Through The Black Door - Chapter Nine
Freezing
Just found this story? It starts here. Chapter One
“I’m freezing... E.. Everyone has disappeared.”
The posters on the walls are blank white squares, their messages erased. The bright fluorescent lights have dimmed.
“I can’t see... gloomy. What... I... happened?”
I push myself up from the chair. My limbs are heavy, as though the air has thickened to the consistency of honey. Moisture freezes inside my nose with every inhale. My eyelashes crinkle, sticking together with frost. When I try to make a fist, my skin feels tight and brittle, like parchment about to snap. The air doesn’t just bite; it burns.
“I am SOOO cold.”
I try stamping my feet and rubbing my arms. The sound scuffles in the dead silence, but the friction doesn’t generate warmth. It’s like my body has forgotten how to produce heat, or this place has forgotten how to accept it.
Then I hear a drawn-out, echoing noise, like a huge reptile growling and dragging itself across tiles, or perhaps... like a crocodile. It seems to come from the shadowed area near the far wall where the freezer cabinets stand in dim silhouette. The sound ripples through the air, visceral and primal.
“What the fuck...”
The guttural creature sound continues. It triggers an instinctual fear response, a recognition older than language.
“I don’t know what that was but I’m not hanging around,” I whisper into the mic. My breath puffs in small, crystalline clouds. “Seemed to come from the shadows by the wall.”
My footsteps are heavy as I creep away from the café area towards the supermarket aisles. My shivering is relentless, bone-deep. The cold is seeping into my core, freezing me from the inside out.
“I’m heading for the main aisles now. It’s too creepy.”
My footsteps echo, accompanied by the distant, unsettling creature sounds of immense weight being pulled across the floor. The supermarket architecture is identical, but the soul of the place has been hollowed out, leaving only a monochromatic shell.
I stumble past row upon row of vacant shelving under the dim, grey light. The entire store is abandoned, as if for decades, yet there’s no dust or decay, just emptiness.
The cold deepens, biting harder.
“I’ve never felt so cold.”
My movements are sluggish. I’m wading through invisible ice water. The tips of my fingers are numb, and I can’t feel my feet. Only pain remains, a deep, aching cold.
“This place is dead. The supermarket. T t t terrifying.”
The creature sound echoes again, closer this time. A heavy drag-thump, drag-thump, followed by a wet, rattling exhalation.
It’s getting closer.
“Hello... hello... who’s there?”
The voice, young and male, startles me and I almost cry out. I freeze, still shaking, my heart pounding. For a moment, I wonder if I’ve hallucinated the sound. Is this evidence of hypothermia setting in?
“Should I hide?” I whisper into the mic, paranoia rising. “I... I don’t trust... this place.”
“Hello...” the voice calls again, closer now, more distinct.
He doesn’t sound threatening, just normal. Almost cheerful. I force myself to turn, fighting against muscles that want to lock in place. A figure stands at the end of the aisle, obscured by the gloom. As my eyes adjust, details emerge.
“I can see him. Looks in his 20s. Flared jeans, tie dye t-shirt, sandals, long blonde hair...”
He’s stepped straight out of 1975, a walking anachronism in this timeless void. His outfit is vibrant, the only colour in this grey wasteland. He stands with hands tucked into his pockets, observing me with mild curiosity.
“Hello,” I call out. My voice cracks from the cold and fear.
“Sooo cool,” the young man says, approaching. He seems unaffected by the cold or the gloom as he moves, swinging his arms loosely.
When he gets closer, my shuddering increases so much, I can barely keep the mic in front of my mouth. It’s pointless recording. All the listener will hear is my shivering. I try to put the mic in my pocket but can’t keep my hand still for long enough. I keep missing.
“Soooo cool, man,” he repeats, stopping a few feet away, looking me up and down with detached curiosity, as though I’m an exhibit in a museum.
“How did you get here?” I stammer through chattering teeth.
“Ha, that’s brilliant!” he chuckles, as though I’ve told a clever joke.
“What!... why are you here?” His comfort in this frozen hell makes no sense.
“Oh, man. This is hilarious,” he says, grinning with perfect white teeth.
“It’s dangerous here.” I glance back down the aisle towards where I last heard the creature sounds. “I need to get... out... and... I suggest you do, too. Something is in the shadows.”
“Such a cool dream!” he exclaims, spreading his arms and looking around.
