DOCUMENT ARK-003

There is still no direct indicator of The Cold Boy’s presence, aside from the continued inexplicable frostiness of my surroundings. I have no thermometer with which to measure the exact temperature, but I do know that it is very near freezing. Fortunately, I foresaw this eventuality. When I was preparing these archives for their secondary duty as an emergency shelter, I installed both a generator and an electric heater. I have no need of the generator as of yet – the electricity in the house is still functioning – but the heater is proving quite useful.

All in all, save for the blank patch in my memory of last night, things have been much quieter since I published Michael Sullivan’s journal.

It is here that I must pause in my work once again, however, to note that the computer that I am utilizing lacks any kind of printer or scanner attachment. This means that photographs, forms, and the like can only be reproduced inasmuch as they can be translated into textual descriptions. Undoubtedly some detail will be lost in the act, but I have no choice in the matter; I can either supply you with a bastardized, incomplete version of the accounts, or I can give up and leave them in the cabinets for Aqualung.

There is a microphone attachment on the computer, fortunately. There are several audio tapes which I may be able to upload, assuming that the quality of the recording is not so low as to be unintelligible when transplanting it from the tapes to the computer. It may well be.

But, for now, I have another document for your perusal.

DOCUMENT ARK-003: WATERMAN, CHRISTIE

[This document is one of those hand-written by one of my two most reliable contacts. I believe that, in the common parlance, she would be referred to as a “Runner”, though I believe that “Hunter” may be more accurate.

This particular document is a cheap notebook used as a journal, covered in Christie’s handwriting. As before, the entries are undated. There are many before and after this portion of the book, but I have omitted these. Translating them would take time that I simply do not have, and they are not relevant to the subject of this particular post.]

James got himself hospitalized. Hit by a bus running from the Trumpeter. Fucking grand. It’s always cold in hospitals, everybody’s drinking from the same water source and eating the same food, they keep you alone in your room for hours, and they don’t let you take stuff like guns inside. And they start looking for insurance information and trying to bill you, so they put you on the map for the Proxies as well.

Phil managed to get all of James’ stuff before the ambulance got there, so we’ve still got his guns and clothes and everything. Everybody else just thought he was a mugger. Whatever. Not like we haven’t had the cops on us before. We’re Bonnie and Clyde Plus One, or something.

We’ll wait a day before we try and get him out. Trumpeter’s around here somewhere. Got to make sure he hasn’t found out where me and Phil ducked off to after we looted James. Plus he actually does need casts and X-rays and all that shit. But we can’t leave him in there too long. Popsicle Man has always had a soft spot for James. Leaving him alone in there isn’t a good idea.

[New entry]

Trumpeter found the hideout. Shot the fucker in the leg, then ran.

Another night of sleeping in the alleys to get away from the Angelproxies, then. Joy.

[New entry]

Double triangles all over the alleys here. Thicker around the hospital. Fuck this town.

[New entry]

Managed to get in to see James an hour ago. Not murdered or frozen, but he’s out of his mind on painkillers. Both legs broken.

Double triangles in the hospital, too. Scratched into benches, bathroom graffiti. Getting James out later today. Trumpeter’s got too many friends here to wait. Plus it’s fucking cold in that hospital. Longer he’s alone, more likely Popsicle Man turns up. Or the Cult of Archie. If he’s recognized, he’s dead. Or we’re being set up.

Can’t abandon him though. Even if it’s a trap. Don’t need the Choir on our asses on top of everything else.

[New entry]

Spotted probable angels in the alleys. Tramps. This is so a trap it’s not even funny.

[New entry]

Trap sprung. Trapped in James’ room, got him in a wheelchair but the door and window are blocked now because Trumpeter’s called down the cops on us saying we’re kidnapping a patient. Technically true, except I think James would want to go with us if he weren’t passed out.

[New entry]

Temperature just dropped like a fucking rock. I think Frosty the Snowboy is going to make an appearance. Fuck. This. Town.

