Without Eyes

A horror rock band by the name of Drowning Glory, set out on their first tour. They weren’t very well known yet but had already put out a few albums at their own cost and were gaining popularity. Darren ‘Hells’ and Matt Ryder were brothers that started the band in high school, they played lead and bass. Their close friend Damon, who at times went as ‘Demon’, took interest in the band and started singing for them. When they found a drummer, John ‘Murders’ Wheeler, they began to play shows and picked up a good following. It wasn’t until they brought in Jared Burns on rhythm and Karla ‘Kills’ Smith with keyboard and backing vocals that they really took off. The six of them maxed out credit cards and emptied their savings to buy an old school bus to go on tour with the determination of getting their music out to the world.
In the middle of their tour, their path led them through a mid-west town by the name of Staff. The town was small and the buildings seemed to have been very old. Something struck them as very odd; there were cars around but no people. Right away Damon exclaimed, “This town is so damn creepy, we’re staying here tonight.” Of course, as they were fans of all things creepy and morbid, they all agreed.
As they pulled up in front of an old inn and entered, Karla grabbed her camera and started snapping pictures. The inn looked like it was an old mansion at one point in time and had paintings of the original owners hanging up. It had many rooms and the wall panels and doors were all crafted out of a hardwood. “Look at this place!” Karla said with such enthusiasm as she continued taking photos, “I bet this place is haunted!” When they reached the front desk, they noticed it was covered in a fine layer of dust and had cobwebs hanging off the pen to sign the guest book with. Repeatedly ringing the bell, Damon called out, “Hello? Anybody here? Hey! We need a room! You bastards, there’s no one here guys.” “But there’s got to be someone around, I mean the place just can’t be empty, can it?” Jared said with a slight concern. Darren smiled and jumped over the counter. He then grabbed some room keys and handed them out saying in horrible spooky voice, “Here are your room keys. Please, enjoy your stay. Oh, and be very careful my friends, this place is known to be haunted.” He trailed it off with a creepy laugh then signed his name on the dusty guest book before jumping back over the front desk to join his band mates in getting settled in.
Once settled, they figured it was time to have a few drinks and explore the spooky old town. Lucky for them, there was a liquor store right across the street. While they were walking to the liquor store they just couldn’t shake off how eerily quiet the town was. As they walked in the store they noticed no one was there either. Immediately, Darren and Damon began stuffing bottles into their jackets. “Hey!” Karla said, always being their voice of reason, “You can’t just take that. You need to pay for it first.” Damon looked her in the eyes before opening a bottle and taking a drink saying, “Pay who, this fucking town is empty.” He then walked out to the street and shouted, “Hey everybody! I’m just gonna take, you know, like a few bottles, you know, for free, without paying for them! Is that gonna be a problem?” Just as he thought, there was no response. He then walked back into the store, “You see Karla, this is a fucking dream come true. We have a creepy old town all to ourselves. You can take all the graveyard pictures you want without people running us off. I mean hell, you could take a picture of Matt humping a church door.” Matt interjected, “Hey man, I’m not humping a church, my mom is catholic.” “Whatever,” he continued, “point is, that there’s no one here to tell us what we can and can’t do.”
With that said they all decided it was time to have a little fun.
They had the time of their lives exploring the old town. None of the doors there were locked and if they saw anything that they liked, they just took it. After a while they got a little destructive and started smashing up cars and breaking glass. They figured, when were they ever going to get another chance to do this again? When the sun started to set, they made a fire in the nearby graveyard and started to wind down a little bit. Sitting around the fire they were telling ghost stories for about an hour until Darren suggested they go back to the inn because his eyes were hurting and they still had to play a show over two hundred miles away the following night. They put out the fire and headed back to the inn.
While they were walking back, Darren was rubbing his eyes and said, “Hey guys, I think I got too much smoke in my eyes from the fire or something because they’re fucking bothering the hell out of me and everything looks kind of blurry.” John put his arm on Darren’s shoulder and said, “Don’t worry about it, it’s just allergies from being in a new place. You gotta get use to that sort of thing though because after this tour, everyone will know who we are and we’ll be playing shows all over the world.” Darren kept rubbing his eyes and squinting but at least now he was doing it with a smile. When they finally got to the inn, they went to one room to hang out with each other a little more before heading off for bed.
