Hell
I warn you ahead of time, this is probably pretty disturbing. At least I tried to make it disturbing. It's fairly graphic and intense, so don't read it if you're squeamish. I saw some very stirring art earlier today, and was inspired to write something chilling and haunting. Please let me know how this turned out, because I've never really tried my hand at writing this kind of thing before. Enjoy.
Air pulsed around the damp stone walls like cool, fetid breath. Its clammy chill oozed into every available orifice, the ground reaching up between knobbly toes with in an algific green smear. The wet filth clung in the cracks of jagged toenails, collecting underneath the white surface in dark globs. There was no light by which to see, only the slap of feet echoing from wall to wall guiding the boy along. Breath came in ragged sobs, plucking up little droplets of foul water with every breath, spitting out thick rivulets of saliva that crept down a pale, angular chin before falling towards the ground like a spider dangling on its thin white web. Yellow eyes flicked back and forth in their sunken sockets, pupils dilated painfully large, begging out for any stimulation.
Each step was a chore, ripping sore feet out of the chilling filth only to plunge them back into the ground. Long, slender fingers massaged the walls, rubbed bare of skin on the rough hewn stone blocks clustered on either side of the boy. A fingernail would catch every now and then, jam between the blocks with a sickening crunch before snapping loose again. The boy doubled over, letting out a hellish cough that shook loose what felt like a thousand pounds of dirt and decay from his lungs. Unable to close the chapped lips, the mucous spewed forth like vomit, splattering against the wall with an angry slap. The boy moaned in pain once the coughing subsided, voice hoarse and gravely. Another moan, this one louder, bounced off the walls. It was not the moan of a human, it was something worse. He did it again and again, half crying half screaming. His chest burned with hunger, an ache that intensified in great waves, a gnawing sensation that something inside him was eating away at his organs with ravenous fervor. The cries stopped, replaced only with the same ragged breathing as before. The boy fell to his knees with the clatter of bones, his skin clinging to the bones loosely, the filth on the skin thicker than the muscle beneath. His face met the green muck, and he shoveled a deep handful down his throat, followed by another.
The thick slop clung to the walls of his esophagus, the stagnant water oozing past languidly, leaving only the thick dirt. He sucked in one rattling breath before he tried to swallow. At first his chest merely convulsed, malnourished ribs cracking as he tried to cough out the heavy rotted material inside his throat. Again he convulsed, a hoarse moan emitted from his nose as he tried to cough again. As the throat spasmed to try and jam the dirt down into his stomach, his body floundered around in the much. His senses were beginning to cloud, and he reached into his mouth with his slender hand, jamming his extended finger as far down his throat as he could manage. Another convulsion, but this time he managed to free the gelatinous mass from his throat. It raced up his scored esophagus, flinging itself out his nose and through his mouth with a splatter. He coughed again, spittle and mud dripping from his face as he fought to slither to his hands and knees.
He sat there for what must have been an hour, dripping onto the ground and breathing. He cried out, his moan echoing through the dungeon. He was about to do it again when something even colder than the air touched the back of his head. He screamed at the contact, writhing as it closed around the back of his skull, tightening with a series of cracks. He was screaming, and screaming, and screaming, eyes rolling to the back of his head as the thing punched through the thin skin of his head. The pressure was overwhelming, and he stopped fighting as the grip continued to tighten. The world swam around him, his face being pushed into the much on the floor. The thing on the back of his head tightened and tightened and pushed and pushed, until it all finally stopped. He felt his skull split open, his brains balooning out inside his skin until they popped free and his world went dark and quiet.