“Where am I?” March mumbled, looking around the small room. Dirt covered the rounded ceiling and uneven walls. It was all empty—no photographs, no memorabilia, nothing.
“You are nowhere,” the man answered, fully withdrawing his hand from March’s lips.
“I need to leave.” If he had to be awake—alive—he couldn’t stay in this unfamiliar place. He nudged the panic back down that attempted to rise.
The man shook his head and shrugged. “Once you’re here, you’re always here.” It wasn’t a threat, more of a resolved matter.
March sat up and got a good look at the man. The pale skin, the dark hair—he recognized him. “You’re the one I saw in the window, who leapt from the cabin. Who are you?”
“My name is Ira.” He paused, clenching his jaw yet his tone dripped with melancholy from his next words. “And I came back here, did I not?”
A loud scream echoed from outside the room, startling them both. March jolted forward and Ira placed a hand against March’s chest.
“What is that?” March whispered.
Ira pressed a finger to his own lips and spoke softly. “One of his victims.”
Victims? March stood from the ground and backed up until he hit the dirt wall. To his left, small drops of water leaked from the ceiling in the corner.
“You wanted to die...” Ira said.
“I did.” What he wanted was to fade out and never awaken again. This seemed more like Hell. Maybe that’s where he was.
“Do you no longer wish this?”
“I-I…” In that moment, March didn’t know what he wanted. He knew he wanted to go home, though.
The screaming from outside of the room started again, louder than before, and not stopping. March had to do something. He couldn't just sit here listening to someone scream in unimaginable pain. Holding his breath, he hurried past Ira.
Ira attempted to grab him, his face full of concern. “You can’t.”
March didn't stop as he ran out into the hall. People stood against a long dirt corridor lit with metal torches, burning warm blue fire. The people’s arms remained neatly at their sides, as if in a trance.
Ira came up behind him and spoke softly, “Stay quiet.”
March nodded and waved his hand back and forth in front of a man covered in tattoos with a shaved head. The man didn’t even blink. March shifted to the next person, a woman with long brown curls and mahogany skin—she didn’t respond either. Neither did the next, or the next.
As though it were a sense of duty, he moved down the line toward the screams. Ira remained close behind him every step of the way. He wished he was brave enough to swoop in there and stop whatever was going on, but there were those who were courageous like in the comic books, then there were people like him. Ones who were frightened to be noticed.
Yet he pushed himself farther and farther until he came to an open archway. The screaming intensified. March took a step forward and peered around the opening. Inside, people sat against the walls. Except the walls weren’t dirt-colored, they were stained with bright red blood. Fresh blood. A head lay on the floor, ripped clean from a body, its terrified eyes staring at nothing, its hair soaked in blood. The screaming had stopped, but March couldn’t get a clear view of the rest of the victim’s body. In front of the slain man stood a creature with skin so pale it was translucent, its skeleton visible beneath blue-black wings that nearly dragged the blood-covered floor. Hair like ragged darkness hung past gore-splattered shoulders, while its muscular legs ended at clawed feet. Its head turned to glance over its shoulder—
Two large hands pulled March back and covered his mouth again. “Don’t,” warm breath whispered against his ear, tickling it.
Ira slowly led March back to the room, passing the line of zombie-like people.
“What is that?” March asked, more in shock than anything, when they came back into the original room. His body didn’t give the slightest tremble, as if it was all a dream.
“An underground demon—some of you people whisper vampire before going into your trance,” Ira murmured. “This is a demon who will rip your head straight from your neck and lap all the blood he can savor—one who will hypnotize you when he so chooses and then have his way with you.”
“How do you know this?” March asked, trying to block out all the ways the demon would have his way with him if he got his hands on him. His hands automatically went to the back of his head as if that would keep it attached.
“My mother was his sister...” Ira bit his lip, displaying one of his long canines. “She got pregnant with me from a human.”
“Where is she?”
“Dead. He consumed her,” Ira said flatly, but there was hurt that flickered behind those silver irises.
March’s eyes widened. “What’s going on with those people out there?” He didn’t know anything about Ira, but he hadn’t killed March yet.
“It will be you in a few days when he comes searching and locks his eyes with yours...”
“Well, why the fuck did you drag me down here?” March asked, trying to keep his voice as low as possible, even though he felt anger blooming.
“Because you kept going into the lake, asking for death!” Ira whisper-shouted, stepping too close to March. “I let you go numerous times.”
March pressed his hands to his forehead and slid them down his face. It was his own damn fault he was in this position. “What about you? Do you like being here? Do you want to leave?”
“It’s the only thing I’ve wanted, but the underground demon has all the control. I venture out through different bodies of water to scavenge for him. I hate it.” Ira’s silvery gaze met March’s, and there was something there, a longing for a different sort of life. “He hasn’t seen you yet, so there’s a chance I can take you back. If not, then… Well, you saw what happens.”
An image of his own head being ripped off and a tongue circling inside the open wound appeared. March pushed it away. “What about you?”
“I’ll continue doing what I do.” A solemn expression crossed Ira’s angelic face as his eyebrows furrowed.
March stared around the empty room. It didn’t seem like much of a life for Ira—it seemed more horrible than his. He had always thought at times that his life was far worse than anyone else’s, even though he knew it wasn’t true. It was just something inside himself that needed to be mended.
“You can come back home with me?” He didn’t know why he was asking this person—half underground demon—to come back with him.
“My blood is bound to his,” Ira said.
“Can you bind it to someone else instead?”
“I can, but I would still be bound to someone else.”
March thought about the choices of being bound to that demon in the other room or to a human. It seemed like a pretty obvious choice to him, but perhaps Ira didn’t know better.
“Look, Ira,” March started. “I’m not much, but you could bind yourself to me and then we can get the hell out of here. I promise I won’t force you to do shit, all right?”
A new scream radiated throughout the underground corridor, a woman this time.