They said it was always night in Heavyside- but at that moment it was actually the night time. People were always telling terrifying and foreboding stories about the old town, but these almost always turned out to be spurious rumors. Great thinkers and mystics alike had ventured up to the place to uncover hidden knowledge and eventually to have their bubbles burst. A young and naive man was smirking as he ambled down a rocky path, clutching a leather satchel and thinking of all the fanciful crap he had been told about Heavyside and how something even stranger could have turned out to be true. Like many curious wanderers he had been drawn to the idea of untapped secrets encased in the haunting spectacle of the gouge in the earth just outside of town.
The tear in the ground oozed perpetually. From deep beneath, toxic fumes seeped up through the mile long rift making the sky devoid of any vibrance. One could spot this lesion in the earth’s crust glowing hazily through the smoke all from a window on the edge of town, like a distant screaming glowworm dying in the valley. But no one in this town gave a damn about geologic trauma- this place was filled with rejects and malcontents gambling away pocket lint and drinking themselves to death to escape their own suffering. The rejects didn’t care for the terrestrial flesh-wound, yet it impressed itself upon them daily. The sky was only ever shades of black, occasionally the bubbling was overtaken by a cthonic din, and then there was the stench of sulfur everywhere. The stinking sut painted the inside of their lungs and hugged the walls of their homes. To live in Heavyside was to live in bleakness. It truly was always night in a sense there, and the bubbling river of magma just a few miles away was their deflated crescent-moon.
	Every so often outsiders found their way to Heavyside to admire the horrible bubbling thing, but the mystique of it had largely died. Some people told myths about it spewing gold or spitting forth demonic hellspawn in the past, but all anyone ever saw was lava, churning away red hot. It could not be plugged up nor cleaned up, and the stench drove away tourists. It slipped from the minds of foreigners and only maintained it’s eerie, discomfiting awe amongst those who actually made the trek up north- either to behold the thing or to hide from the law. Death cults and the insane used to willingly travel the distance to Heavyside to throw themselves in the earthly stew, and often the unfortunate wayward child ended up tossed in as sacrifice to some unspeakable deity. As times changed and scientific speculation evolved, scientists, polymaths and geologists made the trip up to try and get a more serious grasp on the landmark. The gouge ultimately proved either to be too elusive or pointless for the men of science, just as it had for their superstitious predecessors, and so they left the thing. Another series of generations forgot about the mystery of the gouge, and left Heavyside to decay. Few were paying attention when the earth shifted beneath the feet of humanity- especially near the epicenter of it’s ominous pivot.

	Tybal slammed a heavy brow jar down on the table and exhaled sharply, spraying suds all over his drunken friends. “Fuck the sediment- it tastes just fine! I don’t mind a bit of sandy bits”
	“Tybal, you damned idiot,” muttered Winslo through his palm on his face “they aren’t dregs- it’s manure. That’s the counterfeit you’re drinking!”
	“Huh?” Tybal replied, tonging the animal shit in his gums as his companions laughed mockingly.
	The bar was filled, but as usual mostly with hopeless addicts and broken souls staring at the table in front of them. Winslo’s gang was one of the few groups making much noise tonight- and definitely the loudest. The prospect of making a good pile of cash on their first bootleg vintage had all the goons excited. Being in these ashen wastelands was killing them- they hadn’t seen a decent looking woman in weeks and the cheap ale was no longer making the smell of sulfur tolerable. Bjorn and Tybal had both already gotten into fistfights with locals over things they couldn’t remember; it was only a matter of time before even useless town guards like the ones in Heavyside could no longer be bribed and would be forced to intervene. Winslo had the whole bunch ready to leave tomorrow morning for the next poor village with a tavern and hopefully a few whores. Tonight, they had their visions of the future, some more tepid ale, and Tybal making a fool of himself; the tension of living in the smoke could melt away for a night.
	“Winslo, let me have a smoke”
	“Fuck off, Bjorn.” Winslo waved him away from his side of the table.
