadening silence.
“Could it be just my mind? Could I be hallucinating this whole thing? Could this be nothing more than a nightmare and I am still asleep at home? Goddamnit, I need to wake the fuck up!” He closes his eyes tightly and stops only to give a moment that he hopes all this is just a dream.
He slowly opens his eyes and he sees that he is still standing in the hallway free of windows. His heavy sigh comes forth as he begins to continue the long dreadful walk to the Principal’s Office.
As he walks just up to the door on his right labeled in red letters is, “Faculty Breakroom” as he stops to listen to the cackling on the other side. He hears the school janitor a man known as Raul Gonzalez who is in his last year of retiring below out, “Then I caught the little son of a bitch lifting a pack of cigarettes right from his teacher’s purse before she got back into her classroom!” Those inside the breakroom all began to laugh aloud. Scotty remembers this story being told, he remembers the event that happened two years ago. Scotty remembers the kid in question, a kid deaf in both ears that talked funny because of this fact by the name of Walter Love.
Walter Love’s picture is in the School’s Dictionary right next to the name and definition of, “Rebel.” There is none that even comes close to the legendary antics of Walter Love. Since the First-Grade, Walter was then the Plight Upon All Humanity according to the school’s faculty. The memory of Walter Love and some of his antics came to mind causing Scotty to quickly flash a genuine smile. Walter Love is nothing less than a god of deviant mayhem and malevolent rebellion that rivals the Fall of Satan.
As to Walter Love, he eventually gotten worse and his mother planned to have him committed to some child-like asylum in Rapid City. Unfortunately, Walter had found out about his mother’s plans and torched the entire trailer park in Puma killing some fifty people before he publicly set himself on fire only after splashing several quarts of gasoline on his body. Rumors were all abound in saying that eyewitnesses saw and heard him also claim that someone or something was in his head telling him what to do to get everyone back in this hideous act of revenge. Then Walter Love under a cloud of screams, pandemonium, and the sirens approaching then turned the lighter on himself. The home-made video catching his final acts went viral on the net. To this very day if anyone wanted to view this horrible video of a troubled youngster can see it. As for the young lad, his smile vanished quickly in his recall of that terrible event.
Scotty then began to step away from the breakroom door and continue pressing on as the florescent lighting above him began to flash as the sudden shockwave rocked the school building sending Scotty to the floor causing him to strike his head upon the unforgiving tile floor. Outside of the school is a fireball that some would later claim could be seen as far as Meade County and the hamlet of Saint Onge. Those in Spearfish would also lay claim of seeing this huge fireball high up into the air. Some initially thought it was a nuclear weapon of sorts. In the investigation that would start within a couple of days by Homeland Security would conclude that the massive explosion is not a nuclear weapon that killed nearly five-hundred people vaporized instantly and about another seventy-four that would succumb to various wounds from the devastation’s aftermath.
One thing is for certain according to the official press release is that the explosion was not a nuclear weapon detonated by the Chinese who conquered half of the original western and central region of the former United States or of some violent act of an American Extremist Jihadist. The blast was so intense that it broke most every window in the Deadwood area that wasn’t destroyed directly from the blast was completely knocked out. People up above at the Whispering Pines reported the blast rocked the facility but no one was hurt.
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Homeland Security would bring more assets into the epicenter of the blast to determine what kind of explosive was used, who manufactured it, and how it got here in the first place. They would find out quickly that all investigative means and technology would show no evidence of residue of any kind to include any foreign debris even from some sort of kinetic device made of some exotic metal. Unexplained, unresolved, and what very little that Homeland knew, they were not sharing to the public. This fueled even more speculation by the locals’ tongue-waggling.
Meanwhile, Scotty is in the Deadwood – Lead Regional Hospital fighting for his life in ICU. As the powerful explosion engulfed the school, the roof above him collapsed. It would take the First Responders and volunteers from the region some two additional days after being cleared by Homeland to rescue and or recover anyone that may yet to be alive. Scotty was found two days later thanks to a German Sheppard trained by FEMA that found the little boy yet alive. The dog and its fellow worker would offer a glimmer of new hope that some others, children, and loved ones might be alive as well.
As Scotty’s uncle and his mother both wept in bitter tears hoping against all hope holding on to little Scotty lying motionless in his bed under what doctors are calling a “Grave Condition” and lowly commenting that young Scotty is not expected to make it from his injuries and being exposed the the elements.
Along with Scotty from the Deadwood Elementary School, most of the bodies recovered was his former teacher, Miss Pinkie, his entire classmates, and all those with the exception of Miss Slaughter in the Faculty Breakroom were among the dead. As for those surviving is indeed Miss Slaughter also in ICU but in “Critical Condition” as well as Dr. Jay Hamilton, and several others who are fellow students. There were other buildings along Upper Main Street where FEMA found people clinging onto life by a most frail thread.
The blast left a forty-foot crater deep into the ground where once the Packhorse stood. The crater is sixty-five feet in diameter as some would speculate that this may have been caused by a meteor or some other space natural-like event. Of course, FEMA, and Homeland denied any of this along with other rumors. One thing is also for certain amongst those on the fringes of society speculate that this explosion may have been the cause of something that went off the rails with some sort of top-secret government experiment or an alien-reversed-engineered weapons malfunction. This is the most popular conspiracy theory on the subject.
As time would continue, the speculations, the stories, the secretive actions and the withholding of developing information of Homeland Security only bolstered the minds of the conspiracy theorists nation-wide and causing doubt even among those still clinging on faith that the United States Government doesn’t lie to its public.
While Scotty MacLeod’s body was on the cusp of this life and the life waiting for him on the other side, his mind nearly dead contains a small ember deep within. This burning ember is by all means, is indeed keeping him lingering in this world. In this ember is nothing less than his lifeforce – energy that is gathered and prepared to leave his body behind.
To Be Continued…
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DarcWorX 