8

SETI HORROR · YUNG SETI

My Wife Began Attending A Very Strange Church

Part 1

I still recall vividly the final day before the events that unfolded at that awful place. It replays almost on a loop almost daily in my mind, as I scrutinize every moment at which I could have prevented us from going there.

Ultimately, my conclusion is the same, that there is no knowing what could have happened, but I believe by then things were already too late.

There was very little I could’ve done to protect her and I from the sway of forces beyond our control and even understanding, any more than a twig could divert a flood. All I am left with is the chance to recount what we’ve been through on a platform that might be accepted, and hope no others make our mistake.

If you live in the Midwest, especially rural Illinois, stay AWAY from the Church of the Redeemed Fallen.

– –

When I arrived home from work that evening, Carla was sitting on the couch, nose deep in some sort of thick booklet. Whatever it was, she was clearly engrossed as the sound of my entrance hardly seemed to stir her.

A familiar scent hung in the air, though I couldn’t place it. It was faint but present, like meat, singed or soured. I wondered in passing if she might have burned her breakfast or something after I left.

If so, it would have to have been something like the fourth time in the last week and a half, as the odd smell had been reoccurring the past few times I’d arrived from work. I made a mental note to bring it up later.

It had been a long week, with work draining me of wll but the needed energy to function. School had gone out a few weeks before, leaving Carla at home with an abundance of free time she never quite seemed to know how to fill.

The weeks prior she’d picked up new hobbies, read several books, and attempted to start a garden before giving up after buying the seeds that were out of season.

It was to the point that she’d taken to waiting on the couch for my return towards the end of the day as a lackluster remedy to her boredom.

I could tell it was beginning to get ro her, the days without acting, it was making her feel restless, and in turn her behavior had gotten sort of odd in the days prior, more reserved, almost secretive, but I suppose I was too buried in work to think anything of it.

“Hey,” I called through the living room, sighing with all the tension of a long day’s work as I entered through the garage door.

There was no reply. She hardly even budged, apparently spellbound by whatever it was she was reading.

My keys clinked as they were tossed into the bowl in the kitchen which held all manner of miscellaneous junk, and I made my way around the island atop which the bowl sat to greet my wife who sat huddled on the sofa opposite me in the living room.

On the table before her sat two half-finished cups of coffee, beside each one of the small snack plates she used when offering refreshments to guests.

The plate was smudged with a thick sheen of something that must have been grease, a light, watery red on the porcelain plate.

“Hey,” I repeated a bit louder than before.

She startled, eyes shooting up from her literature, wide and surprised for several moments, as she glanced between myself and the clock on the wall, before the glaze of sudden shock gave way to another expression, something foreign on her face, but not unfamiliar.

She beamed up at me as I approached, eyes wide and glistening.

“Terry,” she breathed, her voice wavering, sounding raw with excitement and barely restrained emotion.

“Yeah, babe? Everything… okay?” The question was every bit as confused and reluctant as I felt asking.

She looked as though tears would spring forth freely at any second, her eyes red and wet, catching the light on the ceiling with an odd glint – yet, simultaneously, she appeared utterly elated.

The expression she wore, despite the thin trail running from her eyes down her cheeks the physical evidence of tears shed, her expression was one of wild-eyed jubilation the likes of which I’d never seen from her. It was familiar though, having grown up a church kid, I’d seen that look before in the faces of the devout. It was a look of awe, and joy, all a presentable face for the fear beneath it all.

The mix was…disconcerting, to say the least.

She blinked as though processing my question, before shaking her head fervently. The smile widened.

“No. No. I’m – I’m better than okay, my love,” Her eyes locked with mine, and I saw the glint of something beneath them, wild and unhinged.

I couldn’t quite identify it then, but I know now, that it was the look of bubbling fanaticism, clawing at the floodgates.

She breathed her response, looking and sounding as if she were taken aback by her own words. A faint smell clung to her breath, that same smell as earlier, like burnt meat but different in a way I couldn’t place.

It made my stomach turn, but was immediately an afterthought as Carla spoke.

“I’m – I’m saved.”

I squinted, understandably confused and slightly uneasy, though I wasn’t fully sure why yet. The language was that of some religious nut, and yet it was coming from a woman who, for as long as I known her, had been a fervent agnostic at best, downright dismissive of the very concept of religion at worst.

Surely, I assumed, this was some sort of joke I was simply too tired to get.

“What…are you talking about?” I asked with a nervous laugh.

“Saved from what?”

It was as though my words had some effect on her, like dowsing water over a rising flame.

Her strange, almost child-like excitement fading in an instant, replaced by an embarrassed and apologetic sort of expression.

“It – I – it’s nothing, sorry, ” she said quickly, pulling me in for a kiss, which I returned despite my confusion.

“I… lost track of time, didn’t realize you’d be back so soon.”

I nodded, though I was quite sure my face exposed my apprehension at her non-answer.

“Whatcha reading there?”

I gestured at the pamphlet folded in her hand, held behind her back as though she hoped I’d forget once it was out of sight. In that moment, I could swear something passed over her face, a look of unease, but it was gone as soon as it had come.

“Oh this,” she waved the pamphlet in front of her, laughing.

“I dunno, it’s silly. One of those door-to-door religious types came by and dropped it off. I was about to throw it away, but it seemed good for a laugh.”

I rolled my eyes out of instinct, nodding my understanding as I began to put two and two together.

“The “Church” again?” I asked, making air quotes around the word church.

Carla nodded.

The Church of the Redeemed Fallen has been something of a recent phenomenon here in Cold Lake, and an irritating one at that. While or town, like many other small, rural localities, is no stranger to…fringe religious beliefs.

I’m sure you’ve heard stories before about freaky cults with “prophetic” figures that take off to some farm, or mountain hideout. Cold Lake has had a few in its history that have come and gone.

