Book Of The Path

Disclaimer: I do not own the game that this fanfiction is written for, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.


Title: Book Of The Path.

Author: RaveEchidna

Fandom: Silent Hill 2 with splashes of the other games/ movie.

Paring(s): James/Maria, Pyramid Head(s)/James…too many to list

Warnings: Spoilers, Heterosexual sex, Gay sex, rape, snuff, dubious consent, gore, torture, child abuse, death, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempts, strong langue….lots and lots of very wrong things.

Rating: R-NC 17

Disclaimer: I do not Own Silent Hill Konami and Team Silent do. I just wanted to play with the world they made.

“Could we stop for a moment James?” The voice though cheerful was jarring and it pulled the morose blond from his retelling of events. Under the man’s tired hazel eyes the doctor shifted. Uneasy, he’d never seen any one look at him with such despair and sheer self-loathing “I am a little confused.” The doctor kept talking trying to ignore the raw emotions that shown in the others eyes “You say you got a letter from your dead wife and you went to look for her?”

James nodded looking away from the doctor his gaze fell upon a small flock of butterflies, “Yeah I know it sounds insane.”

The doctor raised an eyebrow as he checked the amount of tape that had been used. “Insane is a legal term and not one that members of my profession use.” He smiled softly hoping that James would take come sort of comfort from that. “Though it does sound like you are suffering from some kind of delusional fit, after all a dead person can’t write a letter.”

The blond snorted and turned again to face the doctor. “Tell me something that I don’t know?” It was a question but it also held the edge of a very angry statement. “If you can’t take the letter as a fact, and a reason for my trip to Silent Hill as real, then you’re not going to believe anything else that I am saying and I am just going to be wasting our time.”

He blinked looking at James the tone of the man’s voice had taken on a low and dangerous edge. Others that had worked with him had warned him about that tone. It was a clear warning that the man was on the edge of one of his less then friendly fits of anger that could and often did take several orderlies and an almost lethal dose of tranquilizers to put an end to. “No it’s not that James I am just trying to make everything clear. So that when I go over your case later I will not get confused and have to ask you again what it was that happened.”

James frowned he didn’t look at all convinced but he let it drop. “Right whatever.” He took a deep breath. “Yes, the letter was from Mary I am so sure it was it is.” He still had the letter he knew it was in the pocket of his coat, how it was the article of clothing, continued to remain intact was a mystery to him. “I keep it in my jacket’s pocket.”

“Your jacket? The one you have on now?” The man asked leaning in a little closer. “Could you show it to me James?”
The blond shifted; he didn’t like taking the letter out from its protective pocket, he liked showing it to strangers even less, they always looked at him as though he’d grown a second head when he did. He chewed on his lower lip before pulling the letter free and offered it up to the doctor. “I want it back.”

“Of course, you do.” The doctor knew that in time he would have to get James to throw away the tattered note if he ever wanted to save the man, but that would come in time, it was far too early to expect the man to be able to cast aside his ticket to what ever dark dream the hill had offered up to him. His sculpted eyebrows rose up to his hairline as his lips moved silently reading over the note.

It was insanity. Sheer insanity given voice in red ink, he blinked when he saw something and he quickly handed it back to James. Whatever the man had he didn’t think that it was a letter from a dead woman. If anything it was a masterwork of blasphemy born in a fit of rage and depression penned by the warped and damage soul that sat across from him. “See?”

James nodded and took it with care folding it and placing it once more inside of the coat. “In my restless dreams I see that town Silent Hill.” He sighed. “She was always so good with words.” The doctor noted how mechanical James voice sounded when he uttered the phrase restless dreams. He wondered if he was reciting what he imagined the letter said. “She could paint pictures of thought and emotion, better then I ever could with paint.”

“You paint?” The man asked looking James over.

James nodded a little color showing on his cheeks. “I haven’t painted or drawn anything in years. Nothing more then quick messy sketches when things grew too dull at the desk.”

Once again it was added information that the doctor filed away. He really didn’t know anything about his newest client. The man James Sunderland was still something of a mystery. He knew that the man and his mother had something of a love hate relationship that stemmed back from events that occurred in childhood. He also knew that the man and his father never talked. They were estranged to one another.