FUCK HOSPITALS.

[New entry]

I don’t even know.

One second we’re in that hospital room, the next I’m freezing my ass off and everything goes white, and then we’re out in the streets and running.

We’re out of the city now, at least. I think Cold Boy just bailed us out. What the hell? If he wanted us, he had us. Instead he lets us go.

Or he could have just left us there to get a bear-hug from Archie. Why did he save us? They don’t help people. So why?

The only thing I can think of is that he figures it’d be worse for us to live a while longer than to go ahead and embrace the Archangel. I know he wasn’t helping us. I don’t think they really know what “helping” IS.

I think we just got to see the Fears' equivalent of CTF. With James as the flag. So they mark territory or something? I guess that means Cold Boy wants James. Or all of us. And that he's willing to go up against Archie to keep us. I don't know. I don't understand how these things think. I don't even know if they DO think.

But we're not going to be splitting up again any time soon, I know that.

END OF DOCUMENT

Questions

Unfortunately for all those curious about the circumstances surrounding my last post, I am afraid that I am as lost as the rest of you.

I suspect Aqualung’s involvement, naturally. I can hear the shrieking which indicates his presence even now. Well, to be perfectly honest, I cannot hear anything. The “noise” which his presence creates is nothing of the kind. It is quite impossible to describe, in truth; English does have its limits as a language, after all.

This also raises the issue of what memories, precisely, were taken from me. Was it just the memory of the previous night? Or was it something more? If so, how much more? Have I forgotten something vital? How can I make certain that anything is missing at all? And who is the “someone else” mentioned in my last post? There is no one here now save for myself and Aqualung.

Questions which, for now, shall have to go unanswered, as much as I hate to leave such a mystery unsolved.

I do, however, have a little bit of a lead. Even for one such as myself, an old man who has hardly made use of computers prior to starting this online repository, it does not take much effort to work out what, precisely, the rhyme in my last post is.

It is a series of lines from a song: “The Guild of Mute Assassins”, by a modern rock band by the name of “Clutch”. The full lyrics are:

Organ, organ, organ grinder’s henchmen shaking their coins in time

Guild of Mute Assassins will convene at a quarter to nine

Behind the courthouse, atop a scaffold, stands a man with a bag for a face

“You will not have learned until I return to give my executioner the chase”

[chorus]

The swinging of its censers, the silence of its members

Oh, the Guild of Mute Assassins

From the places in between that are so seldom seen

Oh, the Guild of Mute Assassins

Widow in the furrow with thimbles hasn’t seen her face in years

Kneels into a puddle’s reflection to find it is just as she’s feared

And in the garden, the Archangel, sword above his head

“You will not return until you have learned what you have forfeited”

[chorus]

Baby on a threshold with silver, breath rises from its lips

Beam of yellow light from a doorway and the figure of a silhouette

And in the cradle a wood stiletto rattles like a barrel of bones

Another journeyman, with passion, silently recites the oath

It obviously means something to someone. Perhaps it meant something to me, last night. But I have never heard this song before in my life, and was unaware of its existence until I searched for it online this morning, when I awoke in my and found my computer displaying that post.

Given my current situation, it is likely that the “Archangel” referred to in the song’s second verse is the same Archangel which so many of us are running from. If this is the case, then the executioner in the first verse is likely another entity in the same vein, though which it might be is anyone’s guess, as is what their two messages mean.

I believe that I shall end this ramble here, however. I am sure that the rest of the questions which I should like to know the answers to are the same ones which you are asking yourselves, and I can shed no more light on them here. Listing them would just be banal and pointless.

I am three-quarters of the way through translating the next document. I shall have it for you soon.

Empty now

Behind the courthouse
Atop a scaffold 
Stands a man with a bag for a face
"You will not have learned until I return 
To give my executioner the chase"


And in the Garden the Archangel
Sword above his head
"You will not return until you have learned 
What you have forfeited"


There is someone else in the archives.