There seems to be something about beautiful forests and open fields that draws congregations of cooks like a magnet, and the Church was the most recent of them.

They’d formed a little after 2014, under the guidance of a man named Harold Trager, a prophet if you ask his followers, and a two-bit conman if you ask… well, anyone else.

Their chief difference from most cults was that while other groups kept to themselves, they’d begun making a Jehovah’s Witness-esque effort to proselytize to the community at large.

Besides standing on literal soapboxes outside of stores or local businesses, preaching their strange pseudo-biblical apocalyptic religious views, it meant going door to door with pamphlets on their religion.

Towards the end of the school year, while Carla had been working, I’d turned away two of them already, and according to her, once the summer began they’d ramped up their efforts from weekly to daily, as if on some cult requirement drive.

They were always the same, some overly smiley person clad in white or tan robes like an off color version of something you’d see a monk wear, red blotches over either shoulder.

They’d show up at your door with whatever fruit or meat they were selling that week, usually strips of bacon from their farm, and offer you to “partake in their bounty”, i.e. buy their food.

10 times out of 10, it was a ploy to get in your home and preach to you about “the truth”, or their weird pseudo-abrahamic idea of it anyways. I’d never given one time of day enough to truly decipher their beliefs, but I knew enough to know it wasn’t for me.

Nor, I would have thought, Carla.

Apparently, they were persistent. Knowing it had been their literature, I could certainly understand Carla’s reading it for amusement.

“So what’s it say?”

As soon as the question left my lips, something shone beneath Carla’s eyes, brief but unmistakable. It was that same look in her eye as before, almost fanatical…It was gone as soon as it had come, that smile returning, but like a sudden hailstorm, its presence was unmistakable.

Something felt off. What it was, I couldn’t put my finger on, but the feeling seemed to grow the more we spoke, overtaking my mind slowly like cloud cover on a sunny day.

“Nothing, it’s the usual BS. The end is nigh, repent for the Flayed Angel rises, blah blah blah.”

She rolled her eyes dismissively, yet something in the expression struck me as unconvincing, almost, I don’t know…theatrical?

It was as though she were trying to make a point of appearing uninterested.

“You invited em in?” I asked.

The look that followed was one of surprise and immediate confusion before she gathered herself again with another laugh, much more forced than before.

“The coffee and the plates,” I nodded towards the table.

“Never known you to drink two cups, while using two plates in two places. Even you’re not that forgetful.”

“Yeah,” she began, chuckling ruefully, a faint look of guilt creasing her features.

“You know I suck at the whole confrontation thing. The lady who came, she was sweet and I didn’t want to be rude so I just invited her in for a bit.”

She paused, gauging my reaction adding,

“It was only for a bit, she explained their beliefs to me, had a bit of coffee, and left. Probably wasn’t even five minutes. I know you can’t stand solicitors and we shouldn’t encourage them and you’re right. I just didn’t want you to be upset.”

It struck me as odd that she hadn’t been upfront to begin with.

Sure, I’d never been a fan of those folks and their weekly harassment, but surely she knew it wasn’t serious enough that I’d raise an argument. Her reasoning felt…incomplete.

For one, she’d mention the coffee though not explained the plates which had clearly been used. Perhaps it was an oversight, it did seem a minor detail, though it somehow felt deliberately overlooked, and I didn’t see why she’d hide that.

I’d known the Church to occasionally sell baked goods and various meats from their farms, perhaps she’d partaken and felt…embarrassed at even humoring them given how often we’d joked about the possibility of them Jonestown-ing their food.

Still, I couldn’t see a good reason for pressing the issue, despite the curiosity beginning to claw at my mind like an animal behind a locked door – not wanting to risk upsetting her over what seemed such a minor issue.

I shrugged with a frown that said “I don’t care regardless” and planted a kiss on her forehead for good measure.

“You handling dinner tonight or should I?

She smiled, far more genuine than before, the faint traces of worry I felt I could see in her dissipating.

“I got it, you go take a nap or something. You look half-dead.”

I laughed, thanking her before making my way toward the stairs. Before heading up, I peered around the corner, back into the kitchen. She held the pamphlet with her until she arrived near the cabinets, nearly catching me as I ducked behind the wall to avoid her faze as she turned to check that I’d gone.

I heard the shuffle of papers and other things as she rifled through something.

When I looked back, she was closing one of the drawers in the island at the center of the kitchen, the pamphlet no longer in hand, before turning back and quickly occupying herself with dinner preparations.

I felt a heavy mass of unease, cold and uncomfortably, as it shifted in my gut, its tendrils digging even deeper.

She was hiding something, and I determined that I would find out what.

By the time I arrived in our room, and was pulling myself into bed, I’d already decided I’d be reading whatever that nutbag had left her the moment she was away from the drawer. As I began to doze, faint, lingering unease seemed to color my restless sleep.

I woke up an hour later at Carla’s beckoning, and we had dinner in the kitchen. Things seemed normal, we discussed our days, and she caught me up on some drama amidst her friend group and laughed as we ate.

So much so that by the time we were wrapping up, I’d almost forgotten my earlier intentions.

“Uh, I’ve got the clean-up, babe,” I said, rushing over to take her plate as she stood to make her way to the sink.

She looked surprised, but smiled and handed it over with a kiss, both of which I returned.

“I’m gonna shower, we should watch a movie or something later.”

I nodded and watched as she rounded the corner, listening for the sound of her footsteps fading up the stairs and the creak of the floorboards overhead.

As soon as I heard the bedroom door shut, I made my move, putting her plate back on the table and quickly rounding the island. I began pulling open each of the little drawers, rifling around under heat mats, and old paper until I found it.

She’d folded it, tucking it inside a folder full of recipes she’d printed over the years. The obvious attempt at discretion was strange, to say the least, and as I raised the pamphlet to read I felt my heart pound with anticipation.