While they were all in Damon’s room they began reliving their day by looking through and posting some of the pictures that Karla took. “How much are you guys willing to bet that I got some ghosts on here?” Karla said eager to find anything out of the ordinary. When they came across the picture of Darren behind the front desk handing them the room keys, they noticed a dark shadow behind him that was not his own. “Holy shit!” she cried out very lively, “Look at that! I told you, I fucking told you this place is haunted! Hey Darren, come check out this picture of you! Darren?” They hadn’t noticed but Darren wasn’t there. They started to feel anxious and searched the room for him. When they found him, he was sitting in the bathroom with his hands over his eyes. Matt, being his brother, was the most concerned, “Hey Darren, you alright man? Karla got a picture of a ghost behind you. You need to check it out.” Darren said in a tired voice, “Are you guys for real? That’s awesome.” They moved the camera towards him so he could see it. When he removed his hands from his face, they all took a step back. “Shit Darren,” Matt said, “Your eyes look irritated and fucked up. If it’s still like that by morning, you’re going to a hospital.” As he stood up he said, “Well that sucks. I’m not feeling too good, I think I’m just gonna go to bed.” he left Damon’s room and headed for his own.
After another hour or so, they all decided it was time to get some kind of sleep and left for their own rooms. When Matt got to the room he was sharing with Darren, he didn’t see him on his bed and figured he drank too much and was puking in the restroom. He pounded on the door, “Hey Darren, you alright in there?” When there was no answer he thought that maybe he passed out in there so he opened the door to check. To his surprise, Darren wasn’t in there, then panic set in when he saw the sink was covered in blood. He immediately ran back to the others rooms to gather them up so they could search for Darren but first, to show he was serious, he wanted to show them the bloody sink. “What the fuck happened to him?” Jared asked with worry in his voice. Then Karla noticed there was something else in the sink. She had never been afraid of blood so she dipped her fingers in there to retrieve whatever it was. “Oh my god!” she said in horror. Damon couldn’t believe what he was looking at so he squinted and asked, “Is that one of his fucking eyeballs?” She dropped it back into the sink and the wake it left in the red pool revealed a second eye.
They were all in shock, throwing questions and blame at each other as to what happened and why. Finally Matt yelled out, “Everybody shut the fuck up! My brother’s out there somewhere hurt and blind, we need to find him.” All five of them split up to search the inn. John and Jared went up to the third floor while Matt stayed on the second floor. Damon and Karla went down to the first floor to see if maybe he found his way downstairs.
Damon was searching for him like a detective, looking for a trail of blood or any kind of disturbance in the dust that covered the floor. Karla was just opening doors and calling out for him, then she opened a door that led to a basement. “Damon,” she informed him, “There’s a basement here, I’m gonna check it out.” He just nodded his head and kept on looking for clues. She flipped on the light switch a headed down the stairs.
Karla knew she had to find Darren but she couldn’t help but think that this would be the perfect place to make a video. The basement was covered in cobwebs and had very poor lighting which is exactly what she likes. There was a lot of old chairs and furniture piled up in a corner with sheets covering them, and then she saw small pile of wallets and purses. “What the hell are those doing here?” she asked herself while walking towards them. She bent down to pick up one of the wallets and looked inside it. She was confused to find that it still had a driver’s license, credit cards and even cash. She quickly dropped it when she heard movement coming from the other side of the basement. “Darren? Is that you?” she called out. It was darker on that side but she could still make out a figure leaning against the wall. She was walking cautiously until she made out a tattoo on the figure’s arm, she had found Darren. Karla cried out, “Darren! Guys, I found him,” then she ran over and threw her arms around him. “Darren are you ok, we were so worried. What happened? What happened to your eyes?” Still leaning against the wall not returning the hug he very calmly said, “I’m fine, I can see everything better now.” She thought for a moment then slapped his arm and playfully shouted, “You son of bitch, so that was all a fucking joke? I should have known, you asshole. You need to let Matt know what’s going on because he’s freaking the hell out, we all were. I can’t believe you!” She grabbed his hand and tried to lead him to the stairs but he tugged his arm back. Puzzled she asked, “What is it, what’s wrong?” He said, “You know Karla, you look very beautiful.” She was flattered and started blushing when she said, “Oh is that right. Well I kinda like you too.” He then stepped into the light and whispered into her ear, “I’m talking about what’s inside of you, just beneath your skin.” At that point she became very confused and didn’t know if that was a complement or if he was just being morbid. When she pulled back to ask him what he meant, she was horrified to see that his eyes were indeed gone and only empty sockets remained. She let out a fearful scream that he cut short by knocking her out with one swift punch to the temple.
