Chapter 3 This Is The Scent Of The Quarantine Wing Of A Hospital

The sound of the door bursting in startled me. They had already figured out I had something to do with the condition of the Prophet. I suppose we were lucky enough that no one would disturb the Prophet during his walk so that we had time to gather ourselves this far.

Blue moldy veins began to spread throughout my apartment. One of the tendrils found its way into my room. One of the head Apostles was here! He was the only one who knew how to work this soul magic.

Utilizing soul magic, the apostle would create massive lines of mold that would feed off of and generate from each other. This allowed him to use his abilities more than the average person because part of his magic helped fuel itself. It smelled like rotten feet cheese and as it curled up my leg it felt slimy and fuzzy.

His mold magic allowed him to experience and see what his mold did, which was great for a quick look around any place that needed to be infiltrated. He couldn't see through a traditional human sense however. It was almost a sixth sense, that allowed him to experience what the mold did. From his magic he could roughly tell shape and chemical make up. It allowed him to figure out how many bodies were in the apartment. The problem is once it found something it could also generate a sharp set of spikes at the tip of the tendril allowing the mold to be absorbed into the skin.

There was a stinging pain as it began entering my body. Once the mold was in a body the apostle could use it to control the limbs of the person like a puppet. Further, they could choose to change the molds composition and poison the person as well as long as it was connected to the original tendril.

As the mold entered my body I began vomiting heavily.

"I'm taking control before we die" the voice in my head said. "I will use what little soul power you have first to keep us alive and will only use my power if necessary."

"I never wanted to be a part of this!" I said. "Why don't you just use your supposedly godly powers to get us out of this mess? If you are so damn powerful you should be able to do it with ease."

"That would be fantastic but you have to remember I am clearly weakened and any power I use from myself will delay my healing process and cause you to be stuck with me for longer."

This conversation was happening as she wrestled control from me anyways. Using my soul power she combined to low level spell, an air cut and fire to create an intensely heated blade of air from my hand cutting the tendril off and sealing it away from the rest.

My body was still vomiting but she used this to her advantage. Casting a spell I had never seen before she used the energy of the body to help fuel the spell instead of the soul. By harnessing the already diseased body she was able to expel the remainder of the mold from my body.

I could tell by now my soul energy was getting weaker and I only had a few more weak spells left in me. To be fair I didn't know I had any in me but I suppose this would work too. Using a skin hardening spell, she thrust my body out the third floor window before using another quick spell to create an air cushion to slightly stop the fall to keep us from breaking any bones.

The apostle was still inside and could sense his prey had gotten away. A magic aura was coming from the room. This couldn't be possible as the person who lived here had no magic. It was shown and proven. All the apostle knew was the man who lived in the apartment was the last to enter the park before the stabbing of the Prophet. He doubted that the Wretch in the apartment had anything to do with the apostle getting hurt but was certain he had seen something. The fact that there was magic able to counteract his mold changed his mind on this. What a wretch to hide something.

Back outside there were no people around. It looked like a standard day. I had expected there to be more people but it looked like the Apostles wanted to keep this as quiet as possible. Control was given back over to me. I still felt weak from being sick and my soul energy had never felt this exhausted before. It was like I had used a muscle for the first time and now I could feel it. God help me, it sucked. I didn't have too much time to complain.

Lilly guided me with careful directions down the street and to a bus stop. It appeared the apostle was not chasing after me. They did not want to cause a scene in the street. Hopefully wherever Lilly was taking me they could help me hide because wherever I went, I knew they were watching.

Getting off the bus in an older part of town, Lilly guided me to a back Alley.

"Where are you having me go?" I asked.

"There are still some people who managed to stay in hiding who claim to follow me as their god. They do not speak for me but I have kept an eye on them making sure they do not misuse my name to cause unjust chaos. Those who would hurt or sacrifice in my name were destroyed off the face of the Earth each time it would happen. However there were those sections that were harmless enough. Some of them even did good for the world on occasion whereas others were more about the evolution and preservation of self. I suppose these were the closest to my view on humanity."

