HSA-17: Harvest

The rutting began. Slowly at first, but then the women's greed became apparent. The men writhed beneath their consorts, groaning and wailing as pleasure wracked their minds. Ben was lost once more in the sea of Molly's body. He could feel something being pulled from him and knew it should stop, but he couldn't. He couldn't stop it any more than an opium addict can put down the pipe or an old drunk can put down the bottle. Once more his seed poured into her and all around him, the men he'd come to call friends emptied more of themselves into the beauties shaking and squirming against them.

Chuck screamed first. Black ichor oozed from where he joined with Amy. It coated his crotch and seeped down his legs. His hands had been resting on Amy's hips, guiding her movements back and forth. From every spot that he touched her, bubbling tar appeared on his skin. Amy leaned forward, as though to kiss him and quail any fears, but instead more of that black, viscous poison vomited from her lips and coated his face. Ben watched with a detached horror, still feeling his cock throb and erupt inside of Molly's persistent cunt. His head lolled to the other direction and saw Hank and Norman coming to similar fates. Mira's breasts oozed the black fluid, dripping down onto Hanks chest where it spread out like an amoeba covering his skin. Jimmy, at least, tried to escape, but only made it so far as rolling off of the pedestal. Kathy kept her prey locked between her legs and his cock firmly planted inside of her, milking out his humanity as the creeping tar covered him and froze him in position.

With each soul claimed, the crowd of old men jeered. Ben could hear the hate and contempt in their voices. He realized they too had once felt the love which had led him astray. The tar on Chuck's face cracked and broke open revealing a withered husk of a man that had once been a boy who told jokes in a corn field. Amy rose off of him, leaving a trail of the black ooze as she stumbled back, drunk off of her witchwork. Ben looked up into Molly's kind eyes. "Don't worry, my love, it doesn't hurt. And you'll be with me forever." His hands slid up her thighs and his fingers pressed into her flesh, welcoming what fate would bring. Searing pain reached into his fingers, branching up into his arms. He kept his eyes on Molly's as a single tear streamed down her face.

A wet thwack broke the stare. A shimmering glint of bloody steel emerged from behind Molly's eye. Her body went limp and fell aside. Ben felt as though his soul had been torn out. He grabbed for her lifeless body as it fell to the stage. Screeching filled the air, causing Ben's ears to ring. He looked up to see the scythe plummet down once again, ripping through Amy's chest like it were paper. Anders did not pause or show remorse, moving from Amy's gutted body to the next woman. Mira and the others emitted a high pitched wail that burned in Ben's mind. It commanded him to stop the murder. It told him to rip and tear until Anders was nothing but greasy sinew.

Ben rolled off the platform, banging his knees on the ground beside Mira's body. He reached for her, but saw the black ichor gushing from her wound. Not blood, but black poison that had sustained her for years beyond her time. The wail grew louder, and Ben realized he wasn't the only one to hear it. The thralls, poor souls who had been through this ritual and sacrificed their life and vitality to the witches, were obeying their mistress's command.

Anders was quick with his work and another two of the women fell silent, leaving only Mira and Beth. The old men swarmed around their mistresses and Anders backed away. "Can you walk? Ben?!"

Ben scrambled to his feet, suddenly very aware of his nakedness. "What have you done?"

"Fuck that self righteous bullshit, c'mon," Anders stepped over the bodies he'd left behind and Ben followed. Chuck's car waited a few feet from the bottom of the stage staircase, but the old men had started to move faster. Despite their decrepit appearance, neither Ben or Anders doubted a single one of the creatures had more strength than they could match. They ran for the car, the scythe still in Anders's hand. A crowd of the thralls appeared from inside a building, lurching forward as though pulled by puppet strings. They swarmed between the retreating men and the car. "Shit." Anders wheeled around as two more of the thralls caught up. The scythe sliced through the air and cut open the two men's chests. A wave of relief appeared on their faces as they dropped. The wounds showed no blood, only more of the blackness.