“Mary never seemed to like my work…she said it was disturbed.” He hadn’t realized that James had still been talking until he had caught the wife’s name mentioned again. “She was right. I wasn’t all that good and was just…twisted.”

He sighed once again it seemed that James was denying parts of himself so that he could conform to Mary. “Well do you think that if I got you a sketch book you would be willing to draw in it for me? Just whatever came to mind?”

James shrugged. He hadn’t kept a sketch record in years then again he hadn’t picked up a pencil to really sketch in at least that long. “I guess I could.”

The man smiled grateful that James was nothing like his other blond client. Then again he didn’t have to worry about her slipping into a fit of rage and possibly beating him to death. “Thank you James. I…I am sorry I have side tracked us long enough don’t you think?”

James bowed his head and closed his eyes taking a slow deep breath as he organized his thoughts. “I wasn’t alone in the cemetery.”

* * *

James almost screamed in sudden shock and fear when he stumbled on to her. A ghost of a woman, she had wrapped her self around him calling him momma before her mind cleared enough to see that the person she was holding clearly wasn’t her mother. She let go of him stumbling and landing somewhat hard on her ass. She looked up at him with a glair that promised death. James swallowed his heart back down and tried to smile kindly to her.

“Oh I’m sorry, I thought—well you’re not my momma.” Her voice was one that held a note of unending childhood. It lacked the fullness of a fully matured woman. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen her I—I was hoping that you were her.”

James nodded his head just a little taking a step back. He wasn’t extremely well versed in dealing with crazy people. “I’m sorry.” He did feel bad for her, after all he was looking for someone too, someone that he hadn’t seen in a very long time. “I hope you find her, I looking for some one to my wife Mary.” He closed his eyes fingering the letter in his pocket.

* * *

“Damn it. Hold on, for a moment as I flip the tape.” The doctor sighed and glared at the old recorder. Sometimes he thought the bastard thing gave him so many problems just to spite him.
“So this woman…what was her name?” He asked as soon as he flipped the tape.

James frowned and shook his head. “She really doesn’t matter I don’t even know why I mentioned her.” Under the eyes of the doctor James felt a horrible slap of guilt. “She was just looking for her mother I think that she was running from the truth just like me.”

The man blinked. “Running from the truth? Just what truth is that James?”

“Mary is dead. She has been for three years but she wrote this letter. Whatever called me to that damned town couldn’t have been my Mary.” James voice became totally toneless and the doctor shivered. “Do you believe in hell? I didn’t think that I did until, until that place.

* * *

He had moved quickly away from the strange woman, no girl he doubted that the odd soul was any older then eighteen maybe nineteen at the most. He couldn’t shake the tone of desperation that had been in her voice it was horrible and while he hoped that she found her mother he had some serious doubts if it would be a good thing for her. That thought made him pause he had to fight back laughter. He was the last person that should ever try to consider what was good for another. He’d tried that once and now she was dead, and yet she’d written to him.

The road under his feet was an impossible smear of blood that was dappled with ragged strands of what had to be flesh. He gagged. He’d never seen anything like it, he wondered what could have caused it and he cursed his mind for being creative.
“It’s like some one was rubbed into the street.” From down the street something moved and called out it was a wounded cry. With eyes widened from the shock from the sound darted around the heavy fog that once again crept up choking everything out of existence. They fell upon a staggering retreating shadow. From the uneven movements the figures pain was so glaringly clear. James swallowed and thought back on the first aid lesions he’d taken years ago. He’d need to get the person to stop moving so he could do a quick assessment of the injuries, he’d probably have to use his jacket as a make shift pressure bandage and then he’d have to find a phone or make a jury rigged back brace and pull the person the to hospital or at least the nearest location where there were people. For some reason the town was oddly empty. He moved with newfound determination down the street after the injured person hoping that he wasn’t going to be too late. The blood had almost made him throw up he was positive a fresh body would be more then enough to make him lose what little he’d choked down on his way into town.

He panted a little feeling dizzy as he was forced into a run. Part of his mind screamed at him telling him that an injured person shouldn’t be able to move that well or that fast. As always that part of his mind was ignored. He had someone that needed to be taken care of.