When Karla awoke, she tried to move but found that she had been tied to a table and gagged. Darren took notice that she was awake and began to speak, “Finally you’re awake, this wouldn’t be much fun you weren’t.” He reached down into his boot and pulled out his pocket knife. She began trembling uncontrollably as he slowly opened the knife and spoke so gently, “You know I meant what I said when I told you how beautiful you are beneath your skin. I just want the rest of the world to see what I see…. Oh, my eyes, you want to know about my eyes,” he cracked a smile and continued, “Well, let’s just say whatever is inside of me doesn’t need those to see. Regular eyes just don’t cut it. There is so much beauty in the world that our eyes, human eyes, just can’t see. So I took them out and now, I can see everything.” When he placed the knife on her skin, she shook even harder in fear as tears began to roll off her face. “What’s the matter? Don’t you want to look beautiful for me? Ah, you want to know what happened to me, how I got like this. Well I’m not too sure, from what’s inside my head, I know these ‘watchers’ as they like to call themselves, hmm I call them demons, when they take over our bodies, they completely take over, as in you’re dead and they rip out your eyes because they own your body now which brings me to the point. Somehow this demon merged with me instead of possessing me and killing me in the process, kinda like a glitch in a computer. Well hey, nobody is perfect, not even demons, and what’s left is a better me. Time to become beautiful, Karla.” With his knife, he began removing her skin, inch by inch, slice by slice.
When he was finished, the only skin left on her was what was around the gag. Karla was now a quivering mass of muscle, tendons and nerves. Darren reached down, removed her gag and whispered to her, “You look so beautiful now Karla,” then he gently kissed her where her lips once were and retreated back into the darkness.
Damon was getting anxious waiting for her to come back up so he went to the open door and shouted, “Hey Karla, you find anything? Hellooo? Karla?” He muttered out, “Son of bitch,” and went down to the basement to see what her problem was. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he like Karla, liked the eerie feeling he got down there. Once again he called out to her, “Hey Karla, I know this place looks awesome but we need to find Darren, so stop taking pictures alright. Karla?” While looking around he spotted the pile of wallets and purses a decided to check them out. Keeping an eye on the pile he wasn’t watching where he was going and slipped hitting his head on the ground. “Damn it! What in the fucking hell?” He turned in search of what caused his fall and found something slimy on the floor. He picked it up and noticed there was something drawn or written on the side that was less slimy so he wiped it off and moved it closer to a light to get a better look. His jaw dropped, the drawing was of a bat made of two K’s, for Karla Kills, this was the tattoo she had on the back of her neck. In shock, fear and disgust he threw the glob of skin to the floor.
He didn’t know what to think and just hoped that she and Darren were pulling some kind of prank on him. All that hope dissolved when his eyes took focus on a quivering, dark red mass with the shape of a body lying on top of a table. Once it clicked in his head that he was looking at a twitching, skinless Karla he lost control and began to vomit. Damon collected himself and rushed to her when he realized that she was still alive. “Holy shit, is that you Karla?” he asked with pure terror in his voice. When she first tried to talk only a breath came out. He wanted to comfort her but didn’t know how, he didn’t know if he should touch her or not so he spoke, “Oh my god Karla, I’m so sorry. What the fuck happened to you?” She tried to speak again, “D-D-De-on.” He smiled with a tear in his eye, “Yes Karla, it’s Demon, I’m here for you. Demon is here. Who the fuck did this?” She slightly shook her head and continued, “N-No, no. Da-Darren, de-on.” To make sure he understood, he asked her, “Darren Demon?” She nodded as best as she could then exhaled for the last time. “Karla? Karla?!” he said this time with his hand on her tissue. The tears on Damon’s face began to plummet to the ground as the adrenaline that was racing though his body making him quake. “I will fucking find who did this to you Karla. I fucking swear!” he said with pure determination in his voice.
