Creative Writing

*NB* The stories featured here have either already been submitted for publication consideration or are still a work in progress.

Read and enjoy (or not) but please do not steal my work. Thank you.

Be Yourself, everyone else is already taken ~ Oscar Wilde~

The Beginning of the End

Short Story by Snez Kosanovic

Ngayurnangalku! Ngayurnangalku! Ngayurnangalku!

Shhhh!!! Shut the frak up or they will hear us!

Listen! whispered Steve as his shaking hand clenched over Birrani’s mouth, to silence him.

The sounds of the chittering and grating bellows were getting louder, even with the storm raging outside like a tempest. Steve could feel Birrani’s tears stream over his hand as he tried to gently look over the windowpane without making any sudden movements or noise. The wind howls were ferocious and the gusts a maelstrom of chaos. The lightning flashes, briefly illuminated the landscape with an eerie, electric glow, revealing the devastation before plunging everything back into darkness.

Steve could hear his own breaths come out in hushed exhales and his heart was beating so hard, that the sound itself almost drowned out everything else, while his skin was still stinging him to the bone.

What the frak was in that rain? Steve thought to himself as he strained his ears to catch any sounds that might signal a potential immediate threat, and his eyes scanned the outside world for any signs of those…. things.  

Steve recalled the moments before the storm hit.

It was a beautiful sunny day as Steve and Birrani conducted their Sunday tour as usual. They were lifelong friends and business partners. Birrani, a first nations man who knew endless tales of The Dreaming and would tell bone chilling stories of how the consequences of natural imbalance and environmental damage could awake ancient forces of the natural world, that would seek revenge, when they were unwittingly disturbed.

Steve, a passionate environmental activist with an intense interest in the “spooky side” of Victoria’s Colonial past, especially Ararat Asylum, a decaying and imposing institution located on the outskirts of Aradale which has long been a source of fear and speculation.

Abandoned for decades, the building stands as a dark relic of a bygone era, a time when mental health treatment was shrouded in mystery and suffering. The boys would take their group of thrill seekers and explorers through the asylum’s imposing gates armed with flashlights and their footsteps would echo through the empty halls. As they delve deeper into the heart of the asylum, Steve would slowly reveal the asylum’s history as a place of despair, experimentation, and suffering.

The group would discover chilling remnants of its past: rusted restraints, unsettling medical equipment, and cryptic patient records that hint at unspeakable horrors.

Their tour was a hit and nary a Sunday went past that they were not busy, and this day was like any other, until the storm arrived. The boys were aware that there was supposed to be a storm, but it wasn’t expected to hit until the evening. Which for Steve was perfect as by then the tour would have moved from Green Hill Lake to the Old Lunatic Asylum, setting the stage for the ultimate fright as the boys loved to call it.

Steve leaned on the bus and lit a smoke as he watched the group go swimming.

“That shit will kill you mate” joked Birrani.

Steve scowled back at him and gave him the finger.

“Aye Fella, put that finger someplace else and check out the storm coming our way. May have to get this mob on the bus sooner and get out of here. Those clouds don’t look good.

“Yeah, not wrong brother. Give them another couple minutes. She’ll be right.” exclaimed Steve.

Steve threw his smoke to the ground and bashed it out with his heel to extinguish it. As he leaned down to pick up the cigarette butt, he noticed the ants at his feet, who seemed to be forming bizarre, intricate patterns on the bush floor, moving as if driven by an unseen force. The air suddenly grew still, and an eerie hush settled over the landscape as the first whispers of the approaching storm began to manifest.  Steve looked over at the horizon and squinted.

At first, it was just a low, eerie whistle and it seemed as but a moment that the sky became shrouded in dense, swirling clouds that blocked out the sun and plunged everything into an impenetrable gloom. The sky, once serene and blue, darkened ominously, and heavy clouds gathered on the horizon, blotting out the sun’s feeble attempts to pierce through.

Everybody on the bus! yelled Steve

In that moment a low, and haunting deep bellow began to echo through the desolation. The wind, once a gentle breeze, carried a chill that seeped into the very marrow of Steve’s bones and raised the hairs on the back of his neck. Suddenly Birrani ran past him as bees swarmed him in a frenzied manner, as if they wanted to attack anything in their path. Butterflies and moths fluttered by quickly in unnatural clusters, their wings pulsating in eerie unison and the air grew thick with a cacophony of insect sounds, whispers and sighs that seemed to be converging from all directions. Trees trembled, their leaves rustling in fear, and loose objects were carried aloft, spinning and dancing in the air, while the chittering from the insects seemed possessed, moving with an eerie synchronicity and sounding like a unified voice.

The wind which seemed to take on a life of its own, swirling and coiling in unnatural patterns, turned the once-celebratory atmosphere turned into one of fear and dread and nothing could have prepared Steve for the sight of Birrani standing there soiling himself and letting out a blood curdling scream of Ngayurnangalku! and growling coming from the lake.