*Like you took care of Mary?* The odd thought took him totally unaware and he crashed into a makeshift blockade. He fell back his world swimming. Static filled his ears clawed at his brain as it screamed. He staggered to his feet looking for the source of the sound. His eyes narrowed as they locked onto a small radio. Confusion filled him. Who would leave a radio playing static in the middle of a blocked off passage?

He reached for the radio his hand shaking. Sweaty fingers slid over the plastic casing almost dropping the battered pocket radio. A frown pulled the corners of his lips down as he shook and twisted the knobs trying to clear the unending static. “Is this thing broken?” He muttered looking at the small device. Even if it had been broken he should have been able to turn it off.

James almost screamed in shock when something rustled at the end of the blocked passage. The radio in his hands shrieked emitting a pitch sharp enough to make the man wince. He staggered back the radio still in his hands as he squinted brining his free hand up to help shield his eyes as he peered into the dark. Something was moving staggering closer. Without thought he reached out, the urge the need to help someone that had to be in pain was too strong.
“Are you all right?” He asked reaching out he could just make out the agonized twisting writhing of the staggering figure. James took a cautious half step towards the stranger almost falling into a split a sour sweet smell invaded his nose making him gag slightly. Something had died some time ago within the tunnel and had been left to rot. Given the condition of the town he hoped that what ever he was slipping on had only been an animal at some point and not a human. Stop it. “Careful the floor is slick. Just stay still.” He squinted it appeared that the groaning and crying figure had to have been gravely wounded it seemed to be holing its chest. His mind informed him that a gaping chest wound could have easily been the source of the blood he had seen. It also informed him however that it could have been the source of the slick matter on the floor. The color drained from his face. He would not let himself think that he was slipping on the entrails of the man or woman in front of him. “It’s going to be okay.”

He tried to be soothing as he laid a hand on the person’s shoulder his eyes finally adjusting the darkness. His hand slid off the shoulder and he stumbled back reeling and sliding on the decaying refuse at his feet. The flesh had been slick yet sticky, partly cooked meat. He swallowed down bile, maybe the person had been in a car accident and the car had caught fire. “It’s all right.”

It had no face, when it turned it had no face. James couldn’t stop the scream he couldn’t hide his horror, and he knew in that moment that it wasn’t human. Hot bubbling tar like sludge oozed from a gaping hole in its chest. He could smell the sharp tang of heated pitch and acid coming from the weeping sore. He froze totally his mouth opened and closed as his heart pounded at his chest trying to prompt him into taking some kind of action.
“F…fuck me.” He gasped staggering back his hands seeking blindly for an object they could use as a weapon. His fingers latched on to a broken plank of wood. He reacted with out thinking brining the wood down upon the creature’s featureless face. Stopping only when the creature fell twitching on the ground its head brutally beaten in, James gagged. “What the hell was that?” His voice cracked in panic as he scrambled away for the broken body of the aberration.

* * * *


“A monster, you killed a monster?” The voice of the doctor shattered the macabre image that James had been painting with his words. The man frowned and leaned back. Monsters were a common occurrence with his clients each of them described things that could only be products of a totally delusional mind. If he could just figure out why they were obsessed with the horrifying hallucinations he was sure that he would have the key to fully treating their conditions.

James looked down his expression became blank. “It sounds insane.” He sighed. “It is insane. But I saw them in that place I killed them and they almost killed me.” His fingers twitched and knotted within folds of his coat. “I’d stopped believing in inhuman monsters, until that town showed me that maybe children have a reason to want a nightlight.”

“Inhuman monsters?” the doctor leaned back an odd tilt to his head. “What other kind of monsters exist?”

James looked to the man raking fingers through his hair and just taking a moment to gather his thoughts and place them in order. “The worst kind, the ones that look human but you know; you know if you look deep inside they are rotten to the core. The bastard things that walk around with human faces, the ones that would dare smile and act so normal.” His expression twisted into something cold and primal “The kind of vile creature that can abuse a child in the name of religion or murder to end suffering.”

The doctor blinked. “Wouldn’t killing to end suffering be an act of mercy? I don’t know if you could consider that kind of killer a monster.”

James chuckled darkly his tone close to infernal. “The question becomes who’s suffering is being ended the victim or the victimizer?”