They changed directions and headed toward the town hall, but didn't make it far. Willard appeared, shotgun in hand, aiming it at Anders. "That's enough now. Time to put an end to all this." The screeching stopped, and the thralls parted as Beth and Mira made their way over to them. Willard spoke quickly, "I'm sorry about all this. I truly am. Never thought it would get so out of hand. They're fast when they have their senses. You'll have to be quick."

The beauty in Mira's face was gone. Fury and contempt remained. Some of the black ichor drooled from the corners of her lips and her eyes were coal black. Beth looked worse. She'd not been able to finish consuming her prey. Ben saw a glimpse of what they truly looked like. Hags with paper thin skin, oozing pustules, and rotten teeth. "You killed my sisters," Mira hissed. "At least this eunuch made use of himself."

"Fuck you, bitch," Willard said, plainly. The shotgun cracked like thunder and a spray of pellets blasted off the right half of Mira's face. Beth screeched and her hands whirled out like talons, but Anders was quick. He plunged the scythe into her gut. With a hard spin, he pulled the blade from her flank, spilling her rotten innards onto the ground. Beth collapsed on top of Mira's body. The two shriveled quickly into husks that were shadows of their true selves. The men planted their feet and turned to face the oncoming horde.

Afterward, when Anders and Ben thought of the moments that followed, neither could remember whether what they heard was a real sound or some type of ghostly scream. As Beth's body fell, a frustrated wail rose like a scream on the wind, growing louder until the three men's teeth clenched in fear and pain. The ground shook and Ben thought something very old and very angry passed through them, yet it found no purchase in their souls. Or at least, not enough of one. With the moment gone, the two young men and one old readied to face the remaining gang. To their surprise, the withered men had gone still and turned their eyes up to the sky. The thralls dropped one at a time, each with a smile of relief and a few with thanks on their lips. When the last fell, the town of Ulster Rock was finally dead. Ben, Anders, and Willard looked out over the piles of bodies, expecting some new horror to present itself, yet nothing came. Each, in his turn, felt palpable loneliness and the unceasing watch of something beyond the world in which they stood.

***

"They're all dead?" Harry asked.

"Yes."

"What happened to Anders?"

"Don't know. We left Willard behind and headed out of town. He gave us the week's pay for everyone, and we split it between us. I wasn't in good shape by the time we reached a city. Whatever shit they'd been feeding us wore off. I had it worse than Anders. I set myself up in a hotel, and we said our goodbyes. We worried someone would come looking for us and want answers so we thought it would be best to split up. I never thanked him for coming back for me. Found a room for rent with an old widower and laid up there for a while. Can't tell you the feeling that I had lying in that room, like all my insides were being torn out. Cursed Anders plenty for not letting me die. The widower thought I had the shakes and let me ride it out. Took weeks to get back on my feet, when I did, I headed to my aunt's. Time passed and now I am here."

Harry nodded, writing his last sentence of notes. He looked over them and started to gather up the sprawl of documents. "I want to thank you for your time, Ben. I know that story isn't easy to tell."

Ben's eyes frantically followed Harry's hands, "Wait, what happens now? Have you found Anders? What's left of the town? How did they start it? What were they?" The questions poured out of him with desperation.

Harry went still. "You want answers, that's understandable. The work we do is to try and find those answers. Your story answers many of our questions. You thought they were witches?"

"Yes, what else would they have been?"

"Not sure, son, but I haven't seen a witch yet." He flipped through the folders and took out a clinical photo of one of the black timbers from the stage. "You said in your story that you didn't know what these were made of. Neither do we. We've run every test and trial we can think of. The only thing that really changes is their weight. Know when it changes? Based on how far apart they are." He produced another picture of the stage. "This thing is like a living creature. During the flu, a new graveyard was started northeast of Ulster Rock. They dug down to bury the coffins and found these things buried there. Some fool dug them all up and brought them back to town. I don't know how ritual sacrifice began after that, but that's it source right there."

