Page 1 of Hell Breaks Loose

PROLOGUE: ANGEL

Blood red on white.

Flower petals fall from bouquets, accenting the aisle, punctuating the drapery of silk and gauze-like sheets hung in an attempt at blocking out the view outside the celebration.

Everywhere I look are gaudy decorations, placed to mask the pain etched into the land around the manor and the estate. Decadence grander than any I’ve seen.

What is this place?

Who lives here?

Who would celebrate in the midst of this catastrophe?

As far as the eye can see, the wreckage of a flood scatters the landscape with debris beyond the elegant brick walls, the looming, wrought-iron fence along the top and at the entrances. The land beyond was once a thriving town. Now, desolation.

Something about the place makes me angry.

Triggers something in my emotional memory that my mind can’t place.

Makes me feel even more hollow inside than the lack of any sense of self that haunts me every day. Reminds me of how alone I am.

And why this celebration should mean nothing to me.

All that remains, at the heart of this ceremony, in the bones of this town, and the desolation of my soul, is damage. Hurt. Damage.

Stagnant pools of water dot the gullies between the hills.

Rivers glisten where streets used to run, vacant skull-like eyes of the houses gaping at the desolate neighborhoods and abandoned cars.

Occasionally, you see a figure, huddled and panicked, picking their way through the remains, looking for somewhere to hide. Something to eat.

And there is something so very wrong about the way they move. The way their eyes don’t seem to see what’s in front of them.

Is this all that’s left of the town's inhabitants?

Am I one of them?

Music plucks to life a short distance from my vantage, sitting on the roof of the manor house, just out of sight of the guests taking their seats on the lawn. Their movements are wooden. Forced.

They know that this is inherently wrong, just like I do. The song playing should be as foreign as everything else I can’t remember about my life, but I recognize it.

And what this celebration must be.

A wedding.

The audience gathers, barely speaking to one another.

They at least have the luxury of understanding why it feels so wrong to be here.

I simply watch, wishing that the screaming wail in my head would subside.

Especially when an older man takes the stage, streaks of silver in his black hair. His suit is immaculate. Sharp.

Along with the matching suited guards, and a priest, taking center stage to officiate this fraud.

That much, I know. His expression tells me he isn’t here by choice.

After they take their places, I know what comes next.

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