“Bloody hell! This isn’t a dream!” Frustration and terror war within me. “I’m real... and there’s something in the fucking shadows. HOW... DID... YOU... GET... HERE?”
“Chill out!” he laughs, holding up his hands in a placating gesture. “Hysterical, I’m arguing with myself... absolutely hysterical. Look...” He waves around the empty, gloomy store with a theatrical sweep of his arm. “This is my lucid dream. You’re just another thought, mate. Why do you think you’re here?”
I pause, trying to process this while stamping my feet. “So cold. Why aren’t you cold?”
“It’s obviously not important for me to be cold,” he replies, as though explaining something to a not-very-bright child. “Why do YOU think you are here?”
“I don’t know why,” I admit. “I was interviewing someone and things got strange... and then I’m here.”
“I need all the details,” he demands, with focused intensity. “Who were you interviewing? How did things get strange?”
I take a deep, shuddering breath, the icy air burning my lungs like inhaled glass. “I... was interviewing Leonard Sopwith about... his obsession.”
“The Fine Structure Constant?” the young man asks. His eyes lighting up with recognition.
“Yes... how could you know that?”
He grins again, triumphant, almost smug. “I’m Leonard Sopwith and that’s why I’m here in this dream. My thought experiment is, loosely, about the Fine Structure Constant. So it makes perfect sense.”
My mind reels. This young man is Leonard Sopwith? The same frail, elderly man I was just sitting with in the café? The same man who struck those bells and sent me... here?
“But Lenny, the real Lenny, is in his 70s.”
“Mmm...” Young Leonard taps his chin. “I think I understand. Older me represents future knowledge. I’ve no idea what you represent though.”
“I’m real. This is not a dream.” The cold is making it difficult to think.
“Really?” Young Leonard challenges, raising an eyebrow. “So how come you’re freezing cold and I’m fine? That’s pure dream logic.”
“I don’t know,” I whisper.
He makes a perverse kind of sense. Why would only one of us be affected by the temperature?
“So... what happened?” he presses. “Tell what he said... what he did.”
I fear my spine might snap from the violent tremors.
“It was hard to follow... disconnected phrases. He said Pauli was the alpha male... He said 137 is a pythagorean prime... he called it a Kaballah master number and he seemed to be questioning that it was actually a constant. Said... serendipity.”
“I... see,” Young Leonard murmurs, frowning as he processes.
“And... Espresso,” I add.
“Coffee?” he asks, his brow furrowing.
“Well, that’s what I thought but I think it was an acronym. He reeled off a long name that sounded like a research centre. He said they will find out.”
“Anything else?” Young Leonard’s full attention is on me now.
“Then he pulled out two bells from his bag. He struck one and said ‘The Earth’ and then he struck the other and said—”
“The Universe,” Young Leonard finishes for me, his eyes widening.
“Yes!”
“I know why you’re freezing,” he announces, looking pleased with himself, like a student who’s just solved a difficult equation.
“Why?”
“My subconscious has figured out that the Alpha, that’s the symbol for the Fine Structure Constant, is variable and that it can be studied in very low temperatures. Ha ha, that’s fantastic.”
“No... NO... I’m real!” I insist, desperate to make him understand. “When he struck those bells, everything vibrated and I ended up here.”
“You’re not real,” Young Leonard chuckles. “And, you know, something like that can’t happen in the real world, heh. Never mind. I’ll wake up soon.”
“No, I’m real,” I plead, frustration mounting. “Maybe the older you found something out... something you can use to get us out of here.”
The creature sound echoes again, closer this time. Drag-thump, drag-thump. The sound reverberates through the empty aisles. I can feel it in my chest. It must be close.
“Shit... it’s here,” I gasp, and fear overrides the cold for a moment.
“Hmmm... I wonder what that represents?” Young Leonard muses, looking towards the sound with academic interest. “A manifestation of research anxiety, perhaps? Or the fear of academic failure?”
“I’m too cold to run! I can barely move.” My limbs feel like lead weights attached to my torso.
“Well,” Young Leonard gestures towards the cabinets lining the wall. “You could always hide in there.”
“The freezer cabinet?” The thought is horrifying. The idea of entering an even colder space seems like madness.
“Appropriate, really,” he comments. “Or you could just let it catch you... if that’s part of the thought experiment, I suppose. I wonder...”