	“Fuck you, Win- gimme a goddamn smoke” Bjorn raised up out his seat and placed his hand on Winslo’s pack of Arslan Orange blended hash cigarettes. Winslo placed his hand on Bjorn’s hand. The room became silent; even the nearest drunk slightly sobered from the severity of the air in the room.
	“Bjorn. These are my cigarettes. I paid for them, and I intend to smoke every one of them. Why do I find your hand touching my cigarette- my last cigarette, mind you- when I reach out?”
	The group stood frozen and sweating, watching Bjorn, watching Winslo, watching the smokes. The tiny gold lion on the package held it’s mouth agape in anticipation of what might happen next.
	“Come on Win, please,” Bjorn begged, now asking for more than just a cigarette, “I gave you six smokes yesterday- I rolled them all for you too. Let me have one of your fucking pre-rolled ones.” Winslo’s pupils became smaller and his frown sharpened. “What I mean is- I gave them thinking you were gonna get me back- like you didn’t have any smokes on you so you just wanted to borrow one- but you’ve got one”
	Tybal laughed, “borrow one! That’s freaking good one- right Win? How do you borrow something you can’t give ba--” Winslo did not move a muscle. Tybal became silent once more.
	“Look Winslo, I-” Bjorn tried but-
	“Bjorn. These are not those asswipes filled with dead grass you roll yourself. These are Arslan Orange cigarettes. These are filled with a spiced tobacco, fermented hash and orange peel blend with gourmet cultivated chemicals- hand-rolled by a trained eunuch monk. Four thousand of your cigarettes wouldn’t be worth one of these.” he put the beautiful creation between his lips, and from over his shoulder someone provided a light. Winslo took a drag, and then tapped his excess beautiful ash off on Bjorn’s still extended hand. The gang snickered, and then started to laugh; the group was again raucous.
	Bjorn clenched his teeth behind his trembling jowls. Anger and humiliation lashed at him with every snark of his stupid worthless companions. He whipped his head around and pointed his angry eyes at an old man, hunched over and scribbling on a pile of papers in the corner.
	“You!”
	The man did not look up. He was lost in his writings and muttering to himself. Bjorn, pointing his finger out like a harpoon made his way to the old bastard. “You think that’s funny you old shit!” The man still did not look up, but Bjorn likely preferred it that way. He slapped the old bastard hard on the jaw using the heel of his hand, causing the scribbling man to fall to the floor dragging his papers with him and snapping his fountain pen. He tried to process the moment while spitting ink and blood onto the floor.
“You think that’s fucking funny grandpa?” Bjorn puffed up his chest while the old man tried to wipe the ink off his face, only spreading it into his eyes in the process, making him even dizzier. “Get the fuck up you pieace of shit- I’ll fucking kill you!” Bjorn insisted.
The gang laughed- uneasily at first, but then they appreciated the simple and relatable humor behind the display. Bjorn kicked the man in the ass and Tybal threw a bottle, just missing his head. It was great fun. The terror-stricken old man contemplated dying in a bar and tried to piss himself and cry to perhaps squirm out of the situation like a worm, but ultimately it would’ve been no good. Bjorn looked like the type of man to beat a piss-soaked geriatric to death- why add to the sadist’s fun?
But just then the front door swung open and smoke stormed the bar. The gang and the drunks and the pathetic old man all coughed and spat up until the door finally slammed shut. When it cleared and the barflys had finally rubbed the sut out of their eyes, they saw something decidedly out-of-place. A young man with soft, dirty blonde curls and smooth girlish skin stood proudly in the doorway. He was wearing a nice coat and carried nice luggage and had clean teeth and the nose of someone who had never been punched in the face. The gang of hoodlums all noticed the easy target and the sealed leather satchel he carried, and shot each other the appropriate glances; a plan was hatched from nothing at all. The fragile man held his tiny purse up in the air, proudly.
“I have found- no- discovered quite possibly the most astounding scientific artifact this world has even seen! And all of you lucky bastards are here to witness my brilliant feat- lucky, lucky you!” He gracefully strode to the bar and slammed his palm down. “An inebriant my good man! I’ve spent all day out in the smoke and my throat is caked with dust- as I’m sure you can imagine.” The bartender placed a lukewarm brown bottle in front of the exuberant nerd and walked away. As the man took a long drink, the old beaten scribbler tried to stand. Hearing the faint and hopeless groans the young man finally noticed the old bleeding heap.