"But, Molly and Mira? They told us what to do. They did everything to get us there."

"Appendages of a bigger organism. They were this thing's legs and ears and eyes. I think given enough time those thralls as you call them would have turned into these timbers. Maybe it was a way of reproducing, spreading its blackness over the world. But you boys put a stop to it."

"Where are they now? The timbers?"

Harry's eyes narrowed. "I can't tell you that, but they're safe. Separate. And now we have a clear account of what happens when they get put together. So we won't let that happen again. Now then, let me put these things away, and I'll walk you out." Harry got up and left the room as Ben's eyes drift off into nothing.

Ben held his hands in front of him. He could still feel the touch of her skin against his. He closed his eyes and thought of the pitch on his fingers, reaching out with his mind and seeing the void behind the moon once more. "Can you help me? Can you bring her back?"

Silence, but not an empty silence. Finally, a faint and tremulous voice pierces Ben's mind. "Build my altar."

***

Report of Agent Harry Dean

Case #17

October, 1953

The artifact itself is a collection of unique pieces of wood apparently covered in tar. We recovered them from Ulster Rock in western Missouri. See in file interviews for further information regarding the nature of the incident. I should note that Holcomb's account does not go into detail on the specifics of residents who did not participate in the Harvest Day ritual. Outside of the bodies of the 'thralls', our team found dozens of other dessicated bodies, presumably belonging to the other men and women Holcomb mentioned in his account. To be clear, no survivors were found.

Based on those interviews, we've discerned that the items possess a collective consciousness which can extend into host bodies. It's also reasonably assumed that the consciousness is hostile toward human life. The modus operandi of the entity revolves around luring human prey to the fully constructed state of the altar. It utilizes human sexual drives to accomplish this goal and falls under our purview as such. Accurate body counts remain difficult, but the entity was active between 1919 and 1951, taking at minimum eight lives per year.

Some outstanding questions remain:

First, how did the thing arrive in Ulster Rock in the first place? We have accounts of a similar artifact in Europe circa 1640. It is possible someone shipped the artifact over, and I've directed research into shipping manifests around that time.

Second, the method of recruitment and selection of these young men seemed to matter in some fashion. We do not know the identity of the stranger who visited each town or if he was among the casualties. If he retained some agency over himself like Willard, it is possible he survived. It is also unlikely to be coincidence that all the young men were born within the same short time period.

Third, the whereabouts of Gregory Anders. The account given in Holcolmb's interview is accurate as far as we can tell. Prior to his arrival in Ulster Rock, Anders was attacked by one Roger Birchfield. Birchfield suffered a head trauma during the encounter which resulted in a cerebral edema and ultimately his death two weeks after the fact. Elizabeth Fairview, the young woman Anders described as his true love to Holcomb, was institutionalized several months after Birchfield's death. The nature of her malady is officially listed as psychosis brought on by extreme trauma, presumably the Birchfield's death and Anders's abandonment of her. As part of her therapy, Fairview has given vivid descriptions of nightmares which line up almost identically to the events of Harvest Day in Ulster Rock. I mention all this to suggest a deeper connection between Anders and Fairview. One that he will possibly try to revive, giving us the opportunity to apprehend him.

Finally, what do we do with the artifact itself? Sixty were recovered from the stage's construction. Another seven have been located around Ulster Rock. Our search continues for others kept hidden. The individual timbers are impervious to fire, coming out of a furnace still cold to the touch. Some of them can be superficially damaged with blade or hammer, but the damage heals like a wound. Due to their method of erratic storage around Ulster Rock and their fluctuating weight, we believe some critical mass of timbers is required for the entity to become truly active. We'll continue to experiment with methods of destruction. Potential ideas include sinking a portion of the timbers to the bottom of ocean in various locations, including some of the timbers at the center of atomic bomb tests, and, failing all else, entombing some of the timbers in statues located around the world, hiding them in plain sight a safe distance from one another.

In the meantime, we're keeping them under guard in REDACTED and REDACTED.