Olivia sat back on the couch in pure contentment. She wore her fluffy dressing gown, held a large bowl of salt and vinegar chips, and her second can of Jimmy and Cola went down a treat. She was all set for Anarchy, the biggest concert of the year, right in the comfort of her own home. Sebastian and Andrew — twin brothers and her two closest friends — would be there soon, hopefully bringing more snacks and Jimmy with them, and they were going to rock out in the warmth of her lounge-room. It would be great!
At least, that’s what she told herself.
Anarchy was in Brisbane, a mere three hours drive away. They had all wanted to go but tickets were ludicrously priced and only Andrew was employed. He couldn’t pay for all three of them! At the very least, they could scream-sing along to the music as it was broadcast live from the stadium direct to her lounge.
“Livvy!” Her mum peered around the kitchen door. “Mike said he’s on his way. Sure you don’t want to come? Chef’s special tonight is the seafood smorgasbord, your favourite.”
“Nah, I’m good. Sebby and Andrew will be here soon.” She flashed the devil’s horns with both hands and stuck out her tongue. “We’re gonna rock out with our cocks out.”
“Sweetheart, I gave birth to you. That was a while ago, sure, but I’m fairly certain that you do not have a cock.”
The front door swung open and the twins strolled in as freely as though this were their own house. Thankfully they weren’t identical twins; they got up to enough trouble as mere brothers.
“Livvy has a cock? What’s going on — have we entered bizarro-world?” Andrew grinned.
“Of course not!” Olivia smoothed her dressing gown around her chest, crossed her arms behind her head and leant back against the cushions. “I am all woman.”
Sebastian winked at her and then hurried over to her mother and offered a deep bow, holding a bottle of Jack Daniels carefully in both hands.
“I brought you a bottle, milady; as requested.”
“Good.” Her mother shrugged into her coat and quickly zipped it up before the chill from the front door could assault her. “Replace what you drank last time and this time—” She shot a red-hot glare at the grinning lad. “—kindly stay the hell out of my room. If you need to spew, the bathroom is on the opposite side of the hall.”
“Hey! Drunk legs go where drunk eyes show.”
Her mother rolled her eyes, then smiled happily as a loud engine pulled into the driveway.
“Aim for the tiles, not the carpet. Have fun, kids.”
“Would be more fun if you took sympathy upon us and bought us some tickets,” Olivia muttered beneath her breath.
“You want overpriced tickets to listen to this garbage? Get a job. Ciao.”
The backdoor slammed shut, followed by a car door, and with wheels squealing away from the house and down the street Olivia and her friends were at last alone.
“Garbage… garbage!?” Olivia threw her hands into the air and quickly fumbled for the chip bowl before it could spill all across the floor. “Did you guys hear that blasphemy?”
“Loud and clear.” Andrew nodded solemnly. Sweeping his goth-black hair out of his eyes, he kicked off his shoes and sat back in the recliner, putting his feet up. “Has it started yet? Turn it up!”
Olivia grabbed the remote and upped the volume just as Sebastian emerged from the kitchen. He threw a premixed can of cola-whisky at his brother, handed her another, then plopped down and placed a casual arm around her shoulder.
“So…” He lifted up the neck of her dressing gown to peer underneath. “You naked under there?”
“Sebby!” She elbowed him in the chest and shuffled away from him. “No. I’m not naked under here.” Untying the gown, she thrust her completely clothed chest at him. “See?”
“Well, that’s a pity. Here I was, thinking you were about to flash me.”
“In your dreams.”
“Get a room.” Andrew waved his can at them, then motioned at the television. “Tourists of Rage are on!”
Olivia squealed and turned the volume up to max. With bass thumping through the entire house, Sebastian jumped off the couch and slid across the lounge-room on his knees, playing an air guitar while she and Andrew sang along at the top of their voices.