“Goodness! What happened!” the newcomer reached down and picked the old man up to a barstool while the gang of thugs gathered at their table and quietly schemed over their drinks.
“You fell into your own ink, my friend! That’s not the way to take notes!” he laughed stupidly while the old man’s eyes darted around, afraid of another beating. The newcomer plucked a piece of paper stuck with ink to the old man’s head and gave it a look. Immediately equations and formula stuck out from beneath the smudged ink and caught his eye.
“A fellow scientist! I knew it- I knew this place was still a haven of enlightenment and study! Barkeep! I need a drink for my friend here- what’s your name, sir?”
“Snakeson,” said the old man quietly brushing his coat off and congratulating himself silently for not pissing on himself, “Snakeson Bloodkept”
“I see... And what are you here studying?” asked the fragile man giving his new friend a bewildered look.
“I- … I am sorry, what is your name?” asked Snakeson.
“Eh, well..” The young man looked slyly around, and pursed his lips as if he had something terribly important to say. Something started scraping at the inside of the tiny leather pouch.
“What is that you’ve found, then? An interesting specimen, no doubt?” Snakeson asked.
“Oh!” said the stranger, grabbing the pouch. “This is my discovery! How much do you know about biology, Snakeson?” The old man waited for the newcomer to resume his rambling
“-You seeI think I’ve discovered a lifeform that is both extraterrestrial and epiterrestrial,” the young man whispered excitedly. ”Today, just before I decided to pack up and hike back from the gouge, a thing slinked out of the molten earth and wriggled right up towards me!”
“Out of the magma?”
“It’s unbelievable, isn’t it? I think initially it wanted to hurt me but-” The old man stopped him and then raised a finger to his lips, and glanced in the direction of the muttering thugs- who immediately went silent and faced their drinks again. Snakeson grabbed the young man by the shirt sleeve and led him to a room down the hall. Inside were stacks of books, papers depicting star charts and animal anatomy stuck up hastily on the walls and ceiling, and an unmade bed covered in bread heels and ants. Snakeson closed the door, turned the deadbolt, threaded two chain locks and lit an oil lamp on a table strewn with papers.
“Where were you educated, Snakeson?” asked the young man.
“In Robigo.” Snakeson replied.
“... in the King’s court?” asked the young man hesitantly.
“Yes.” Snakeson replied
The young man was silent for a moment in reverence to this scion of learning. Snakeson belched and coughed a bloody loogie onto the dirt floor. The young man grabbed his satchel and placed it on the table in the dimly lit room.
“Does the court in Robigo know much about cryptozoology?” The young man began to fiddle with the latch to the bag, wearing a nervous and giddy smile.
Snakeson did not answer. He was already silently whispering an incantation, so that his guest would not hear his words and recognize the sleeping spell. The young man lifted the top, turned the pouch over and patted it’s bottom. After a moment, a small pitch-black slug- long and boney like a finger fell to the table. It delicately undulated and would then occasionally twitch, and little sharp points like miniscule teeth rose and sunk on it’s surface. Snakeson stopped short in the middle of his spell- he had never seen nor heard of a thing like this, and recalling what the mere child in front of him said about it’s origin made his skin turn cold.
“-You said this thing wanted to hurt you?” Snakeson finally asked, leaning in closer.
“It looks slow now, but it sprung up at me and got to my collar! I grabbed it before it could go any further but I still don’t know what it was trying to do. Of course the strangest thing on my mind at that moment was that, for a thing that I had just seen slink out of the magma, it was so icy cold.” The young man extended a finger to touch it. He approached it slowly, and the two men held their breaths. He poked the worm, and it did not react. The men let out an unimpressed sigh.
A forceful knocking at the door made them jump. “Cleaning people… Open up.” a brash and stupid voice said from behind the locked door.
The young man rushed to the peephole of the door to see the thugs from the bar, shoulder to shoulder waiting hungrily to get in.