As soon as he turned around, he bumped right into Darren. “I think she means Darren, is a demon,” he said as his bloody fist knocked Damon to the ground. Damon was in awe when he caught sight of the empty eye sockets on Darren’s face. As if he wasn’t already unnerved enough, he asked, “What the fuck did you do to Karla you piece of shit? What the fuck is wrong with you?” With smug look on his face he replied, “Oh her, I just brought out her inner beauty. The real question is, what do I do with you?”
Darren wrapped his had around Damon’s neck and lifted him off the ground. He turned his hand back and forth to get a better look at Damon’s face. “Now, Damon, I mean Demon, you want to be a demon right? Well let me help you on your way.” The knife inched toward one of Damon’s eyes piercing it through the skin on his cheek. He tried to scream but was in such shock that nothing came out. “The first thing is that real demons have no use for human eyes, so let me just get rid of those for you,” then Darren jerked back his arm ripping out Damon’s eye, skin and all. Darren dropped Damon to the floor as he attempted to cry and wail in fear. Darren knelt down next to him and said, “Come on man, you sound like a seal at a circus,” then turned his knife so the eye at the end was facing Damon, “I mean just look at you, you’re a sobbing mess.” He then grabbed the eye off his knife and shoved into Damon’s mouth saying, “Here, hold this I’m almost done,” then proceeded to remove the second eye.
Once his eye was free from his body, the other fell out of Damon’s mouth followed by vomit. Darren moved back and said, “Man come on, you got puke on my boots.” With his eyebrows raised he then said, “I’ve got an idea!” Darren once again lifted Damon in the air and said, “You know what, you can’t throw up, if you don’t have a stomach so let’s just take care of that little problem.” The knife entered Damon’s belly and began to saw back and forth. Luckily for Damon he was unaware that he had a weak heart and died from a heart attack before Darren had a chance to completely remove his stomach. “You selfish bastard, you didn’t let me finish.” he said as he dropped Damon’s lifeless body to the ground to hide back in the shadows.
Up on the third floor Jared and John were unaware of what had taken place in the basement and were still searching for an injured Darren. They had kicked open every door and searched every room on that floor, finding nothing. Certain that he was not there, they went to meet up with Matt back on the second floor. As they were walking down the stairs they heard a crash. Jared looked to John and asked, “What the fuck was that?” In response John said, “I don’t know, we fucked up the rooms pretty bad up there, something probably just fell. I’ll go check it out. You go see if Matt found anything yet.” Jared continued down the stairs as John went to investigate the noise.
The sound led him to one of the rooms by the stairs. He poked his head in and didn’t see anything at first but then he noticed the light flickering in the bathroom and went in for a closer look. He was astonished to find Darren’s body curled up on the floor. John ran over to him, “Darren, Darren are you ok man? What happened?” He was both amazed and frightened when Darren popped up and said, “Wow, I didn’t know I could move through shadows like that, takes a lot out of you though and the landing sucks.” After taking one look at the voids where Darren’s eyes should be, John started running to the door. Just before he reached it, the door slammed shut. He tried his hardest to open it but it just wasn’t going to budge. Darren approached him and said with excitement in his voice, “Did you see that, how I slammed the door from over here?” He pulled out his knife, looked at it and tossed it to the ground saying, “I wonder what else I can do.”
He grabbed John and dragged him, whimpering all the way back to the bathroom. “I have you in front of a mirror because I want you to see what I see, John.” In a defiant voice, John questioned, “How the fuck can you see anything? Let me go asshole!” All of his struggling to get out of Darren’s grip was for nothing. He looked into John’s eyes through the reflection and said, “You know John, my allergies, as you called it, don’t bother me anymore. You were right. I just had to get used to it. Now let me return the favor.” Darren clamped one hand around John’s mouth, holding him tight as he reach over and tried to rip off his nose. “Huh, well that didn’t work,” he said as the nose just slipped out of his hand, “I guess I’ll try it this way.” Darren released his grip on John’s mouth, wrapped his fingers under the teeth in his upper jaw and yanked. A loud CRACK echoed in the bathroom. In Darren’s hand was the front of John’s skull, nose and all. “Ha!” he shouted, “There we go. Now look at yourself. You look so much better now.” The blood began to run down John’s throat, choking him. As his body began to drop, Darren lifted him back up, “No no, no no no, John, don’t pass out on me. I want you watch yourself drowning in your own glory. Hey! That’s our band’s name, Drowning Glory! And you get to live it John.” His eyes shuttered and rolled up into his head, he was gone. Darren let go of him and said, “Or not.” The light flickered again and Darren disappeared.
