Down to Hell (Text)

Down to Hell

The fire cracked as we all huddled around. It was time. The moon had just come up and the breeze had died down leaving a crisp stillness to the woods. This was our first camping trip for the summer and we were just buzzing with excitement for the rest of the weekend. Unfortunately this year we didn’t leave early enough and so we were showing up late. No one was worried because we had enough lanterns to light up half of New York.

Every year Todd, Heather, Crystal, Murray and I would continue our camping tradition. This year Todd brought his girlfriend Chelsea along. She was pretty cool, when she and Todd weren’t slobbering over each other. I’d known Heather and Crystal since we were kids. We all grew up in the same neighborhood and we’d always helped each other through the hard times. I have to admit I’ve lately developed a thing for Heather, but I always ignored it. We were friends and I didn’t want that to change. Well that was my excuse anyway..

Murray for the last week was preparing for this year’s spooky story. Every year we would have one and I had to roll my eyes every time we did this. Murray's stories weren't all that scary. He would screw up lines and forget important parts in the story, but this was a diehard tradition and no matter how much we protested we all loved it deep down.

This year Murray kept telling everyone he had a story that would beat any other story we had ever heard. "That shouldn't be hard," Everyone scoffed when he told us. It made the road trip fun as we all jabbed and taunted one another. Murray took the brunt of the jokes, but it was mainly because he kept bringing up the story over and over again on the ride up.

We finally got all settled in and set up Todd’s Dad’s R.V. This was our usual camping spot, right in the Birchwood forest about 20 miles out of town. We had found a great clearing in a field of trees. It always took some time to make sure the R.V. didn’t scrape on the way in, but we made it in without any problems this year.

As we sat there waiting for the story Murray abruptly stood up and said he would be right back. As he walked away we all started to scoff. Crystal, one of the girls, laughed and made a joke about how the suspense was killing her, but soon enough Murray came bouncing back out of the RV to the campfire. As he sat down we noticed he had a peculiar book in his lap. The old leather bound book seemed new, almost as if no one had ever opened it. Not a single crease marked the dark leather spine of the book. On the cover the gold lettering had long faded and left a smattering of gold flakes. I felt a tiny twinge run down my spine as I actually got a bit excited for this story. It seemed Murray finally came to his senses and got some help from an outside source. 

Heather moved around the fire and sat by Murray to inspect the book. “Where did you get that?” She asked. Murray explained that he was at the library and thought he’d ask the librarian about scary books. “That’s when she smiled and pulled this out from underneath the counter.” Murray held up the book just right so the lettering glowed in the light. “Alright,” Todd exclaimed, “Maybe this year will be better than last.” Chelsea let out a nervous laugh. You could see in her eyes that she hated this kind of thing. Well that and the fact that she was already basically sitting on top of Todd and we hadn’t even started the story.

Murray made a motion with the book getting everyone’s attention. I unintentionally caught Heather’s eye from across the camp while looking around. I’m not sure why, but I nodded in the direction of the empty spot next to me. Heather paused for a minute and that when it hit me…. Oh no. What did I just do? I was about to start chastising myself, when she stood up and came over to me. “What was that?” Heather asked. “What.. I don’t know… I had a stroke…. I couldn’t –.“ “Oh shut up!” She said as a perfect smile burst across her face. As she adjusted herself and sat down next to me I heard her mutter something to the effect of, “-bout time.”

I took no offense as Todd caught my attention from across the fire. He shot me a smug smile and a thumbs up. I sheepishly grinned as I turned away. I knew there would be congratulations, and questions later….. Oh well…. Heather sat with her legs to the side and wrapped her arm around mine.

 “A fair warning,” Murray loudly announced, “these stories are intended to scare. I wrote this book with the spirit of evil and it will -  yada yada yada. There’s quite a few stories in here. Where do we want to start?” Murray began to name of the stories, “The Raptured Soul, Down to Hell, Cre –.“ Todd cut in, “Down to Hell, it sounds like your other stories!”  He and Chelsea chuckled. “Shut up,” Murray spat out. He lowered his head closer to the books pages. “Asshat.” Murray whispered. Heather and I just barely heard but we laughed.