“How strong are the locks?” the young man whispered, turning to see Snakeson delicately opening the window above his bed. Snakeson, noticing his guest’s glance put a finger up to his lips. Then he stopped, realizing something: the black slug was no longer on the table.
“Open up in there- we’ll kick the fucking door down.” said one of the hungry wolves at the door. The young man stood paralyzed with fear thinking of being punched for the first time- or worse, what if they wanted his discovery? He looked to the table to find it already gone.
The door flew off it’s hinges and into the petrified young man, knocking him bloodied to the floor. Snakeson again contemplated death and pissing himself as Tybal shrugged down to get through the now opened doorway, with Bjorn and the others behind him holding knives and cracking their knuckles. Snakeson put his weight into the window to find it jammed
“You’re fucking dead this time, old man,” Bjorn said drawing closer and showing off his knife, “You and your little boyfriend- where is that little fucker?”
The whole room whipped around as a bloodcurdling scream broke out. The young man was writhing beneath the splintered door and clawing at his face while screaming pathetically.
“What the fuck did you do, Bjorn?” asked Winslo from the doorway.
“He musta got a splinter in his eyes,” said Tybal, chuckling as he bent over to pull the pained boy up by the collar. The young mans hands and arms collapsed and his whole body went limp, giving the crowd a full view of the long black wriggling finger-like creature that was forcing its way into his brain via his gaping red eye socket.
Tybal dropped him and recoiled in disgust and fear. “What the fuck was that thing?!” he yelled. A couple of the thugs from the back pushed forward to see while the ones in front held them back in terror.
The young mans leg kicked into the air and the room froze. His leg kicked more forcefully and purposefully, with it’s sole scraping the ground. Then both of his legs were mobile and began kicking his limp body into a corner of the room. The young man then tossed his whole torso up in the air and over onto his belly; spasms rippled up his exposed and lacerated back. After a pause, Bjorn spoke indignantly.
“What the fuck is this- some kind of magic spell or something? Bullshit!” he strode over the debris towards the motionless body. “Magic is for fucking fairies and-”
In one motion and one instant, the formerly lifeless body lunged, open-mouthed and teeth first at the soft belly of Bjorn. The two fell to the floor as what was once the young man began to tear away at the fabric, and then the flesh of Bjorn exposing and promptly ripping out his viscera and tossing them all over the floor. No matter how much the thugs kicked and stabbed the body, it remained monstrously focused. Only once it had ceased to feel the life in Bjorn’s body did it lunge once more- this time at the neck of Tybal.
Snakeson stood frozen, pissing himself. Winslo and his remaining comrades tried to stop Tybal from running so they could grab the thing tearing away at his veins and tendons. Eventually Tybal’s fear took over completely and he burst through the men blocking the door- but by the time he reached the bar, the ravenous carcass had reached his vertebrae and blood loss left him woozy. Tybal crashed to the floor as horrified spectators circled the bloody pair of bodies. The thing stood upright like the person it once was and turned to face the group of thugs all clutching their knives tightly. Winslo held them back as they witnessed it’s face, contorting itslef into a human-like expression. The skin they could see that wasn’t soaked in fresh blood was tinged a sickly purple color but what was most shocking was that the eye that was just eaten was back- except now it was bright yellow and it’s pupil was a horizontal dash like that of a goat. The young mans mouth hung open and a bellowing, belching screech pushed out the blood and organs he had swallowed- and after this, a black grainy slime that was already smoldering before it hit the ground. The pile of vomit ignited and one of the addicts ran out of the front door screaming “Fire!” letting in even more smoke.
The beast lunged immediately for the door on all fours, grabbing the ground with extended fingers and thrusting himself forward into the black and empty night, leaving behind him a trail of spiddle and blood.
The thugs all ran for the door and jumped onto their horses and carts, but Winslo remained frozen for a moment. He turned back to the room, but Snakeson was already gone, as were most of his papers. Winslo walked to the window and could see the beast take off clumsily like an ersatz apex predator, heading to the mountains, to god knows where next.