Realistic or Modern Welcome to Krigsloch: "A Nice Place to Live"

[Saccharine Cyanide]

High school - even for the most well-adjusted and sociable teenager, it can be tough navigating this labyrinth of raging teenage hormones. For the, well, less-adjusted, high school can be a living hell.

Our tale of terror begins somewhere smack in the middle of the 1950s, in the halls of Miskatonic High School, in the middle of nowhere. It's the only secondary school serving the teens of Krigsloch, Colorado, a town that's not so much sleepy as it is in a coma.

Small towns are notorious for being poor places for keeping secrets. When everyone knows everyone, everyone soon knows everything. Gossip spreads through the suburbs like wildfire, loosening lips and sinking ships.

It's strange, then, that Krigsloch is hiding a secret. A secret that has been hiding for centuries. A deep, terrible secret that threatens not only to change the lives of the people of Krigsloch, but to upend life as humanity knows it.

Krigsloch is about to go through some major growing pains. And it's not going to be pretty.

 

[Clinthulhu]

Moonlight gleams off of the wet asphalt of Main street, while the inferior street lights tint the side walks orange every 20 or so feet along the way, as a lone, jacketed figure makes their way through the unrelenting rainstorm. The weather has grown abnormally wet as of late, rain and snow coating this poor city in cold, damp misery. The lone figure, standing at no more than 5'4" stop as a crosswalk, glancing both ways down the dark, empty road, before making their way slowly across towards the white, florescent lights of a 50's Diner. Greasy Greg's glows in red neon lights which buzz monotonously overhead as the figure steps under the metal awning, and lowers their hood, running a hand through their damp ginger hair. They approach an ordering window, and knock on it gently with the back of their hand, sniffling at the cold which bites at their nose. And as a heavyset man, his bulging gut covered by spatters of grease, and cheap condiments, opens up the sliding glass, she asks him for a number 3 small.

"Wull 'lo to you too Polly." The man smirks just slightly beneath his bestubbled face, turning to start putting together her order as he calls over his shoulder, "Wha's got ya out so late, eh?"

Polly runs her fingers through the hair draped over her shoulder as she watches the rain pour down to her right, her green eyes looking almost black in the dim light, "I couldn't sleep..."

The heavyset man doesn't look back, letting out a thoughtful, "Hmmm," as he squirts condiments onto his greasy work of art, "Ya 'avin them nightmares again, yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Tha uns about the lake?"

Polly hesitates a second, taking a deep breath in through her nose, "Yeah..."

The man turns, and sets down a little cardboard dish on the metal shelf outside the window, followed by a soda cup which still hisses as its contents settle inside, "You get on 'ome now, ya hear? Ain't safe fer ya to be wanderin' 'round town all night." He reaches a meaty paw out to gently pat the top of her head, and then squeeze her shoulder, "Yer gonna be alright, kid. Ya alredy gots more brains th'n I do!" He chuckles, and smiles at Polly.

She smiles back, and pulls her hood up again, "Thanks Greg, you uh... you have a good night." She sets a 5 down on the counter for him to take, before turning and bringing her hot dog up to her mouth. She takes a juicy bite out as she makes her way past the little Diner, back out into the dark.

Greg watches her go, pursing his lips, and saying to himself, "Poor kid..." Before closing the sliding glass again.

The rain doesn't relent as Polly walks home, Greg's flickering neon haven fading out into the rain behind her, leaving her to wander the dark, alone once more. Her comfort food vanishes quickly as he approaches her dismal little home, a single story shack, with the most miserably peeling porch the world has ever seen. The two front windows are dark, just as she left them, and she wastes no time grabbing the key she hides under one of the boards of the half rotted deck. She makes her way inside after rehiding her key, and tosses her cardboard tray and her cup into the garbage can next to the kitchen counter. She walks through what little home there is, and opens up the last door on the left before the backdoor. The dimly lit room is just as she left it, clean aside from some undergarments scattered on the floor, and papers strewn across her little desk. She removes her jacket, kicking off her shoes by the door, and striping out of her wet clothes before climbing into her creaky bed. Her damp, cool skin clings to her sheets, and she shivers for a moment before rolling onto her side, "Tomorrow's a new day Polly... Tomorrow's a new day..."

She sniffles slightly, before snuggling into her pillow, and closing those green eyes. She takes a deep breath, and sighs, before she resigns herself to her nightmares once again.

 

[Saccharine Cyanide]

JJ woke up to the sound of someone screaming.