Murray skipped through the pages until he found the right part. He readjusted himself as he scooted closer to the light from the lantern, and began to read. For the first time Murray’s words began to get our attention. The story told of a man and a wife who had experimented with witchcraft. At first they thought it harmless but they stumbled upon a book with Latin inscriptions.  The husband and wife had decided to perform one of the rituals from the book. The ritual was complex but somehow this couple had managed to prepare it perfectly. 

“He grabbed the knife,” Murray spoke in a clear voice. Something was already wrong. Murray was probably the biggest coward of us all, but his voice didn’t tremble. It eve seemed as if he was becoming more excited. My eyes left Murray and looked around into everyone’s eyes. We were scared. I felt Heather tightening her fingers around my arm cutting off the circulation. I saw Chelsea literally hiding under the blanket her and Todd shared. Even Todd had a slight pale look to his face. Last but not least, I myself begin to notice muscles tensing and a twinge of fear as I pulled my arm from Heather’s death grip, and put it around her. I pulled her closer feigning an attempt to calm her, but I was really trying to comfort myself. “… and slashed the knife across his wife’s wrist.” Everyone jerked a bit as Murray explained the scene. “He poured it into the goat’s horn and drew symbols on the ground.

*Sound of grating dirt*

Murray stopped for a second and looked up. “Did you h –“ Crystal screamed from the opposite side of the campfire. Heather and I bolted over to her to see what the matter was. Crystal was pointing to the ground with her hand. A slew of symbols covered the ground in front of her. I turned to Crystal who was a stiff as a board. “Crystal?” I said. “What were you writing in the dirt?” She looked at me and through the start of tears whimpered, “I didn’t write anything they just started to appear.” That’s when another scream ripped out of Heather’s mouth. My ears rang as I turned to Heather, “What was that?” Heather’s expression immediately became very serious. Heather whispered in a quiet voice, “Is that blood?” Everyone immediately turned towards Crystal again. We were too busy looking at the ground where the symbols had been carved and didn’t notice the pool of blood gathering underneath Crystal’s left hand.

We ran to the RV and pulled out the first aid kit. Crystal was actually doing well, albeit looking terrified. She hadn’t screamed when she saw the blood and she explained that she didn’t know how it had happened. After we opened up the first aid kit Heather and I cleaned Crystal’s hand off and in the lantern light we saw a clean long gash across her wrist. As I looked closer at the cut it was strange, the cut was clean and straight. This clearly wasn’t something that happened by accident. I talked to Crystal as I put some gauze and medical tape over the cut. I asked if she remembered banging her arm against something, or getting it caught somewhere. Crystal said that she didn’t remember anything that could’ve done that.

Todd came back over and announced that he had found something by the fire pit. He held up an old twisted wire that had a dull gleam in the fire light. “It was probably this.” Todd said as he shrugged his shoulders and placed the wire on our tiny card table by the RV. I was the only one that had really seen that cut that close, and Crystal was kind of in a daze so I’m sure she didn’t see how clean the cut was, but I know it wasn’t the wire. I was about to say something but just brushed it off as a coincidence. In all reality I really just wanted to get back to Heather.

Things settled back down and we all gathered back around the fire. I saw Heather heading in my direction and the butterflies returned. The butterflies quickly vanished as soon as I saw her with Crystal in tow. “Crystal’s gonna come sit by us.” Heather said as she got next to me. I reluctantly nodded and put on a smile, I couldn’t be mad, really, I was too ecstatic by the fact that she had snuggled up to me earlier. I’m sure it wouldn’t be the last time. Ha ha. 

As Murray pressed further into the story the sense of unease quickly came back. “As they sat back waiting for the ritual to finish, the couple became increasingly aware of the darkness that had crept into their home. It wasn’t a normal darkness, but a shadow that hid everything beyond a certain distance in complete darkness. It began to shrink and close in on the circle they had made on the floor until everything in the room was absorbed into the inky black.” Murray started to read with a deliberate fervor as Heather shifted her weight and leaned toward me. “Doesn’t it feel like something is wrong?” She whispered into my ear. I turned my head to answer her and I immediately noticed the darkness.

