Join My Cult - Original Falcon Press

do. As an Agent, as an executive, I can hide behind the mask, become the
part. Idealizing again. Does this cycle repeat
Forever
?
The cream Nissan smoothly edged into a parking spot alongside a tall
metal fence. The sounds of industrial music could be heard from a
nearby nightclub. Agent 139 got out of the car and motioned to Johny,
who tentatively nodded and followed his lead. Even this deep in the city,
the crisp smell of autumn, the cloying scent of rotting leaves and
something else, something indeterminable, was in the steely air. The
Bank was a hunched, sprawling structure, a crooked form backlit in the
style of a 1930’s horror movie, replete with stone teeth and steel bars for
eyes. The Nosferatu aesthetic was alive and well here.
Jesus looked at Agent 139 incredulously. “The club over there?”
The Agent slipped on his sunglasses. “It’s called the Bank. If we’re
going to find any of the members of this elusive little organization, well.
This’d be the place to start, I’d say.”
“Mother Hive Brain?” Johny asked.
“No. Order of the Hidden Path.”
“Oh,” Johny said, now twice as confused as before.
The tall, vaulted ceilings in the room gave the impression of a cathedral.
The walls were aged stone, streaked by thin white lines—apparently
water damage, adorned with ancient, tattered paintings. A thick, cast-iron
chandelier hung from the ceiling on a chain, casting a ring of shadowy
light from the tiers of white candles affixed to its edges. There were sofas
along each wall, most of them inhabited by gaunt, skeletal people
dressed in black. Everything in the room felt slightly damp, more like a
crypt than a cathedral.
“Really? I’m only on Paxil and Zoloft. Yeah—they said it was manic
depression. Well, whatever, I’ve always known I was fucked up.” The
girl who was speaking was wearing a tight fitting purple velvet dress.
Her skin seemed as white and thin as egg shells.
Another fragmentary conversation caught the Agent’s attention from
across the room. “Before they put me in, I cut myself with a razor, see?
…I know, I did it the wrong way. I was young, right? So…”
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