"Exactly what religion are you talking about?" I muttered to Lilly in my brain.

"I suppose you would know them as followers of Satan. The problem is I am not the Satan they believe in and I am neither as good or as evil as anyone thinks of me. I just am. There is no Satan in the sense of what you know. There are more deities out there than you could even fathom to count. What you call "god" and me "Satan" we are just tiny pawns in the grand scheme of things. That being said, because I kept an eye on them I know what you need to say to get you an audience with someone who can help you out and give you some time to strengthen up before we head into the wasteland to get to the one free sanctuary city left.

Coming up next to a trash can I could see a trap door leading to a crawl space into what looked like an abandoned building. This use to be a warehouse before the beasts took over. Opening the door left open a tunnel that instead of going into the warehouse, only slightly went in before going down into a dark, musty hole. The ground was unevenly dug and smooth all the way around. Toward the bottom of the hole about twenty feet down and thirty feet below the actual warehouse there was a small dirt room with a door.

On the door was an intriguing lock. It required the input of buttons in order to open. I went over to the door to inspect it, a light shining off the door itself illuminating the room.

"Don't touch that door!" Lilly screamed in my head.

"What the hell? Why not?"

"That door is a trap. If you do not enter the code in exactly as intended some small explosions will go off above us creating a cave in completely shutting down the hole and making sure no one could dig their way through. It is a fail safe to ensure that trespassers cannot catch the members who seek refuge here. The code I'm about to give you is my own personal code. However, considering I'm in your body, you need to keep your guard up as it will look suspicious considering you look nothing like me."

Lilly proceeded to give me the code to the door. I was extra careful to make sure I entered it correctly, not wishing to suffocate to death. The light on the door went dark as there was a subtle ticking sound coming from the inside. A gentle knock was heard and Lilly had me answer back the knock as a code. Another minute passed and the door slowly opened up. I could see nothing as I stepped through the entrance into the dark abyss.

Upon entering the new space a sharp pain was felt on my head and I blacked out. Before I could hear and smell. Now there was nothing.

I woke up to a dark room. I could still see nothing but I could hear the sound of my heartbeat.

"About time you woke up" Lilly said.

"What happened?"

"The members are being safe. I put in my code to enter the refuge and when they looked out the camera attached to the door light to see it was not me, yet you still knew the secret knock as well, they decided that instead of killing you, they would just imprison you. While you were knocked out, I was still awake. While I didn't have access to any of your senses because you were unconscious, I managed to get an estimate of the time. You have been out cold for at least two days."

"Two days!?!? How did this even happen?" I shouted. There was an uncomfortable feeling in my arm. It was an IV that looked to be giving me fluid. That explained why I wasn't so thirsty but I was getting hungry as hell. It also appeared I was strapped down. I couldn't move at all. However, I really appreciated the pillow they provided. It was honestly nicer than my pillow back home. It really supported the head.

"Did they keep me asleep or something?" I asked.

"As far as I can tell monitoring your body, there appears to be no drug or magic residue causing you to sleep. I think the trauma of about transforming into a scarred monster as well as using your soul ability, even if it was me doing it caused your body and soul to wear out to the point of exhaustion. At this point enjoy the sleep while you can. Look alive, I have a feeling we will be in for a rough time until we can get this sorted out. Hopefully they will let us speak with Augustus. He is the leader of this sect and is most likely to listen to us. He is also the only other person who knows what I was attempting to do with the Prophet."

A bright light formed in the room. It was a completely white room with no windows and only a vague outline on the door to show where the entrance and exit were. There were four cameras one on each corner of the room as well. A speaker on the ceiling spoke: "It appears you have woken up. I now have some serious questions for you. If you even think about lying, the IV will quickly fill with a special poison created with the help of science and magic making you wish you were dead. Lets start with the most pressing question. Where is Lilly?"

Chapter Title from Camisado by Panic! At the Disco

I am trying to title all my chapters based off of songs that I feel either represent my mood when writing, or describe the setting of a portion of the chapter, or simply applies in some thematic way. Let me know if you think it is too cringe and I can always edit things to a normal sounding chapter title.