There was no longer a forest around us. It was black. Not just a dark night, but a thick sheet of deafening darkness surrounded us. “… just as the voices began to name them and pronounce their sins….”  Heather and I shot up as everyone around the campfire started to notice the whispers. The kind of voices that you can only invent in your head cause they aren’t possible in real life. The raspy, hollow voice began to get louder and intensify in anger as we started to hear fragments of sentences. I suddenly realized that whatever Murray read, was slowly happening to us. I yelled in an attempt to get Murray’s attention, but he was gone. He still sat on the stump by the fire, but he was not the one reading his voice has achieved a strange… phasing…. effect as if someone was trying to speak through vocals chords they had never used before.

I looked over to Todd and he had shot up out of his seat and had knocked a hysterical Chelsea backwards onto the ground. My look went unnoticed as  he was busy trying to calm her down.

“….as the fires of hell erupted around them…” Murray continued in his frantic voice. 

Immediately everything round us burst into such intense flames we had to cover our faces. Heather turned to me sobbing and I covered her with my jacket. It was so hot I could feel my eyebrows singeing. We made our way closer to our campfire which was cooler than our surroundings. Todd showed up seconds after us dragging Chelsea. Chelsea wasn’t moving. Todd had tears in his eyes as he rolled her over and exposed that half of her body had been severely burnt.

Wait, we’re missing someone. Crystal. I frantically turned to face where we had been earlier to see Crystal. She was… walking… away from us? She moved with convulsions as if her body refused to obey her. That’s when I saw… in the fire, a familiar figure. Crystal’s mother. She was wreathed in flame and beckoning for Crystal to come closer. Crystal’s mother had died in an accident last year and Crystal had a hard time dealing with it….. How could she be here.. I opened my mouth and tried to scream at Crystal but that was when it noticed me. Crystal’s “mother” saw me and mouthed an eerie smile. I moved to reach for Crystal and the figure’s smile quickly turned to rage. The figure quickly reached out with arms wreathed in fire and pulled Crystal into the fire and out of sight.

I turned to Todd and yelled as loud as I could, “We have to get Murray to stop reading!” Todd nodded that he understood and we took off our jackets and left them with the girls to keep them covered. We shielded our faces with our arms and started walking around the fire to where Murray sat. The heat was so intense we could feel the burns developing on our skin. When we finally reached Murray his eyes were locked on the pages he was reading. I reached for the book that he held in front of him and Todd grabbed Murray’s arms as we tried to remove the book. We strained and pulled as hard as we could…. But it wouldn’t budge. Murray continued to read as we tried and tried to tear away the book from his unseen strength.

Then the words came off his lips that I’ll never forget. “….. then he came… Into the circle and out of the darkness. The sickest of demons, the crude and malevolent one. They wailed and dug clawing the floor with broken nails, but he was not to be denied. They were his.”  Murray went silent, and the book dropped from his hands. Todd and I looked at each other we felt a sickening presence. We turned to where we had left the girls. A monstrous figure stood in their midst. With horns that chaotically reached out, and several spider like eyes that flickered in the heat. His massive form grabbed the girls and drug them towards the fire.

I remember screaming at the top of my lungs for Heather to run. I ran as fast as I could. She had poked her head out from underneath the jacket in her last confused moments. I watched as her confusion became terror as she saw Todd and I across the way. Her head turned to see the monstrous figure dragging them into the flames. She turned back to me and let out a silent scream as fire erupted from where the demon had entered the flames. I fell to my knees my head rushing and my skin burning… She was gone….  and the darkness took over.

I woke up, here in the Saint Matthews hospital. My parents were there with a man in uniform. As I faded in and out of consciousness I heard the words, “Smoke…” “forest fire…..”, and “3 bodies….” A nurse put something in my arm and the pain subsided as I floated back out of reality.

It’s been 10 days since the accident. Todd isn’t talking and I can’t talk. My lungs and esophagus were burnt severely in the fire. My mom entered in and began to talk to me and update me on what had happened that day. I smiled, she was the only one who had managed to still treat me like a normal person and not a victim of a tragedy. She took on a more serious tone towards the end as she said “We went through the belongings left at the camp, and have donated them to good will.” She stood and hugged me and made for the door to leave for the night. “There wasn’t much left…. Only a chair or two and book we had found on the ground. Hopefully, someone else can use them. I love you, and I’ll be back in the morning.” The door slowly closed as I tried to make sounds through my burnt windpipe. All the came out were muttled grunts of pain. Tears came as I remember all that had happened that night, and the book… That book that was now sitting on the shelves in some goodwill store…. Waiting for someone else…..