He bolted upright in bed, gulping down ragged gasps of air. The sound slowly faded to a faint, tinny ringing in his ears as the deep breaths began to calm him down. As terrifying as the nightmare had been, he couldn't recall what it had even been about now that he was awake. The only vague impression he had was that it was cold. Cold and wet and indescribably lonely.

"Shut the fuck up!" That was his step-dad from the master bedroom, which shared a wall with JJ's room. There was a crash as something was picked up and thrown against the shared wall with force. JJ realized that the scream he heard in his dream had been his own.

There was the sound of shuffles, his mother's voice, the exchange of swears, muttered apologies. Then, JJ heard a shuffle and scrape as the man went to scoop up the pieces of whatever he had shattered. A lamp, probably.

JJ got out of bed, locked his door, and propped his desk chair under the door handle for good measure. He'd just slipped back under the covers when the handle began to jiggle.

"Open the fucking door, Jesse," came his stepdad's grunt from the other side. JJ turned over on his side and pulled his knees up to his chest as his stepdad began banging violently on the door.

Whatever. The old man would get tired eventually, go back to bed and hopefully forget about everything in the morning.

JJ quietly hoped he'd able to forget, too.

***
​

Miskatonic High School had a somewhat unusual shape.

It was normal for high school halls to be arranged in a straight line, maybe a horseshoe if the architect was feeling frisky. Miskatonic's four hallways were joined together in an infinite square, with the cafeteria dead in the center.

The even-numbered classes were situated on the outside of the square, while the odd-numbered ones were squeezed between the hallways and the cafeteria. Lockers sat in the spaces between the classroom doors.

There was only one story, and even though there were less than a thousand students in this backwoods high school, the hallways were always inexplicably cramped. Getting around could be a real nightmare.

The weirdest thing about Miskatonic High School, though, wasn't the shape. It had to be the life-sized statue of horror writer H.P. Lovecraft, complete with held book and tentacles wrapping around the author's feet and up his calves, in the small courtyard near the gymnasium.

(The school's eccentric founder had apparently been a Lovecraft fanatic. Hence, the school's unique and unusual name).

To be expected, the statue was in a constant state of defacement. Today, Lovecraft was sporting a bright yellow construction hat and a lovingly hand-knitted scarf.

Once outside the gymnasium's back doors or through one of the gates near the parking lot, you'd find yourself in the school's modest football stadium (modest apart from the state-of-the-art scoreboard, one of the main reasons the school was still using textbooks from the '20s).

The grass was yellowed and overrun by crabgrass in some places, the yardlines, freshly painted at the beginning of the school year, barely visible now that football season had wound to an end. Due to the relentless downpour of rain and slush lately, the track and field were largely waterlogged.

The home bleachers were JJ's preferred place to sit and read after the bus dropped him off in the morning, while he waited for the homeroom bell to ring. He was always the last person to show up to class, in order to miss the early morning rush, although he had to take extra care not to be late and risk invoking his worst nightmare: a lecture from Mrs. Keene in front of the entire class.

"What's your story, morning glory?"

JJ didn't look up. There was only one person who knew all of JJ's hidey holes and smoked Camel Straights.

"Hey, Teddy," he said, waving cigarette smoke away from his face.

The star quarterback plucked the book out of JJ's hands.

"Invisible Man, huh? That's the one with the guy with the, uh, bandages and shit all over his face, right?"

"Hey," JJ said, swiping at the book as Teddy held it aloft, but the other teen had a full foot in height on him. "You're thinking of The Invisible Man," JJ said, indignant.

"What, there's a difference? Whatever, I've only seen the movie. That Gloria Stuart, wow," Teddy grinned, tossing the book back. "She's a looker, don't you think?"

"Yeah, I guess," JJ said as he caught it. He flipped through the pages, trying to find his last dog-ear.

Teddy took a long drag from his cigarette. Smoke curled from his lips, a hot white smudge rising on the cold air.

"I know, I know. You've only got one girl on your mind," Teddy grinned impishly. "Victoooria from Mr. Ekstrom's hoooomeroooom," he said in a sing-song voice.

JJ snapped his book shut. "What?! No, I don't! I mean, I'm not-"

"Shhh," Teddy said, raising his finger to his lips. "I know how you feel about me, Jesse-boy. The truth is...I've always felt the same way about you." JJ had stifle a laugh as Teddy fluttered his eyelashes and flashed a coy smile. It wasn't a bad impression, if he was being honest.

"Why don't you take me in your big, strong arms and...Oh. Speak of the devil, and she shall appear."

JJ followed Teddy's gaze downfield. Victoria was squish, squishing her way up to them in a pair of fashionable galoshes.

