cult

Somehow almost a full short story.

I was in some kind of cult on a small shard-world, like a broken asteroid floating through the void. A massive mansion housed us.

The cult was made up of nun-like beings, beat-down sanitation workers, and whatever it was the group I belonged to was, likely the sacrifices, as we kept getting mocked by the nuns and received pity from the workers. It felt like we had been spirited away into this place and didn't belong here. Everyone knew something terrible was to happen imminently. Most figured the only way out was a suicide pact or to just face down whatever terrible thing they were going to serve us up to. I was convinced, for whatever reason, that we could stop it.

I dug under my bed and found my trusty axe and a few other things I felt would come in handy. I tried to talk some sense into some of the sacrifices, and only a few came with me. I recall there being some misadventures attempting to find out more about the place and the cult, but I can't remember more than that.

Soon the time of the event approached, and most of my group killed themselves. I don't recall much about the scene, but I know it was on the upper floors of the mansion and almost all my friends killed themselves. I didn't blame them, I had a sense that what was to come was something most would want to avoid. The nuns didn't seem to mind that most of the sacrifices were doing this, for whatever reason. They mostly let us have free reign actually.

Me and the remaining sacrifices attempted to follow the nuns into whatever secret headquarters they had in the mansion, but we only got as far as a strange hidden side room. In it was a massive contraption the nun stepped into, some kind of side-moving-elevator. The nun entered it and then it slimmed to nothing, merging with the side wall and phased out of existence, far as I could tell. I decided to follow anyways. I entered it and, despite being inside, I could tell that it didn't do the same thing as what the nun had experienced. I was in some kind of large, winding conveyor belt tube. Ahead of me at regular intervals were cardboard boxes. I jumped up and smacked some open with my axe, but they contained nothing of interest. At the end of the line I was dumped out into a large, grey, almost translucent room filled with nothing but what must have been garbage, piles and piles of semi opaque tubing, containers, and other miscellany. The pile that the belt dumped onto was odd, nothing but tubes and vials in little baggies, like a medical waste container. There was a sanitation worker in the room who looked at me and got back to his business of shoveling things into the incinerator. I took a look around but I knew there was nothing that'd help me here. Somewhat defeated, I clambered back up the pile to the end of the belt. At this point we knew we were too late, we went outside the mansion to stare upwards and await our fate, huddled together. A nun cackled at us. A massive, giant red head appeared in the sky and announced that she was merely acting on her orders. Her eyes glowed and black winds howled. She dove repeatedly into the shard, shattering the world. I knew there was no avoiding it this time, but had the sense I'd have another chance for whatever reason. I braced myself and prepared to be consumed. Soon I was looking down the maw of the giant worm-lady-creature, and then I was inside a massive void.

Torn to shreds, I saw my body from third person, guts hanging out the bottom half of my body, I saw a voice proclaim 'sand spirit processing 1' and then my body disintegrated into atoms in a poof.

Somehow my consciousness continued on, I regained myself in some kind outdoor clothing store, where I browsed the wares looking for something that'd help me in my next attempt.