Chokehold

Tiny bits of pavement kicked up into a grey hail behind me, and everything became a blur of green, white, and blue haze around me. Just as I turned the corner, facing again the overwhelming visage of rows on rows of identical hallways stacked against each other, and the maples swaying heavily against the concrete intrusions, my eyes traced a black dot moving hastily across one of the upper levels. 
Ah, it's Sorrow.
That's what I thought, and up until I clattered through the gates, nearly tripping over myself against the elevates stone pathway, it was what I saw.
But now, approaching the entrance, still dark and damp, protected from the sunlight by the flora and walls, a sickly, congealed trail of deep scarlet traced the doorway, leading through the opening, all the way to a figure slumped against the row of metallic mailboxes, heaving under the weight of the substance.
"Sorrow?!" I grimaced, clenching my teeth and feeling my nose contort in disgust.
"What's with... ugly look... on your face... haha..." came in barely audible gasps, like he was whispering to a friend during a marathon, too out of breath to raise his voice any higher.
His prominent, straight features were muddled with sweat and tremors of pain, his nerves and muscles tensing and clenching at uncontrollable intervals, giving the impression of an old man at the end of his life. 
I looked away.
I didn't want to see him like this.
For somebody always so irritatingly prepared...
Whatever, in that case, it wasn't him, but that monster prowling the upper layers. 
I know what I have to do.
With one last look of understanding, I left him to wheeze against the cold metal, and continued following the heavy liquid up the stairwell, like a hunter in the wild.
While placing one tense foot above the other, I flipped open the phone, a clack rebounding against the pipeline stairway, all the way up out into the halls, and dialed support services. Thankfully, it's enough to call the number and whisper a location, not much time wasted, and not much exposure given. I shoved the phone back in my inside jacket pocket, slamming it shut beneath the fabric to muffle the sound. 
I expect that monster had crawled up a couple extra levels, so I gauged my exit as close to the last level, but it's possible that it decided to wander back down instead.
Either way, I would run into it sooner than later.
No matter how far I went up, that disgusting trail kept its pace and shape, steady and strong, like paint on a highway, perfect and perpetual.
To lose that much blood, it's a wonder Sorrow was still lucid.
As wave after wave of concentrated beams of light, the only ones peering in to the damp stairwell, finding a gap in the open hallways and entrances to penetrate even such a miniscule amount, I felt like I was having the emotions washed from my body.
Calm.
It's not use freaking out over Sorrow.
We can deal with whatever comes next, as long as we have a next to deal with.
I'm sure he would think the same, probably with greater ease than me.
I'm not as cold hearted as he is.
I hate him, but I'm not an adult, I'm not going to throw him to the wolves just to rank up a little higher with the sheep.
Just as I was thinking something so dramatic, I almost slipped backwards over myself on an especially large pool of liquid, concentrated in a groove indented into the landing.
Haha... I should stop taking things so seriously.
It's not good for my health.
I'll end up like one of those overworked intelligence officers, always looking ready to drop dead when we arrive from a mission. Somehow, they look more battered and distraught than we do.
Even the time Schene dragged himself in, arm torn from his shoulder, he had more life in his eyes than those people. If anything is dramatic, it was that.
Seriously, who waltzes in from a mission, not even calling for any medical support, with a big grin on their face, almost insane from the pain and anemia, then cracks a joke about stress being able to kill you? 
He even told her to lighten up a little, that he would take her out for a drink, etc.
...maybe he just can't help but hit on women. 
That's pretty funny, but if that kind of character flaw can give him the ability to grit his teeth and remain lucid after an appendage was twisted from its root, then maybe I should find some kind of quirk like that.
Who knows, maybe an obsession with mayonnaise will save me from cracking my head open at the bottom of the staircase after slipping on this long trail of Sorrow's blood; reuniting with Sorrow at the bottom, I could even crack a joke about this not being any worse than the time I had bought the wrong brand of mayonnaise on a cross country trip to Hokkaido.
...hold on.
I gripped the steel railing; it's still cold surface seeping into my palm.
Leaning down, I peered at that strange, gooey black liquid.
Huh, it seemed more like water than anything, only a little thicker...Sorrow hadn't been dragged up here, or dragged down.
I shoved a finger into one of the large puddles, and turned down a couple steps, walking out on to one of the open hallways, and stretched my finger out in front of me, catching the gleaming sunbeams as the hailed the coming day.
Ah, it wasn't even red.
This isn't his blood, or anybody's blood at that.
If this came from that monster...Wounded? Probably not, unless it could spill that obscene of an amount and still continue shrilly announcing its presence. At this point, the sound had drowned my ears in a monotonous thrum, and it seemed like the particle in the atmosphere were themselves rubbing against each other in anger, producing the awful noise.
This is a lot worse than we thought.
Sure, it was already kind of going poorly, but what this meant is, and I'm almost sure this substance isn't monster innards, or my Rabbit Hole would have reacted accordingly, that this monster has some kind of connection to water or fluids.
Long story short, bringing along a flame-based tool wasn't going to seem a very effective choice in hindsight. No, right now, this lighter in my pocket feels more useless than if it was mayonnaise.
I wish my characterisation was a person who had a weird, kind of off-putting addiction to sponges.
Ahhh, how satisfying it is, watching those droplets contract and pull themselves in against those frilly pink rivets... Something like that.
Beginning to pick up, the wind carried a humid warmth, hugging the back of my neck, and making that damp darkness of the stairwell seem more appealing than before.
I looked out against the mountains, the wobbly sun gazing at me from behind rows of skyscrapers.
I pushed my finger out against the breeze.
Hmmm...
I walked back into the stairwell, sloshed around with my outstretched hand against the rough concrete landing, then returned to the hallway.
Pushing my palm out against the warm breeze, soaking the sunlight with the pores on my fingers, I waited a minute or two, before pulling back and scrutinising the opaque veil clinging to my skin.
Huh.
The screaming had died down a little.
I hadn't paid much attention, too overwhelmed by its sheer abrasive tone, I suppose, but hadn't it been fluctuating a little.
Hm.
Well, now the question is, what happened to Sorrow?
Was there another monster lurking about this shoddy apartment complex?
Probably not.
It's possibly he was overpowered, surprised more likely, by this gross, sloppy monster whose entrails were coating the building, but even then, if he could be overrun that easily, even without being prepared, well, he wouldn't be all that much to talk about.
He definitely wouldn't have the reputation he currently did.
I probably wouldn't have found myself so unconsciously annoyed by him if that was the case.
Then what had left him in that state, his strong features almost liquefying under the ooze, his body undulating like he was perpetually melting, then spewing out more liquid from the top of his head, like a high-speed, self-regenerative candle.
Liquefying... His features becoming muddled... Darkness remaining tightly layered inside the building's guts like an inseparable component of this place...
Well, I suppose I'm going to get scolded for sending in a support call so irresponsibly.
Sorrow wasn't injured.
He hadn't been able to speak properly because he was choking on his own damn, grossly oozing cells. His features had melted into themselves because he really was something like a self-regenerative wax figure, constantly melting and recuperating. 
But that means...
Just as I was about to pull out that flip-phone that had gotten more uses today than the rest of the month, I head a squelching behind me, somehow audible, like it was superimposed by that steadily rising frequency.
I turned to face the rows of tightly shut wooden doors, spreading out into the direction of the mountains, and circling around the corner, where a heaving, black mound of soggy hair was dragging itself towards me.