Several more whiskies later, all three of them were parading around the lounge-room in their own personal mosh-pit. Sebastian grabbed her and lifted her slightly off the floor so it felt like she was flying. Fuelled by the alcohol, she relished his warm arms wrapped around her; the amusement embedded in his green eyes; the single curl of blonde hair by his ear… good grief. She hurriedly looked down at her feet dangling in the air.
“Put me down!” She shrieked, flailing her arms and laughing awkwardly. His arms tightened and he spun her around in a quick circle. “I will spew on you. I swear to God!”
“Okay, okay.”
He let her go and, dizzy, she stumbled to the floor then hurriedly sat back on the couch, poking her tongue out at him. He sent her an infuriating smirk and continued jumping around the room with his brother. Christ. If he ever found out her little crush she would never hear the end of it — he would torment her forever.
Suddenly, the music stopped mid-song and a mass of booing yelled out of the speakers. Wincing, Olivia turned the volume down and they all stared at the TV. The band seemed frozen in place. The drummer held his drumsticks mid-air, his eyes glued wide open; the two guitarists were mid-strum, their fingers still on the strings; the singer held the microphone up in the air, his only movement a slight twitch of his eyeballs.
“What the fuck?” Olivia muttered. “Am I drunk or are the guys frozen?”
“Both, obviously.” Andrew smiled. It wasn’t a cheerful or reassuring smile; it was an awkward smile. He didn’t know what the hell was going on either. “I don’t think this is part of the show…”
A girl crawled onto the stage. Long, knotted red hair fell across her thin and filthy frame, her dress in tatters. It was hard to tell if she were a child or their own age, but either way, she did not belong there. The band still frozen, the girl was the only thing that moved as she stumbled to her feet and walked towards them. Olivia blinked her fuzzy eyes and narrowed them at the girl. Was that blood on her dress?
A police officer and two security guards came out from the back of the stage and approached the girl, slowly, cautiously.
“Are you alright?” The officer asked. The camera zoomed in on the officer and the girl. It was definitely blood. The girl was covered in it. “Do you need help?”
“What kind of stupid question is that?” Andrew exclaimed. He looked at both Olivia and Sebastian incredulously and gestured at the TV. “Seriously. Does she look alright?”
“Right. Get her some help and get the music back on!” Sebastian sat down on the couch with a bored plop, nearly landing on top of her, and cracked open another can. “Seriously. Just ignore the band, yeah? The frozen band. The frozen band worth millions. Approach the strange blood-covered girl.” He sculled half the can and waved it in the air. “Some occultist shit is going down! I feel it in my bones.”
“I’m sure you feel something in your bone…er.” Andrew shot back, smirking at the two of them.
Olivia shuffled away from Sebastian and pointed at the TV.
“Shut up. Something’s happening.”
The camera had panned out again, showcasing the crowd around the stage. Thousands upon thousands of people muttered and yelled, demanding the girl to fuck off and get the music back and happening. The officer stood a half-metre from the girl and outstretched her hand, offering help, and suddenly, the girl stood up straight and proud and thrust her arms out in front of her. The officer, security, the band and all of their equipment flew off the stage in a swift motion.
“What the fuck?” Andrew gaped. “Did you fuckin’ see that? Is she a Jedi?”
“A Jedi?” Sebastian laughed — a laugh that faded away as the crowd around the stage rose up off the ground and floated in mid-air. He swallowed. “Jesus Christ! Yeah, she ain’t no Jedi. Fuckin’… told you — it’s occult shit!”
An impossibly tall man appeared at the girl’s back, wearing crimson robes that billowed around the both of them. Thirty thousand people rose higher into the sky, screaming as they were held helpless beneath the full moon. Suddenly, bits of their flesh were torn from their bodies by invisible forces. Horrified, Olivia backed away from the TV and fell into Sebastian’s arms.
“Are you seeing this?” she whispered.
His hand tightened on her arm but for once she didn’t notice.