On the cover of the pamphlet, beneath the name of the Church – typed in ornate letters – at the very center sat their logo. An image of what appeared to be a man on the cross, drawn somewhat hastily by appearance.

It was similar to the typical scene on the cross, the man wearing the same vaguely pained expression, head lolled to the side, arms outstretched, but with key differences.

The being on the cross had wings. Long and batlike and deeply tattered, and it most certainly wasn’t Jesus. Its skin was depicted as a deep red, and there was no crown of thorns.

Only a pained, open-mouth expression like a scream frozen in time.

“Creepy fucks,” I muttered.

I’d seen the logo before, emblazoned over the left side of the white smocks every member wore, and it hadn’t yet failed to be disconcerting.

How could anyone worship…whatever this was? And why was my Carla secretly hiding it?

This particular pamphlet was titled, the words running along the bottom in bright red letters.

“Rejoice and be merry! The Angel has returned, and the Day is close at hand. Are you saved?”

With a scoff, I began to flip through the pamphlet.

“I guess staplers and computers are against their religion,” I muttered.

It was compromised of several pages, all of which were seemingly done by hand, bound at the side with a length of twine that ran through holes cut into the papers.

I opened the first page and began to read.

From the pulpit of His Divinity, He Who Travels Beneath The Wing, Father Harold Trager – prophet of the Fallen Son. The following is both a dire warning, the most glad of tidings, and a warm invitation to those who the Fallen Son chooses to receive it.

The words up until that point were scrawled in stunning handwriting, as though penned by some master calligrapher. Little of what I’d read was unusual, at least for the Church, echoing the usual greeting I’d seen on some of the posters or signs they would wave when preaching.

It was what followed that made a chill run down my spine for reasons I couldn’t understand. The words were bold, at the center of the page in such a large, alarming letters and scarlet ink.

HE HAS RISEN.

Rejoice. Rejoice. The day has come. On the night of June, 12th the year two-thousand and twenty-two on the calendar of the false messiah –

OUR LORD HAS RETURNED.

Arriving beneath the willow, as foretold by our Father Trager, the Winged One, the Fallen Son, The Flayed Angel returned to his flock, bringing to fruition the final sign to signal the beginning of the end of this world and the birth of a new. The Day of The Falling Stars.

It was a noticeable deviation from the usual rhetoric. For the little time they’d been in town, the Church of the Redeemed Fallen had been the typical doomsday cult, going on and on about an end of times they called the ‘Day of The Falling Stars’, with the usual apocalyptic messaging and vague arrival dates.

This? It struck an oddly confident tone, almost…celebratory? As though they felt their prophecy was no longer just prophecy.

Outside, the stubborn claws of winter still clung to the otherwise warm Illinois summer night, kicking up a howling breeze that echoed through the house.

That gnawing unease swelled into something far more present, and as I continued I felt much like a child reading a horror story they had no business with, small and strangely exposed.

The kitchen was rather dark, only one of the pilot lights over the stove on, as I had wanted to avoid alerting Carla as to my whereabouts if she woke up, and the only other light drifted faintly from upstairs, and the shoe room, near the garage on the opposite side of the house.

The house groaned under the continued offense of the wind, and I jumped despite myself. Swallowing against the knot growing in my throat and my rising disquiet, I continued.

You, who have received this message, are invited on this holiest of nights to the Temple on High, for a sermon by our Father as he reveals to us, finally, our winged God and grants us all the chance to revel and soar in his wake.

Be born again, angels in a new world.

I began skimming the pages, heart-pounding for reasons I wasn’t sure of, in search of something I hadn’t defined.

The rest of the pamphlet read much the same, providing more information on their crackpot beliefs, going on about this “fallen angel” of theirs and the message Father Trager claimed to have received.

A lot of it seemed to be alternate telling of stories already familiar to me from my brief time in a college religious studies class, but I’ll do my best to summarize.

They claim that Trager had been a broken man before receiving the message, “lost in the collective illusion” as they put it. All until one day wandering a field on the outskirts of town, beneath a willow – it appeared to him lying beneath the tree, an angel stripped of its skin, wings tattered.

It awoke at his presence at which point it would beckon him near and whisper to him a great truth. Apparently religion as we knew it was a lie, the stories skewed to denigrate the true protagonist.

His name was Ibiz, or had been, and he had been a former citizen of heaven, at one time beloved by the creator for his curiosity and wisdom. He had been close to the creator, looked upon favorably until the birth of Man.

The angel knew the creator had erred. It saw in man an innate evil, a corruption that would lead to the destruction of all that the creator had made, and when the error of Man led to the fall of the Garden of Eden, Ibiz felt certain of the fact, raising the issue with the creator.

I don’t think it matters which religion you follow, no version of God seems to enjoy being questioned, and the Church was no different.

The creator grew furious at the perceived challenge to his wisdom, lashing out at the angel, causing him great harm(hence, I believe, the tattered wings and missing skin), then cast him out of heaven.

Banishing him to the world of Man.

According to the Church, knowing what he knows and that the creator is unwilling to intervene, Ibiz has made it his goal to prevent the destruction Man will wreak, and make again heaven on Earth. In his new world, Harold would serve as his messiah leading a flock of those who heed his message to be born anew in this world.

It was…heady stuff. An odd mix of various Abrahamic doctrines combined with a heavy dose of batshit insane and horrifying.

Still, as utterly ridiculous and slightly disconcerting as it was, it didn’t explain Carla’s weirdness.

It wasn’t until I arrived at the final page, that it clicked.

There was a date scrawled in a similar font as the title had been, it was that upcoming Saturday, only a day from then.

Below it, scrawled in red letters was her name. It was an invitation meant just for her…

The piercing creak of the floorboards overhead made me jump, setting my heart to racing as I immediately began putting things away.