"Hi, Teddy," Victoria said, fluttering her eyelashes. JJ realized with a sinking heart that she'd probably followed the quarterback here.

She seemed to barely notice JJ standing behind the quarterback and flashed him a polite half-smile when she finally seemed to realize he was there. "Hi, um..."

"JJ. We were in the same homeroom last year. Mrs. Thompson, remember?"

"Yeah, sure." Her eyes lit up a little. "You're on the football team?"

JJ remembered that he was wearing his Letterman jacket. Forest green and black, the school colors.

"Yeah. I play free safety."

JJ could have sworn he saw the interest physically drain from her eyes.

"Oh." Her gaze slowly turned back toward Teddy.

"Hey, are you free tonight? Do you want to hang at Greg's later?"

"Nah," Teddy said, tossing the remains of his cigarette and crunching it under his heel. "I can't. If I don't at least get a C in Language Arts this semester, coach threatened to kick me off the team next year. So I'm gonna be studying my ass off every night for the next few weeks."

Teddy stood next to JJ and nudged him with an elbow. "But JJ's free tonight. Right, JJ?"

"Oh. Actually, I just realized that I'm busy tonight," Victoria said quickly. "I have a...thing. Maybe I'll see you later, Teddy?"

Teddy sucked air through his teeth once Victoria was out of hearing distance. "Geez, buddy, that's rough. I don't know what else to say."

"Forget it, man." JJ turned away from his best friend. He could feel his face getting flushed, and he didn't want Teddy to see.

The sound of a bell cut through the cold morning air like a knife. The homeroom bell, five-minute warning.

"Do you mind if you walk to class without me?" JJ said as he knelt down, stuffing his copy of Invisible Man into his backpack.

"Yeah, sure. But JJ, can you come over to my place after school? I...kinda want to talk to you about something that's been bothering me."

JJ opened his mouth to reply.

"Did you say something just now?" Teddy snapped suddenly.

"Uh, no. You didn't give me a chance to say anything." JJ looked at Teddy quizically. "You alright, man?

"Yeah." Teddy rubbed his temples. "I've just...been getting these killer headaches lately. Migraines, I think."

"Well, take some aspirin," JJ said, waving his friend off. "I'll see you later, okay, Teddy?"

"Yeah," Teddy said quietly as he began to walk toward homeroom. "Yeah. I'll see you later."

 

[Clinthulhu]

Blue. Deep, dark, blue. The unending, black abyss stretching out under her, while the blue waters about her swirled, and twisted, conspiring to force her down into it. Like a gaping, slavering, toothless maw widening to devour her, the black spreads, seeping inkily into any portion of light that still remained.

"Come. To. Me."

"Be. With. Us."​

She tries to cry out. She struggles, her tears lost in the waters around her while the abyss clutches at her feet. She could feel it, feel the cold claws gripping at her kicking legs. It wants her. It wants her so badly.

"Not. Alone"

"We. Are. Here."

"All."

"One."​

She screams into the deaf waters, her lungs choking on the heavy waters, her hands reaching up towards her last glimpses of sunlight as she sinks. Deeper, deeper, and deeper into the hungry abyss.

"Sleep."

"Wake."​

Polly's eyes opened with difficulty this morning, her hair clinging to her head in a tangled mess as she smacked her lips quietly. She doesn't scream. She stopped screaming some time ago, after these nightmare visions had plagued her for several weeks on end, but she still feels that sense of dread. That feeling that something is lurking, somewhere, waiting for her.

She stretches, and her eyebrows draw together as she looks down at her legs, her toes pressing into the carpet gently. Solid ground is more comforting to her in that moment than anything else in the world. But comfort only extends so far, and her door swings open slowly, a narrow, sharp face leering through at her, “Ah... Honey? Good morning. You... Slept well?”

Her mother’s ratlike face shifts uneasily as Polly nods, “I’m fine Mom,” She lies, rubbing her cheek gently, “I’ll be out in a second...”

The face vanished out again quickly, without another word, leaving Polly to slowly wander her room gathering up her clothes, and doing her best to be ready for her day. She runs a brush through her hair, staring into the mirror with a flat expression, her mind slowly combing through her thoughts like her brush combs between her curly ginger hairs. What does that damned dream mean? What does it mean she isn't alone? Who is we?

She sighs, setting her brush down, and looking away from her quickly degrading face in the mirror. She inhales deeply, and stands, taking her bag off of her desk before leaving her dismal little room. She takes a final look back at her faded white door, before walking down the hall, and out the door.