My survival instinct, however frozen, takes over. While Young Leonard ponders the metaphysical implications, I lurch towards the nearest freezer cabinet. I can hear heavy stomps now, accompanied by that awful rattling sound that reminds me of death. I slide the lid and climb over and into the cabinet, then slide the lid closed except for a small gap.
“I’m hiding,” I hiss through the crack, from the confined, icy darkness. “I’m telling you... this is all real. You should run.”
“No, no, no...” I hear Young Leonard say from outside, his voice muffled. “This is far too much fun. Who needs Stephen Spielberg... ha ha.”
Each breath is a struggle with lungs that want to seize. Outside, I hear the loud stomps arrive, followed by the creature’s rattling growl.
“Wow, man, so cool,” Young Leonard’s voice sounds awed. “I’ve outdone myself... Whoo, what a beauty you are! Mind you, I can’t figure out what you represent... danger... of experimenting with alpha?”
I hear a deep, guttural rattle, then a terrifying, loud roar, followed by wet, crunching, chomping sounds. Young Leonard’s scream is abruptly cut-off.
Then it’s silent, apart from my own frantic breaths in the freezing dark.
My consciousness slides into darkness, first, at the edges of my vision, and then into pitch black. The cold becomes almost comforting as numbness spreads through me. Some distant part of my brain recognises this as dangerous but I don’t care anymore.
I curl into a ball among what feels like plastic-wrapped packages, and wait for whatever comes next.
Then, muffled shouting from outside wakes me. The sounds pierce the cocoon of protective numbness I’ve wrapped myself in. Light floods in as the freezer lid is slid open. A woman screams.
“A hand... a hand!”
“What the hell!” a male voice shouts amid the rustling of bags and boxes. “Wait a minute. There’s a man under the frozen fish! What the...”
“That’s it, I’m done with Sainsbury’s,” a customer declares, abandoning her shopping cart with a clatter.
“It’s a tramp,” another voice sneers from somewhere above me.
“A tramp... kick him out.”
More voices erupt, talking over each other. I try to move, to explain, but my limbs won’t cooperate. My jaw is locked with cold. My muscles refuse to respond to basic commands.
“Is he dead?” the worker asks, jabbing me hard with what feels like the end of a broom handle.
I let out an involuntary groan. “Errrr!”
“Shit. He’s alive,” the worker announces. Then there’s more rustling as packets are pushed aside. “What the fuck are you doing in here?” he demands, leaning over me, his face red with a mixture of shock and anger.
“Gg rr shhh,” I manage with a tongue thick and unresponsive.
“What’s your name?”
“M M M…ark H H H Holwood,” I slur. “Eshxaminner of F F F Fortean eventsh.”
“You’ll have fourteen fish fingers up your arse if you don’t get out of there!” the worker threatens, mistaking my state for drunkenness or drug use. He grabs my collar.
“C C Can’t M m m move,” I chatter. “F F F frozzzenn.”
“What’s going on... oh Jesus.” It’s a new voice, calmer, more authoritative, the Manager, based on his name badge and better suit. “Pull him out.”
More voices grumble, loud and upset. Rough hands grab me under the arms. The shock of comparative warmth outside the cabinet is painful, like being burned with fire after the ice. Bags of frozen fish and peas cascade onto the floor around me as I’m hauled out, collapsing in a heap at the feet of horrified Sainsbury’s staff and customers.
Rough hands heave me away from the frozen mess. dragging my uncooperative body across the floor.
“How did you get in there?” the manager demands, crouching beside me. His face is a mask of professional concern and confusion.
“C c c can’t exshplain,” I shiver, fragments of memory flashing through my mind, the bells, the instant transportation to that grey limbo. How to explain the inexplicable?
“What were you thinking? Why?”
“H h h hiding. M m m monster.”
The manager sighs, exchanging a knowing look with another employee. “I’m calling an ambulance. He could have hypothermia.” He stands up, addressing the worker. “We need the police but I think he’s got mental health issues! Jason, clear all this food out. It’s done. Close off this aisle.”
The world tilts as paramedics arrive, their green uniforms blurring in my vision. They wrap me in foil blankets that crinkle with every movement. Professional hands check my vitals. Voices discuss temperature readings and possible frostbite.
The last thing I see before the blackness creeps back in is the Sainsbury’s logo above the aisle, its orange glow following me into unconsciousness.