The contents of the drawers I’d searched were strewn about the island, and as I heard the bedroom door open, I had little time to worry about order. Quickly, I shoved all of the remaining papers, and assorted knickknacks into either of the drawers.

I felt my heart in my throat as I threw the pamphlet beneath the recipe book, and shut the drawer just as I heard Carla’s footsteps arrive at the bottom of the stairs.

I closed the drawer, cringing as it slammed louder than I’d hoped. Moments later, she entered the kitchen.

“Hey,” I spoke, perhaps a bit too quick, turning my back to the island.

“Sleep well? “

She nodded, blinking slowly as she seemed to take in the scene. A cold, steady drip of unease ran down my spine, as an unasked question flashed beneath her eyes.

“Late-night snack?” She asked.

I laughed, the sound a great deal more forced than I’d have liked.

“No, just came for some water, and the mind got to wandering.”

She nodded again, then averted her eyes with a sigh. She grabbed her arm hugging it close, something I’d seen before many an argument or difficult discussion.

“You read it, didn’t you? The invitation from the Church.”

Fuck.

I swallowed hard, my mind wavering between lying and just coming clean. I settled on the latter.

“Yeah,” I admitted.,

“Why’d you feel the need to hide that from me?”

She closed her eyes, running her hands over her face with another deep breath.

“Because I knew how you’d react, you can’t stand the Church,” she said.

“Sure, but that doesn’t mean I’d get mad at you for reading the damn thing for laughs, I don’t get all the -“

“Listen,” she interjected, the word set my heart racing at a hare’s pace.

“It’s not a joke. That’s why I hid it from you.”

I blinked, my mouth opening though I had no response in mind.

“What – what do you mean?” I swallowed, my mouth feeling unusually dry.

Carla stepped in front of me, grabbing my arms and pulling me into a half-hug, looking up at me.

“Baby, it’s – they’re not what you think. When you’ve been at work they’ve come by a few times to talk, and at first I thought they were nuts but…” she paused a glistening look in her eye.

“But Trevor it’s…it’s not. You’ve got to hear them, baby, I thought they were crazy but… it’s the truth.”

I pulled myself away gently, moving towards one of the cabinets for a cup, quickly filling it with water and taking a drink.

She watched me with a hopeful, wide-eyed expression like a child hoping they’d convinced their parents of something.

“I…if this is a prank, I have to say it’s an odd one.”

She frowned, the legitimate disappointment visible. She was serious…it made no sense. Carla had been almost arrogant in her disbelief if anything, unswayed by religion despite growing up under the roof of a preacher.

I couldn’t imagine any sort of proselytizing getting through to her, let alone the most fringe, almost fantastical of pseudo-religious doctrines…

What could they have possibly told her?

“Just come with me… you read the pamphlet you know, come with me to the Church.” she gripped my hand tight, pleading with a wide-eyed, hopeful expression as if begging for me to step off of an open flame.

At the moment, I couldn’t explain the sensation her words bred in me. It was as though a window had been cracked, letting in a chilling breeze that gripped me with a sort of disquiet I couldn’t shake.

Yet, her expression was so hopeful – and the whole situation had caught me quite off-guard.

“Okay.”

She smiled as wide as I’d ever seen, and for a moment, I was convinced she would burst into tears before she pulled me into a tight hug.

“This is going to be, amazing for us.” She said, and I could tell she meant it.

I felt my guts twist inside of me, feeling for the first time in my life strangely uneasy in her arms. Still, I returned her hug, my hands running along her back, and as I did…I could have sworn I felt something shift just beneath her shoulder blades.

It felt as though a muscle or something like it was protruding from just beneath the bone. I slid my hand between her shoulders, eyebrows creasing in confusion at what I’d felt.

Whatever it was, it was there and then gone too quickly to even be worth acknowledging, but it only added to the mountain of unease I felt building.

Something was going on with Carla, and I was growing certain it had everything to do with whatever strange shit was going on with the Church of The Redeemed Fallen, and their seemingly upping their recruitment drive.

If only I could have foreseen the true extent of what was taking place, perhaps the story wouldn’t have ended as the sort fit for this forum.

I’ve got to wrap it up for now. It’s late, my body has been crying for the bed for the past hour, and my mind well, it’s done enough recounting of those events for now.

I’ll finish this tomorrow, until then, be wary and stay away from that goddamn “Church”.

Part 2

I apologize for the delay in an update. I’ve spent the last few days packing the contents of my wife and I’s life together in boxes, mustering the strength to return to those days.

It’s…taken longer than anticipated but It’s time I wrap this up.

After the events of the night previous my head spun with questions. What was with the sudden change? If it was some sort of joke I wasn’t getting it.

The rest of that night passed in a strained performance of normalcy.

We tried to watch some television, but it seemed neither of us could focus on the show, and went to bed by the end of the hour.

All the while she clung to my side as if worried that, if ever out of her sight I might flee.

I never could shake that unease with her beside me, a cold and foreign feeling and as I drifted off that night, my sleep was an uneasy one, full of nightmares depicting impossible scenes I struggle to recall, and skinless, winged things.

I awoke the following morning to an empty bed, greeted by the fragrant scent of cooked meat clinging to the air, and vague wisps of lingering unease from the night prior.

I replayed the prior night in my mind, hoping that with a clear mind and a night of rest, I might make sense of Carla’s sudden interest, and an even greater part of me that hoped to find it was all some odd joke.

As I made my way downstairs, the sound of Carla’s shuffling amidst the plates and dishes growing, as did my hope that it was all some misunderstanding.

As I entered the kitchen, that hope began to rapidly fade. Carla stood at the island, scooping eggs from a pan onto two plates before her. She was clad in white from head to toe, wearing a thick white dress I didn’t recognize, her hair tied back in twin braids.

It was the telltale dress of a member of the Church. If this was a joke she was deeply dedicated, and something told me it very much was not.

