Grim E-Book

Sara B. Elfgren

• Herausgeber: Arctis US
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Seitenzahl: 696

Beschreibung

Eighteen-year-old Kasper has gone through a rough time, but now he has landed his dream job at the amusement park Gröna Lund. He befriends Iris who teaches him how to terrify guests in the haunted house. Thirty years earlier, in Stockholm of the eighties, sixteen-year-old Håkan's life changes when he meets Grim. They live and breathe music and have big plans for their death metal band. But it all comes to nothing when Grim dies. Håkan breaks up the band.What really happened? Kasper, who is Håkan's son, tries to find out the truth. Together with Iris he delves into the myths and secrets surrounding the band, and his dad's best friend. Grim, who inexplicably died at such a young age. Who was he? And why does he appear in Kasper's dreams?

Leseprobe

Sara B. Elfgren

Grim

Translated from the Swedish by Judith Kiros

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

W1-Media, Inc.

Imprint Arctis

Stamford, CT, USA

Copyright © Sara B. Elfgren 2021 by Agreement with Grand Agency

Copyright © 2023 by W1-Media Inc. for this edition

First English edition published by W1-Media Inc./Arctis Books USA 2023

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner.

The Library of Congress Control Number is available.

English translation copyright © Judith Kiros, 2023

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner.

ISBN978-1-64690-611-6

www.arctis-books.com

A NOTE ON THE SWEDISH SCHOOL SYSTEM

In Sweden, grades 1–9 comprise primary school, and secondary school (high school) lasts for three years, the equivalent of grades 10–12 in the United States.

Förskola (ages 1–1/2–5): Kindergarten

Lågstadiet (ages 6–9): Elementary school

Mellanstadiet (ages 10–12): Middle school

Högstadiet (ages 13–15): Junior high

Gymnasiet (ages 16–18; most people graduate the year they turn 19): High school

Man was made for Joy & Woe,

And when this we rightly know,

Thro’ the World we safely go.

Joy & Woe are woven fine,

A Clothing for the Soul divine;

Under every grief & pine

Runs a joy with silken twine.

—William Blake

Forever wandering

These dark halls of despair

I am the madness that devours

—Dark Cruelty

INTRO

At first, I couldn’t write at all.

The blank white page blinded me. The cursor blinked. I wrote one paragraph and was disgusted. The text felt false and fake, every word dripping with fear.

There was so much to be afraid of.

And then the entire world turned upside down.

I was supposed to have worked at Gröna Lund again, but ended up in limbo. The day for the planned premiere came and went. I couldn’t pay my rent with only student loans; it had been a while since I stopped talking to my roommates, but I still resented moving back in with my parents, into my old room. Like crawling back into a shell that had become too small.

I took down all my posters, my pictures.

You could tell exactly where they’d once been on those sun-bleached walls. Mom carried rolls of wallpaper up from the basement. She’d obviously planned for the moment when I’d finally clear away my teenage angst. Instead: flowers and birds in bright colors.

Every day was the same.

Dad taught his students from home. Mom came home exhausted, her face marked by her face shield. I sat on the floor of my room, trying to do research for my dissertation. We were three caged animals, our house a zoo. At the dinner table, we spoke about the same things as the rest of the Swedish population did. Later in the evening: each of us in our own silence.

I applied for jobs I didn’t receive. Got stuck in front of makeup tutorials and film reviews. Returned to games I hadn’t played in years. Reread books from my childhood. The world was on fire; I retreated. Back into my shell. Too small, but safe.

Except at night.

The hairline cracks in the ceiling remained the same; I stared at them and they stared back at me. I kept waking up covered in sweat. Instead of going back to sleep, I’d put my headphones on. Listened to a podcast or some harmless YouTuber. One video followed another, according to the mysterious workings of the algorithms.

And then: a haunting.

Even though I’d cleared my history, started anew, it was there. The video I’d seen so many times in this particular room, during my waking nights.

I was half-asleep when the familiar sound reached me. Tinny, uneven, damaged. I opened my eyes, turned the screen toward me.

A shitty VHS recording from the end of the eighties.

Dark Cruelty’s final performance.

The empty scene at the youth center. The tiny, expectant audience. And then the band enters: the final lineup.

Tony “Berserker” Lehtonen shuffles toward the drums. He raises his arms and twirls the sticks; his long fall of hair gleams like gold. You can’t make out the band name stamped on his shirt, but I know it’s Master. I’ve seen it in the pictures in Håkan’s photo album. The same Håkan “Maimer” Nordin who’s shouldering his bass guitar and tuning it. He’s in blue jeans, even though they agreed to wear all black, and I know Malte, who glances in his direction, is annoyed. Malte Lundell, who called himself “Iago” at the time. His own T-shirt, sleeves cut off at the shoulders, is plain; his arms look childishly soft against that harsh aesthetic, the spiked bracelets and bullet belt. An inverted pentagram in a chain on his breast. The necklace swings when he bends over the guitar, looks up again, tosses his blond hair. Looks sideways. Here he comes: the one who’s going to be dead in just a few weeks.

Grim.