Emerging from the shadows of the storm over the lake were nightmarish creatures.

They were tall and hunched, with gnarled, bark like skin with curved, elongated limbs that ended in razor-sharp claws. Their eyes were hollow and lifeless yet emanating a malevolent red glow.

Steve watched in horror as their long, serpentine tongues flicked in and out of its grotesque, toothy maw. Without a moment’s thought, Steve grabbed Birrani and they ran towards the bus leaving their tour group to the fate of the creatures.

As Steve slammed down the pedal to the metal, the storm grew in intensity, and panic in nature spread like wildfire around them. Trees uprooted themselves, and the houses shook under the relentless force of the tempest. The wind carried the screams of people left behind and what seemed like voices and anguished cries in the gust of wind as they sped to safety of the desolate walls of Ararat Asylum.

Steve snapped back to reality from the horror of the memory and took his hand off Birrani’s mouth and looked at his tearful friend right in the eyes. You keep saying Ngayurnangalku. What is that?

Ngayurnangalku are monstrous cannibal entities in Dreamtime stories that materialise when the balance of nature is disrupted cried Birrani.

They are just stories!

If they are just stories, then what the frak did you think we saw out there?

Did you think that the Elders made these stories up? NO!

You’re an environmentalist, have a look around you. Did you think that humans can just ravage nature with chemicals and bad behaviour and not expect any consequences?

Steve looked straight at Birrani and said, “We will get out of this mate” Nothing is going to eat you!

No! the Frak we won’t screamed Birrani.

This is the beginning of the end! Nature is revolting!

“Calm yourself down!” roared Steve as he suddenly lunged at Birrani and swung a powerful right hook, but Birrani managed to duck and avoid the blow and countered with a series of swift jabs, landing a few solid punches on Steve’s torso and face.

The sound of fists connecting with flesh echoed through the walls of Ararat, as both men exchanged blows, grappling and wrestled. Blood trickled from Steve’s nose, and Birrani’s eye was already swelling from the punches he had taken.

Neither man, had heard the doors of the medical lab they were hiding break open.

As Steve used his shirt to wipe the blood pouring out of his nose, he looked up and screamed Ngayurnangalku! as he watched the creature lunge from behind and bite down onto Birrani’s head.

Details

The Mask of Amera.

Written by Snez Kosanovic

Sarah’s dimly lit studio was nestled in an old house on a forgotten corner in St Albans, and the dusty old mask sat on a worn-out wooden shelf. It was a grotesque relic, with contorted features that seemed to shift and change when you stared at it too long. It was all Sarah had left of her beloved Grandmother. Memories flooded her while she sat there painting and with each brushstroke, Sarah cast a glance over at the mask.

In the flickering light, it seemed to come alive, as if it were cursed with a life of its own. As the final stroke of paint was applied, Sarah looked at the mask with an unsettling grin. The words of her dying grandmother rang as clear as the day she drew her last breath.

“Beware the power that dwells within.”

Her grandmother Danica was an eccentric lady, but Sarah loved her dearly. Her long silver hair flowed down to her waist, and her eyes sparkled with wisdom. She wore flowing robes and adorned herself with beads and silver jewellery that seemed to glimmer even in the dimmest light.

Sarah remembered that her home was cozy, warm and welcoming with brilliant paintings and shelves lined with old books. Sarah recalled the aroma of delicious food wafting in the air, and she smiled at how her grandmother used to dance to the sounds of Shostakovich’s Sonata in D Minor or Remo Giazotto’s Adagio in G Minor.

In her mind’s eye, Sarah could see her sway and swirl across the room with her shawl as if she was on clouds. Danica was a force of epicureanism, love and kindness, but she also harboured dark secrets that only Sarah knew and dared not speak. The basement contained a secret ritual chamber filled with an Altar adorned with red and black candles, the scent of incense, ancient oddities and that mask.

In a world where magic was a long-forgotten art, Danica proved to Sarah that magic could be found not only in spells but in the resilience of those who dared to dream of the extraordinary to carve the life that they wanted, and that Mask was the key. The ritual required Sarah to confront the very essence of the demonic mask with courage and determination. One evening, as the moon cast eerie shadows through the small windows in her studio, Sarah felt a magnetic pull toward the mask’s ominous aura, and she could no longer resist the allure.

She donned the mask and performed the invocation, just as Danica had taught her many years ago. That night, as she lay in bed, she couldn’t shake the feeling that the mask’s hollow eyes were watching her, but she laid there satisfied that her desires will be granted.

As the days passed, strange occurrences began to unfold. Sarah’s sleep grew restless, plagued by unsettling nightmares. She would wake up to whispers in the dark, faint voices that seemed to emanate from the mask itself and as the days passed, the mask’s features contorted even further and twisted into a malevolent grin….

…to be continued…