The intro stinger plays, upbeat against my current mood. I sit in my studio chair, warm now after a day of recovery, but feeling bruised inside and out. The familiar environment of my small recording space offers no comfort today. Instead, it feels like a confessional booth, a place to make sense of sins and transgressions against reality.
“Needless to say,” I begin, voice flat, devoid of performance energy, “this didn’t end very well. I’m now banned from Sainsbury’s across the UK.”
A humourless chuckle escapes me. My ‘celebrity’ status has finally arrived but not as a respected paranormal investigator, as the madman who terrorised frozen food shoppers.
“Luckily, although I had the beginnings of hypothermia, I’ve recovered quickly and I’m fine, now.”
Physically fine, anyway. Mentally? That’s debatable.
“I don’t really understand what happened. I’ve called Gill but she has blocked my number.”
Which is understandable, perhaps. Finding your charge’s interviewer later being dragged from a freezer cabinet, raving about monsters, would strain anyone’s professional boundaries.
“To be honest, I just wanted to make sure they were ok.”
Is that true? Or do I just want confirmation that Leonard, old Leonard, hadn’t been chomped by a subconscious nightmare creature? That Gill hadn’t been dragged into that grey void after I disappeared?
“I have no intention of meeting up with Lenny again, just in case...”
I pause for deliberation. I have a question, one I can barely ask, even of myself. “Did I just travel in time?”
Or sideways? Or into someone else’s breakdown? Did I glimpse Leonard as he once was, before whatever breakdown changed him forever?
The outro tune starts playing, a melancholy counterpoint to my confusion. I let it play longer than usual, finding comfort in its familiar notes while I try to centre myself in a world made of shifting sand.
The jarring ring of my phone cuts through my post-recording trance. Eli. Again. I pick it up, resigned to whatever new complication this brings.
“Eli.”
“Don’t give me any of your processing hallucinations shit again,” Eli snaps. His voice is tight with irritation. “What the fuck happened? Gill has just told me to piss off.”
I pause. How to answer? The truth is insane. But lying feels pointless, especially to someone like Eli who seems to collect other people’s secrets like trading cards.
“I entered another dimension and woke up in a Sainsbury’s frozen fish freezer cabinet,” I say, too exhausted for subterfuge.
I can almost hear Eli’s calculations, his weighing of my words against whatever agenda he’s pursuing.
“So... another hallucination?” His voice is soft with danger.
“How do I know?” I counter. Weariness floods me. “Maybe I am going mad. Maybe it’s all real. Maybe the distinction doesn’t even matter anymore.”
“What does your gut say?”
“Look. If I AM mad... then my gut won’t help,” I state the bleak reality. “My gut is part of the system that’s failing.”
He sighs.
“What aren’t you telling me?” I demand, needing to push back against this one-way flow of information. “Where are you getting these leads?”
“I told you. Leverage,” he replies. The word is meaningless yet somehow threatening.
“I’m either going crazy or you know more than you’re saying.” My frustration boils over.
“Could be both...” Eli replies.
“What?” I ask, bewildered by this unexpected admission.
“Nothing. Forget it,” He says, changing tack. “I have a sick sense of humour. I’ve got you an invite to a magic ritual.”
The words are absurd, unreal. Yet, after the freezer cabinet, young Leonard and the creature in the shadows, what is unreal anymore? The boundaries have dissolved.
“For real...” I breathe, despite myself.
“Yes. It would seem so,” Eli confirms. “Interested?”
Am I interested? After everything? Am I suicidal? Maybe. But am I curious? Always. The pull of the unknown overrides my instinct for self-preservation. It always has. It’s my fatal flaw. Hell, it’s my defining characteristic.
“What do you think?” I reply.
“Ok. Send me the audio files for your podcasts,” Eli commands, reminding me of the price. “I won’t ask again. I’ll be in touch about the ritual.”
He hangs up, leaving me in the silence of my studio.
I’m banned from Sainsbury’s, possibly losing my mind, and apparently, invited to a magic ritual.
Just another Friday for Mark Holwood, examiner of local folklore and Fortean events, chaser of shadows, finder of doors better left closed.
I place the phone down and stare at my recorder. The red light still blinks, capturind my breathing. Whatever comes next, I’m walking into it with eyes wide open.
Or at least, I’m telling myself that’s true.