“Hey! Good morning, love,” she greeted with an uncharacteristic cheer.

“Morning,” I said, leaning in as she pecked my cheek.

“Today’s the day.” her voice was full of barely restrained excitement.

The smell of sour meat, what I could only assume to be bacon hung on her breath, though there was something not quite right about it. An odd, unfamiliar scent.

It clung to the air of the kitchen.

So she was serious…we were actually going to the Church.

I nodded, unsure of quite how to respond without somehow expressing my obvious misgivings.

“Hey,” she said, placing a hand on my cheek. “This is going to be good for us, for you.”

Irritation bloomed bred by the return of unease her newfound attitude spurred. I was quickly growing tired of her sudden preachiness, the patronizing way she spoke as if I was lost and only she could see it.

I almost spoke up, but as I opened my mouth to respond I could swear I saw a… a change in her eyes, a red glare as though something bright shone just beneath them.

I stepped away, immediately taken aback by what I thought I’d seen, my brain already settling into the process of rationalization.

Carla frowned, speaking again in a low, calming voice.

“I promise.”

Surely I knew I must be mistaken, her auburn eyes had simply caught the glare of the light. Yes, that was it.

I nodded, and grabbed a plate, turning towards the food on the stove in a half-hearted attempt to break some of the tension I felt under her gaze. There was a new weight to it, her watching me, as if she were exuding some sort of pressure.

I spooned a helping of eggs on my plate, noting that she must have mixed it with the grease of the bacon, something I’ve been known to enjoy. As I pressed my fork into a strip of the meat in the pan, my face screwed in disgust.

That smell…it was stronger than ever where I stood, the thick aroma of meat, withholding a trace of something sour and unnatural.

“What’s wrong?” I jumped at the sound of my wife’s voice in my ear, never once hearing her move from her place near the island.

“The uh, the meat,” I started, “Does it smell alright to you?”

Something passed over her face, a mask of… nervousness perhaps, passing over her features.

It was growing undeniable that she was hiding something.

“It’s not pork,” she admitted sheepishly, glancing down at her feet.

My mind began to race, unthinkable conclusions beginning to emerge from amidst a sea of unease.

“It’s goat,” she offered quickly, eyes widening as I began to react.

“I thought you might not try it if I told you.”

Irritation overpowered any relief I felt.

“Enough with this…weirdness,” I spat, “Ever since yesterday with that weirdo from the Church, you’ve been acting odd, hiding things, feeding me partial truths, what is wrong with you?”

For a moment, she clearly bristled at my reproach, but her expression softened after a bit.

“I’m sorry,” she began,

“You’re right. I’m…just nervous about today. I really didn’t think you’d take it well with how silly we used to think the Church was but you’re right. I’ve not been my best self.”

I folded my arms, anger tempered before it could rise to a boiling point, though still reluctant.

“Let’s just eat, love,” she murmured. “After the service, you’ll understand.”

There was much I  wanted to say, but none of it felt productive and I could tell it would just devolve into an argument. As surreal as it seemed, her sudden devotion did appear genuine.

I nodded.

“Yeah, yeah, okay.”

We took our respective places at the table, and began eating in an uneasy silence. I pushed around a helping of eggs with my fork, stirring it habitually with the grease. All the while Carla watched me closely, doing her best to appear uninterested.

It made me uncomfortable, but with no interest in a fight, I simply pretended not to notice. I assumed she was gauging my mood, hoping I would still attend this silly meeting with her. I would did my best to ignore her, as I spun a long strip of the not-bacon in my eggs, before taking a bite.

As I bit into it, I was immediately taken aback by the odd rubbery taste of the meat, reminiscent of the smell of burnt plastic.

It was unbearable, and if not for her eyes on me, I’d have outright spat it out. Instead, feeling much like a sneaky child, I held the rancid food between my lip and gums, quickly going for a glass of water unable to hold my composure even for Carla’s sake.

“You don’t like it?” she asked, looking slightly alarmed.

There was an almost acidic after effect to the meat, which made my throat burn slightly, my mouth watering as my saliva took on the awful taste

“That didn’t taste right at all,” I said, in between mouthfuls of water as I tried to clean my mouth of the odd, greasy film the meat had left in my mouth.

I had tried goat once before, at a Muslim friend’s house for some holiday party they’d invited me to, and this certainly wasn’t it.

She shrugged.

“I don’t know, maybe I cooked it wrong, I’m sorry.” a look of reluctance crossed her face before she added,

“Still, perhaps you should finish -” stopping quickly as if thinking better of pushing the matter.

“It’s fine, you tried it, and – and that’s what matters.” her voice sounded as though she were trying to convince herself of something, and just barely holding back a storm cloud of unpleasant emotions.

“We should be getting ready soon anyway. Finish up your eggs and I’ll clean this up, you should get dressed. We’ve got a special day ahead.”

As I emptied the last of the water from my cup, I felt those same tendrils of unease coiling deep within as my stomach twisted into uncomfortable knots from what I was sure to be nerves and nausea from the taste.

“Okay,” I said. “After, we need to talk about all of this – .” I motioned vaguely around us.

“This sudden change. I’m fine if you’ve… found faith or something but this is all a lot very suddenly.”

For a moment, her expression fell. To this moment, even as I write this, I’m certain her expression was one of pleading.

It was the look you’d expect of someone being kidnapped, a silent plea, but like so many others it was gone before I could ask.

“And we will,” she practically cooed. She stepped forth with a distant sort of twinkle in her eye.

“After today, all will be understood.”

I let the conversation end there, and Carla seemed to take the queue.

“I’m going to get freshened up,” she said, heading for the stairs.

“We should leave soon.”

I nodded, as she turned to leave I caught sight of her back and for a moment I was certain I could see something at either side of her upper spine. Faint protrusions that grew more or less visible with her movement.

