Two Heads.

14-Patchwork Monsters.

Newly aquired gun in one hand and phone blaring out a harsh white glow from the other, Edmund began to make his way down the dark, cobblestone passage. He could hear the footsteps of his mysterious companion padding along behind, and he wasn't sure whether they comforted him or terrified him more.

They came to a junction, and stopped. Other than the light from Edmund's phone, it was pitch black all around.

"Damn" Edmund muttered, unsure of which way to go now.

"Light off" his companion ordered, reaching for the phone in Edmund's hand. Edmund clicked it off, quickly sticking it in his pocket.

"Now wait for your eyes to adjust" came the next order, as the darkness enveloped everything in Edmund's already limited world.

"Right" Edmund muttered, as he strained in vain to see.

"I reckon, right" came the suggestion Edmund knew had been on its way.

"Why right?" he asked warily.

"Because, if your eyes've adjusted properly, you'll be able to see that it's slightly lighter to the right" came the now slightly irritable reply. "Youths of today-all those screens. Destroying your eyesight..."

"Alright" Edmund snapped, a little harshly, possibly due to how nervous he was now he couldn't see. "Right it is."

"Don't fall over, now" the man continued. "Young people. Think you know it all...Keep that light off!"

"To be honest, sir, I'm totally out of my depth" Edmund admitted, reproachfully sticking the light back in his pocket as they set slowly off again, right.

"No need to be honest" his companion's gruff voice echoed from the darkness ahead. "I understand."

Edmund stifled his rush of annoyance and focused on the task in hand.

Now their eyes had adjusted to the darkness, they could see a little light from the way they had come-and possibly another light up ahead, a slightly ultraviolet purple, to their left this time.

They followed it, their feet soft on the cobbled floor, but then a foul stench stole its way up their nostrils, pungent and harsh. The air was thick with it, making Edmund gag repeatedly, as he stuffed his cuff of his suit jacket over his nose in a desperate attempt to clear it of the bitter air.

"Wha..?" he spluttered, noticing his companion seemed less affected by this latest development.

"Rotting flesh" came the gruff interjection.

Edmund was nearly sick on the spot, but as they turned another corner he tripped over something in the darkness which sent him sprawling, his pistol skittering across the floor. The ultraviolet glow around them showed his fall to be due to a rickety mass of white sticks, or at least Edmund thought they were sticks.

For about half a second.

"Holy shit!" he gasped, before gagging once again as his horror at the pile of bones in front of him forced him to breathe the potent fumes hanging in the air.

"Get yourself up, Mr. Policeman" his companion ordered, now, Edmund could see in the dimness, with a scarf over his nose and mouth. "We've got to hurry."

As Edmund scrabbled to his feet, feeling something horribly squishy slide through his fingers as he did, another high pitched, terrified scream racked the cavern.

The gun was gone. Edmund had lost it. He and the old man both set off at a run, the latter taking the lead as the former nearly took a wrong turn.

The stench was worsening horrifically as they charged down the tunnels, and sick, twisted shapes of skeletal figures hung, lay crumpled and were scattered along their path, strung with scattered scraps of material, ripped lines gauged out of the sides, and crusted with dried blood. Rotting, and glowing in the ultraviolet.