Soon the crowd was but a mass of blood and bone that spun faster and faster around the stage. Guttural, primal screams flew out of their dripping skulls and through the speakers. Olivia fumbled for the remote and muted it. She didn’t want to hear this, to see this, yet she couldn’t look away. Jags of lightning shot across the sky above the stage, the growling thunder audible outside the lounge-room windows… was that possible? Anarchy was in Brisbane. Brisbane was three hundred kilometres away!
In unison, the three teenagers looked at each other with wide, frightened eyes, and slowly walked to the front door. Cracking it open the tiniest smidgen, they peered outside.
Just as they opened the door, the sky shattered. It was akin to a hundred thousand glasses smashing simultaneously and they quickly covered their ears to block out the sound, though it didn’t do much good. The canvas of the sky ripped in half like a ragged fabric, revealing an iridescent glow that spread outwards and encompassed everything. Bizarre howls emanated from the ever-expanding hole in the sky, ghostly figures and black silhouettes rose up from behind the fading clouds, and shrill laughter sang loud as humanoid bodies and twisted creatures floated to the ground.
Gasping, Olivia slammed the door and raced back to the television with Sebastian and Andrew hot on her heels. The sky on the TV looked just as the sky outside her door. The camera zoomed in on the man at the girl’s back and she paled. That was unlike any man she had ever seen. He had bony protrusions in place of eyebrows and cheekbones and his slanted green eyes peered directly into the camera, directly into the eyes of everyone watching.
“Welcome to your new reality.”
Everything was muted and yet they still heard his silky smooth voice as clear as day. A perverse smile spread across his face, revealing rows of pointed teeth. The lights flickered, then all electricity shut down. It was dark, the only light was the surreal glow from the tear in the sky, then a great roar shook the house and the foundations it sat upon.
Outside, animalistic noises reverberated through the walls and people screamed in terror; Olivia didn’t want to be down here anymore, and she definitely didn’t want to be out there.
Her eyes darting from Andrew to Sebastian, she motioned over her shoulder and raced upstairs. Tools sat in the middle of the hallway beside a ladder that had been placed against the manhole. Mum’s boyfriend had been doing repairs up there… she swallowed. It was doubtful he’d be doing any more.
They hurried up the ladder. Andrew kicked it away and pulled the manhole cover closed, then they all scurried to a broken board in the wall so they could see the outside world.
A felinesque creature with writhing tendrils spread across its body leapt onto a woman and disembowelled her in the street, pulling her intestines from her gaping stomach with its nail-like teeth. Olivia swallowed down her nausea yet could not look away. All three of them could not look away.
Horrified, they silently watched the chaos of the outside world from the relative safety of their roof-top hideout and hoped that these bizarre terrors would not find them.
If this wasn’t a disaster of apocalyptic proportions, Olivia didn’t know what was.
Sooooo.... almost a year ago (woops) I posted Chapter One of this story.
In that time, I've changed it a little bit so that Alexandria only summons Authrum into the world and more power is required to "send her into the other realm," which is basically Authrum's manipulation as he seeks more power to pull his entire realm into this world under the guise of helping her.
All that power? The deaths of thirty thousand concert-goers should be more than enough!
If/when I actually finish and publish this, both this and chapter one will be merged into one very large introductory chapter. I wouldn't call it a prologue, as people apparently hate prologues, but I don't really feel as though it's a prologue either. It's an introduction to the story and makes a good starting point, in my opinion.
Also — surprise! 😁 — over the past couple of months I've actually plotted this entire book — I'm not pantsing this one. It's a miracle.
I mean, I find myself in the annoying position of writing three very different books all at once (immature comedy/fantasy erotica/post-apocalyptic fantasy) switching to and from each one whenever the mood strikes, but this one? This particular one? It's actually thought out. In doing so, I've switched characters up a bit, added a new one, and changed some things around. I'm quite happy with how it's coming along. 😊
Babble, babble, babble, babble, babble.
Thanks for reading!! 🤓📚📝
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