She was wearing something under her clothes, I told myself. She had to be, it was the only logical answer. I hurried to the trash can, emptying out the chewed remnants of the “bacon” and after forcing down down the rising discomfort, I followed her up to the room.

By the end of the hour we were en route to the Church of the Redeemed Fallen.

* * The church was located in a sizable grove amongst some of the woodland surrounding the area about five minutes outside of city limits. In all my life, I can hardly recall more tense a drive.

My heart grew heavier as the suburban homes and small businesses of our town gave way to farmhouses and forests before the former disappeared entirely.

As we drew nearer the location, there was a palpable shift in Carla’s mood from excitement to an almost pious sort of nervousness.

Her head was lowered as we winded the bend onto the twisting gravel path leading up to the property, and I could hear her mouthing some sort of prayer.

“May we taste of the flesh and be reborn, may we partake of the blood and be made pure. May we taste of the flesh and be reborn, may we…”

As a former Church kid, the prayer was almost familiar to things I’d said myself, and yet there was something about it that seemed wrong, and made a primal part of myself want to cry out for her to stop. That mass of unease had become overwhelming,  nearly making me turn back.

It was too late.

A small line of cars had formed behind us heading towards the Church as well, blocking our only real path out, and so I continued despite the icy mass of dread I felt at my core, growing the nearer we came to the building.

As we pulled into the grove, the first thing to come into view was the cross. For one, it was massive, as though someone had simply stripped the bark off of two redwoods and attached them across one another.

It had to be nearly 90 feet tall, its wood a white so pale it almost looked like bone made no more pleasant to the eye by the image painted at the center, a depiction of what I can describe only as a skinless angel.

Its wings extended out onto either side of the cross, its face twisted in an expression that appeared less like agony, and more some sick sort of exuberance.

I watched as Carla’s mouth fell open, eyes wide. The speed of her eerie prayers picked up, and I saw the flash of something hungry in her wild stare.

Next, was the church itself.

It was my first time seeing the building and given the size of the monument outside, I was shocked at its modesty. The building sat at the center of the vast clearing, the edge of which was lined with various cabins clearly built by less than professional hands.

It looked less like a church, and more like some sort of lodge or massive log cabin. A few other cars had parked in one of the larger open spaces in the clearing, forming an impromptu parking lot, which our vehicle soon joined.

As I brought the car to a stop, there was a moment of silence that fell and in that, I realized just how unnerved by this I was all of the anxiety I’d been forcing back crashing down all at once as it truly dawned on me where I was.

If you’d asked me the day prior, I’d have told you I was content to never step foot in the cult camp outside of town, and yet here I was, at the sudden and inexplicable behest of my wife.

The expression on Carla’s face was unreadable. Her eyes were wide and watery as she stared ahead blankly, lips quivering. I couldn’t tell if it was sheer joy, or horrified realization kicking in.

She looked over at me, and I swear, it was as though whatever internal conflict she was undergoing was visible behind her eyes.

I hoped despite myself that at any moment she would ask that we turn back, that we return home and away from this awful place. But there was no such luck, and after a few more seconds she’d opened her door and was making her way towards the building.

Muttering a string of curses under my breath, I soon followed.

“Welcome to salvation, welcome, welcome, brother and sister!”

Two greeters stood at either side of the door two meet us, one a man in an all-white set of dress clothes, holding a basket with its contents covered by a serviette, and a woman in similar attire to my wife.

Both plastered impossibly fake smiles as they welcomed us, rushing ahead to push the doors open. I cringed at the greeting, as genuine as it might have been, something about the two rankled me.

“Have you all partaken in the flesh?” The woman asked in a voice dripping with artificial cheer.

The man held out his basket, inside of which was a mass of uncooked meat, vaguely resembling beef. It was raw, bloody, and looked certain to cause some sort of sickness if ingested. Bile shot up my throat and into my mouth.

“Yes, thank you,” Carla spoke quickly, putting herself between myself and the basket and nearly dragging me inside.

Questions fluttered to the forefront of my mind, but there seemed little time to ask as she ushered me forth.

A small crowd of no more than sixty or seventy people had gathered in the chapel of the building, which seemed to make up the majority of its interior, the low, unintelligible hum of dozens of nervous conversations and small talk filling the air.

At the front center stood a small stage with a podium, on which a similar design to that on the massive cross was emblazoned on the front complete with the same nightmarish being I was coming to recognize as the Flayed Angel.

At the back of the stage sat another cross, crooked and in a quite pitiable condition.

“Family!” a man’s voice boomed, summoning the attention of the entire room at once and settling a hush over everything.

I recognized him immediately.

Father Harold Trager.

It had been a while since he’d last been seen in town. He looked older, more weathered, but it was certainly him. That booming, almost cartoonish preacher voice meant to command a room was infamous.

He was shorter than I’d imagined, and a bit rounder, with something of a permanent redness too him and sweat that seemed to hang around his brow no matter how much dabbing he did with his handkerchief.

“Family, what a glorious occasion this is. Truly, truly glorious. I would thank you all for coming, but I ask you what use is my thanks to you, in the face of the glory you are about to attain! ?”

The room exploded in an uproar, cheering and applause and amens.

“Now if you’re here, well, you’re one of the special ones,” he paced back and forth on stage, speaking with grand exciting motions that kept one’s attention.

“You’re one of the few who saw the truth and acted! The few who, when offered a chance to taste the fruit of salvation, bit down with hearts full of righteous greed!

The room joined in uproarious cheers and applause.

“The few who saw through the lies of the unsaved, those who’d call me a charlatan and con.”

He paused to allow a smattering of boos, Carla joining in her face a deep red.

“Oh, but woe be unto them. Woe indeed, my family. For this evening you will all bear witness to the truth. The one truth revealed to me all those years ago. That of the Flayed Angel our Fallen God, arisen!”

