In the Pit

By Erik Lynd

Samuel is a prisoner, innocent to some, guilty to others. But his prison is different than any other. Here the dead have a habit of coming back to life, madness is just around the corner, and the only real escape is into hell itself.

 

From the author of Asylum and The Collection, Erik Lynd, comes this supernatural horror story. This story, along with others, is collected in The Long Fall Into Midnight Vol. 1

• Language: English
• Publisher: Broken Gods Press
• Release date: Jan 27, 2021
• ISBN: 9781386956594

Book preview

1

Simple sounds are louder in prison. The hallways are large and, at night, silent. The sound of a single drop of water originating from a sink or toilet is amplified as though through a huge acoustic chamber. As it echoes through the hall the volume builds on the loneliness of the incarcerated and the sad desperation that is at its most tangible at night. The sound of the drop reverberates through a heavy, melancholy silence that if not for the occasional sound of a snore would completely crush the little bit of life and sanity out of the residents

It was this sound echoing through the halls and through his dreams that woke Samuel that night. He woke slowly, reluctant to leave his wife. In his dreams Lucy was still his wife. In his dreams she had not shown up one day in the visitor’s room with papers to sign. Papers that said she was not his anymore; that he should not try to come to her after he got out; that he should just forget the last six years of his life with her. In his dreams she had not said that she was with somebody else; that she was in love with his old pal Jack. She had not looked at him, tears running down her face, as she said it was over; that she did not know him anymore. Best of all in his dreams she was not afraid of him. She did not look at him with those sad, fearful eyes. In his dreams Samuel did not feel sick at seeing that; he did not go back to his cell and cry for hours.

Samuel opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling in frustration as he tried to recapture his lost dream.

Hey Sammy.

The voice was clear and spoken at a normal volume, but in the silent cellblock it sounded deafening. The voice came from the cell above his. It was his upper neighbor Joey.

Hey Sammy, you awake?

Samuel ignored him. He was too loud. The guards in the hall would hear and come running any minute. Joey would be put in solitary. In the three years Samuel had been here he had learned to avoid the guards and solitary.

Hey Sammy I know you’re awake. I can smell it, heh heh...

His voice was different. It was Joey all right, but the voice sounded manic. He could hear the urgency in it, as though he was on the verge of panic or maybe euphoric joy.

Fuck Sammy, answer me! Don’t make me come down there, heh heh…

His voice was