Back on the second floor, Jared found Matt. “Hey Matt, You find anything?” He replied, “No man, nothing. You guys find anything?” Jared shook his head and said, “No, but we heard a noise so John went back to check it out. Maybe Damon and Karla found something.” Matt nodded, “Yeah, maybe. Let’s go find them, I just hope Darren’s alright.” They made their way to the first floor and began calling out for Darren, Damon and Karla.
Matt wanted to continue his search for his brother while Jared looked for Karla and Damon. He started with where they first entered the inn and worked his way to the front desk. Jared followed the footprints in the dust that led to the basement while Matt became intrigued by the ledger that Darren signed. As he was looking for a date from the last signature, Jared yelled out, “Hey, I think they went to the basement. I’m gonna go see if they’re down there.” “Alright man, just be careful and holler if you find something.” Matt continued looking at the guest book and found a date hidden under the dust, it was from six months ago.
As Jared descended the stairs, he had the same thoughts as the others but kept his focus on his search. He called out, “Darren? Hey Damon, you down here? Ka…” Before he could finish saying Karla’s name, Darren squeezed Jared’s throat silencing him then putting his finger to his lips saying, “Shhhh! can’t you see that Damon and Karla are sleeping.” As soon as he saw what had been done to them, Jared immediately began clawing at Damon’s arm trying to get free. Darren pulled him close and whispered, “I’m getting stronger. Here, I can do anything.” Jared continued to struggle for freedom and air while Darren lifted up his hand near his face and said, “Check this out. You see my nails, yeah I know they look a bit thicker but they’re razor sharp. Let’s give them a try shall we.” He plunged his hand into Jared’s side and took hold of his ribs. With what sounded like a tree branch slowly breaking, he tugged at his ribs and pulled out bone. The wet crater left behind opened up spilling Jared’s intestines on to the floor. Darren released his grip from Jared’s throat, leaving him alone to suffer to death and headed up the stairs.
Matt didn’t know what to think about the dates he saw. He wondered how long this town had been abandoned because the last date was from six months ago and before that was another three months. There were a few signatures without dates in between so there really was no way to tell. Then he heard Darren’s voice come from behind him and say, “Three months. Three months ago was the last time this place had a living soul in it, a side from drifters and people like us. They’ve moved on already but there was one straggler left behind.” Matt chewed back his fear after seeing a demonic looking Darren because in his mind, that was still his brother. He questioned, “What are you talking about? What happened to you? Where is the rest of the band?” Darren laughed and began walking around Matt, circling him before speaking, “I made the others see what I see before they died. So don’t worry about them. And this place, it was taken over by watchers, demons from the Void. They sucked this town dry of life then, they just left, vanished to who knows where. I don’t know, maybe to another town like this one. But one was somehow left behind and he became a part of me. I don’t just feel like a demon, I feel like a god.” Trying not to cower down, Matt tried to reason with him, to bring out the real Darren, “I know you. I know you’re in there Darren. You’re not a god, you’re not a demon, you’re my brother.” Again he laughed, “You don’t get it do you. Once you burn a piece of paper, it’s not paper anymore and it never will be again. And in this town, I am a god. So how about it brother, give me your faith.” In a final act of resistance Matt yelled out, “FUCK YOU!” The last thing Matt ever saw was his brother raising his hand and lunge at him to scoop out his eyes. “Let this be my final act as your brother. I will leave you here to rot as blind as I was. Maybe one of the watchers will return and end your suffering.” Darren then disappeared into the shadows in wait for the next person to stumble upon the town of Staff.