More applause. I was feeling more and more isolated among the sea of sweating, cheering faces.

Everyone bore the same sheen of moisture, and every face capable appeared to be turning a bright red as though from a heat I couldn’t feel. Several seemed to have developed the same odd itch in unison, scratching madly at their arms and faces and any exposed flesh as they watched the stage with the eyes of a zealot.

“Now in these last few weeks, we’ve made an effort, a concerted attempt to save as many souls as we can, and looking out on your beautiful and new faces, I can see we have succeeded in that mission.”

My throat felt tight with dread rising inside like icy floodwaters.

“For so long, we have traveled beneath his wing. And now, upon his return, for that we have been rewarded. This world, the world of the old God and his will is doomed, doomed to die in the cold wake left by his gaze turned from us. But from its remains, it will give birth to another, his world,” he motioned to the facsimile of the creature on his podium.

And he has insisted we, his flock, populate it with him.”

The air suddenly seemed to crackle with a strange sort of energy, a smell like brunt ozone and something more familiar filling the air. I’d smelled it in my house that very day, a sour, burning meat scent.

“If you’re here, you have already taken the step. You’ve already accepted his blessing and tasted of his flesh. Just a handful, that’s all that must be ingested for what’s to come.”

My mind seemed to quake with realization, my gaze turning from Father Trager to my wife as the icy claws of dread sank deeper into me.

“What was that meat?” I muttered, loud enough that a few folks near us turned to look. She glanced away, her face awash with guilt.

“I’m sorry, love,” she said, “But it really was for the best.”

My head spun, the realization of what those words might mean hitting like a tidal wave.

At once the room burst into sound, cheers, prayers, and screams traveling from the front as something seemed to move through the crowd towards the stage.

“Bring him forth! Our god, our feast! Let him see us into our ascension, witness the birth of his children!” He was practically screaming now, emotions unrestrained and eyes nearly bulging out of his skull, face nearly purple.

“After all it’s only right,” he spoke, a burst of gurgling laughter erupting from his chest.

“He’s fed you all at least once now!”

A group of men in what I can only describe as cloaks made their way to the front carrying something above their heads.

At first, I was certain I was looking at a dead body. I could see bloated limbs and rancid flesh that looked as though they’d been skinned, large chunks of flesh were missing portions of its chest and….dear god.

More was gone by the second as members of the crowd nearest descended into a ravenous sort of free for all, fighting like animals amongst each other to tear bits free shoving handfuls into their ravenous mouths.

I felt vomit shoot forth in my throat and barely managed to swallow it down in time.

It was a corpse. The meat that came from this place was sourced from a fucking corpse, and people had been eating it. I remembered with overwhelming relief spitting out the bacon that morning.

Then, I saw the wings. My heart jolted with a shock like nothing I’d ever felt, as my mind seemed to bend and groan under the weight of what it was taking in.

They were long and batlike, tattered far past any sort of usefulness, and yet still they fluttered slowly.

It was… alive?

These people were eating the flesh of a living… person?

No, clearly not. Angel? I couldn’t accept that no matter what they called it. Iif angels existed, surely they wouldn’t look like this.

No, this was demonic in nature, and yet somehow I was the only who seemed anything other than joyous.

Its head turned at impossible angles, observing the scene around it with a look that sent a stomach-churning chill coursing through me, making me wonder if I might lose my balance.

It smiled an expression that seemed all but perverse coming from such a being.

“Raise him up, raise our savior to his rightful place and let him bear witness over what he has borne!”

The cloaked men followed Father Tragers command, lowering the cross, and proceeding to attach the thing to it.

Its face was a horrific pit, with two beady black eyes, a hole for a nose, and a slit mouth full of tiny razor teeth all in close proximity giving it an oddly aquatic look.

It was utterly inhuman, and I felt my skull pound under the sheer weight of its appearance of seeing this impossible thing, and yet even from my distance I could see its sick smile as the cross was raised.

The crowd was in a state of complete elation, people in tears and screaming, folks throwing themselves to the ground and in every state of disarray. I looked over at Carla, and the expression I saw was devoid of anything familiar.

“A promise delivered, my brothers and sisters. THAT is what this evening is! I told you all I would lead you forth to glory, and here it shall come. Do you feel it? The change in you? It’s starting now, you’re in his presence my friends, oh, it’s starting now!”

His face was beet red as he continued his tirade, sweat almost pouring forth from his face. A quick glance around revealed that he wasn’t alone.

He rolled his neck at an odd angle, his shoulders heaving up and down as he began to work his suit open. Within seconds he was removing his shirt, and before I could wonder what was happening, turned and abated any confusion with unrestrained terror.

It was a transformation, like something from the fever dreams of H.R.Giger and the Wolfman.

His skin seemed to ripple and peel, as though invisible fingers were removing it in strips like old paint, revealing the angry red flesh beneath, as two limb-like growths protruding from his back began to stretch. They bloomed out behind him in a spray of blood and chunks of meat like some hellish flower, curling, and unfurling like someone would exercise a hand.

The thing on the cross above him reeled its head back and forth, cackling and screeching with unholy laughter. I was so engrossed in the nightmare unfolding on stage, I hardly noticed it around me.

All around me people were following in the footsteps of Trager.

Clothes being shed, bodies contorting impossibly, and wing-like growths emerging.

My eyes locked with Carla’s. I shook my head, despite what I knew to be coming.

“I – I’m sorry,” she struggled to speak.

“When I ate that s – stuff it changed me, I – c – couldn’t tell…” she lurched forward with a crack, her back taking an unnatural position.

An impossible cocktail of emotions, horror, bewilderment, and all the things one would feel watching the love of their life become something…else before their very eyes. Till this day, even at this moment as I write this, there was one that stood out the most.

Helplessness.

My hands shot up to either side of her face, the frigid floodwaters dread churning through my veins unrestrained as the process began.

It started at her forehead, an almost beautiful uniformity to the otherwise horrific sight, the skin along her hairline rolling in unison, and beginning to travel down her face in morbid ringlets, interspersed by thin trails of blood.

My hand began to sting at her touch as the face I’d loved from the moment I’d seen it grew unrecognizable revealing the flesh beneath.

A sound like a hissing crack echoed from her face and…god help me, her lower jaw split in half, separating into two parts like mandibles.

“Carla, please, please,” I begged, unsure of what I was even asking for, my mind far from logic.

Her eyes met mine, wide and gleaming with an animal hunger and something like surprise.

A quick glance told me she wasn’t the only one. Father Trager now stood atop the podium, wings outstretched, in a pose much like the thing on the cross. All around me, I could feel eyes in our direction.

I hadn’t eaten the flesh. It was clearly responsible for the changes and by the looks of it, I was the only one.

The realization made my heart lurch into my throat. Carla’s eyes followed me, like I’d seen folks pet cats follow insects along the wall.

I need to leave.

The thought seemed to spur my body into action, as I took a few steps away from my wife. She was all but unrecognizable now, and any sense of loss I was feeling was quickly dwarfed by the terror I felt in her presence.

“There is an unbeliever amongst us.”

The voice was like the sound of death, raspy and yet somehow bellowing. It curled the very blood in my veins, making every hair on my back raise in alarm.

My gaze traveled to the stage, expecting to see Father Trager watching me. He was, but I realized quickly it hadn’t been him who spoke.

That thing… the Flayed Angel, its hollow orbs were locked on me, a wry smile breaking its lips.

“Feast, children.”

I snapped around to face the thing my wife had become.

It still had her eyes, but the creature before me resembled the monster on stage much more than the woman Carla had been. Her bones cracked as her body adjusted to its final form, but it was all but over.

But her eyes, though it was fading, a light of familiarity still shone.

“Run.” she breathed.

The reaction was immediate, both theirs and mine.

I burst into a full sprint, hardly bothering to look as I turned in the same direction we’d come.

A sound, eerily similar to the inhumane screech of a mountain lion tore out from behind me, and I could feel sharp claws brush along my back.

My heart pounded in my ear, feeling like it might give out at any second as the room descended into a horrific cacophony as the creatures all seemed to respond to the call.

Arms and clawed hands lashed out, several still stretching and morphing through various stages of the transformation, several pairs of wings nearly swatting me back.

It was a scene from a nightmare, my desperate escape slowed by the droves of monsters.

The hair on my back stood at attention with the expectation that, at any moment, I’d feel some fleshy, clawed hand halt my progress, and I would die an excruciating death.

Still, adrenaline kept me moving at a speed otherwise impossible, and with most of the monsters still distracted with their continued changes, I was able to reach the exit.

The sounds behind me were like the gate of Hell had been opened, an echoing cacophony of shrieking cries and breaking bodies.

I ran, not stopping for even a second as I crossed the field every step marked by the thud in my chest. I slowed only as I reached the car, fumbling through my pocket for the keys, before unlocking it with a click and throwing myself inside.

The entire clearing seemed to shake suddenly, followed by a sound like before but far louder that shook the very windows of the car. A glance behind me showed that I had been followed.

Several of the creatures perched atop the wooden frame of the Church, watching me with wings outstretched.

Go.

I pulled into reverse, reorienting the car to face the exit and with no thought for speed limits, I punched the gas. The engine roared, the vehicle a spray of gravel in all directions, before it bucked to life, hurtling down the path.

As the trees passed on either side, I tried to keep my eyes forward, but couldn’t ignore the figures darting in and out of my periphery amongst the foliage.

A sudden darkness overtook me, as something overhead blocked out the sun. I didn’t need to look back, the sound of beating wings growing nearer overhead told me all I needed to know.

I could see them, getting closer on either side, until entire faces were visible darting amongst the treeline. The exit was ahead, the dirt road leading off to the highway closer with every second.

I chanced a glance up through the front window and…she was mere inches away. Those familiar eyes glaring back at me.

Fuck. Something told me at any second, I could be torn free from my seat and meet a swift end.

The thing that used to be my wife squinted, as though realizing something I was unaware of. A smile passed over her face, and just as soon as she had appeared, she was gone.

I slammed the gas as though I were trying to kick through the floor, nearly flipping the car as I swerved to the right and onto the dirt road.

I didn’t slow down until I reached my house, at which point I immediately launched myself from the car in order to vomit.

The following days went by in a blur, I reported a shooting at the Church certain police wouldn’t believe my story.

Instead of being questioned, the officer sent to my house simply debriefed me on the towns “official story” of a gas leak leading to mass psychosis in order to explain the disappearances, and to insist that that is what I’d seen.

I know the truth though. No gas leak at the Church would explain how strange Carla had been in the days before. She was under the influence of something impossible.

I don’t know what happened to her, or any of those things. I’m sorry, I’m sure that’s not what anyone wants to hear.

Believe me, it brings me no joy to know those things might still be out there but it’s all that I know.

There’s much that haunts me about that day, but one thing has  nagged at my mind most of all. Those things could have caught me, I’m certain of it. Yet they simply followed as I escaped.

I dunno, maybe I’ve given in to paranoia but a small part of me feels that, for some reason, they wanted me to leave.

I don’t know what that means for me, yet but every night I have the same nightmare in which I can feel my skin burn and bones break as I change. I always wake up, a sweating, shaking mess before it’s through.

I’m going to wrap this up.

It’s getting late, and there’s nothing more to share. I suppose if you take anything away it’s this; be wary of any groups offering you a strange sort of salvation, and if ever you cross a member of the Church of the Flayed Angel, don’t accept the food.

It will be the last meal with your humanity.