The poor quality of the recording makes it look as though his face is melting. Greasy black hair hangs heavy in front of his pale face and eyes marked with black paint as he tunes the guitar. His mouth gapes open when he grips the microphone. Then his voice through the cracked audio, the goose bumps on my arms when he hisses:

Through death . . . I rise . . .

The opening riff of “Nocturnal Allegiance.”

PAUSE.

Grim’s face, upturned as if in ecstasy. The left arm raised, the fingers crooked like claws. A pose that’s since become standard, “squeezing the invisible orange,” and so on. But this predates the clichés.

Why did this particular video find me?

It felt like a sign.

The next evening, I asked to borrow my parents’ car.

The streets were empty. I was tense, driving unevenly into the city’s heart, then out toward Djurgården. I left the car in the run-down parking lot, looked toward Gröna Lund. A crane raised itself out of the Main Area. The towers, the arcs of roller coasters, stood out against a pastel sky. The neon stripes on The Free Fall glowed. The sun on top of Icarus revolved.

Grönan, as people in Stockholm call it.

At that time of day, the sounds from the rides, the music, and the shouts should have been traveling across Djurgården, annoying the neighbors. Instead, the air was thick with silence, and I ached as I walked toward the theme park.

Everything had gone wrong.

What more could I have done?

What could I do now?

Blackbirds sang from the eaves. Benches were stacked on top of each other in the alley called Lilla Allmänna Gränd. Workers should have been moving here, ambling between the Main and Minor areas. Gossip in the smokers’ tent, what happened at Skeppsbar last week, who did what with whom.

My steps echoed beneath the covered bridge. Dandelions grew in the gutter. A tour bus should have been parked here. Bass notes from the stage, the roar of the audience. I caught a glimpse of my pallid face in the tall mirror at the stage entrance. Threw another look at the windows of that box in the upper floor of The House of Demons. A memory of myself and Kasper at the whiteboard that first summer: Who’s doing makeup? Who’s doing masks?

Longing and concern erupted in my chest.

I sat down at the wooden dock, letting my boots dangle over the muddy water. The sky was bright and endless, the boats tugging against their constraints. On the other side of Saltsjön, Södermalm luxuriated in the evening sun, with windows like rows of gold teeth. At my right, the Octopus rested on its barge with its arms lowered; at my left, the gulls cried over the island of Beckholmen’s heights.

We stood there on his nineteenth birthday, Kasper and I, one of the dry docks beneath us, the theme park where we worked before us. Maybe if I’d acted in some other way that night, things would have turned out differently. Or: it wouldn’t have changed anything.

Perhaps I’m blaming myself for no reason at all. And yet I can’t stop myself from doing just that.

The city was so quiet.

Like the silence in The House when the looped sound effects and music got turned off. The silence after Grim’s final whisper in the hidden outro.

I suddenly knew how to begin.

Kasper had always adored Gröna Lund.

For his sake, I have to write about what happened.

But I have to turn it into a story, write it as if to a stranger.

I’ve tried to find out as much as possible. Sometimes, though, it’s hard to know who’s telling the truth, whose memory is correct. And I obviously don’t know how they thought and felt at every moment. But I can try to imagine it. I can try to understand.

I will be leaving out some details.

The truth I seek is of a different kind.

To reach it, I will need both light and shadow.

Appendix 1. Excerpts from an ad for Dark Cruelty’s EPAncient Bloodlust.

Dark Cruelty Ancient Bloodlust

Label: Necrodamned Records

Format: Vinyl, 12*, EP, Limited Edition, Numbered

Country: Sweden

Released: June 198■

Tracklist

A1 A Foul Mist Obscures the Sun (Intro)

A2 Ancient Bloodlust

A3 Nocturnal Allegiance

B1 Unholy Shadows Reign

B2 Curse of the Lost

B3 Untitled (Hidden Outro)

Credits

Bass: Maimer

Drums: Berserker

Guitar: Morbid Eradicator

Guitar: Iago

Vocals: Grim

Notes

Self-released on the band’s own label in an edition of 666 copies.

Hand-numbered by Grim or Maimer. No 452.

With insert. Stamped dust sleeve.

Condition

Media: Near Mint (NM or M-)

Sleeve: Very Good Plus (VG+)

Comment

Signed by the legendary Grim!

KASPER

Kasper had always adored Gröna Lund.

There was something eternal about the theme park. It didn’t matter that the rides changed throughout the years. After one season, the old ones were forgotten and the new ones felt as though they’d always been there—no one really missed Disco Jet or Extreme. The thing that made Grönan wasn’t in the capsules whirling through the air, the smell of fried food and popcorn, the tinny tunes of the carousels, or the hit songs performed on the main stage.

It was in the laughter. It was in the screams.

The rules that governed the everyday ceased at Gröna Lund. People flocked to this place to experience something beyond the drudge of ordinary life, beyond the routine. At Grönan, you could taste danger without actually being in danger. Hurl toward the asphalt for a few seconds, before the powerful brakes intervened. That knife’s edge of horrified amusement: maybe this time the chains will break. Maybe this time we’ll slam into the ground. Screams turning into laughter and into screams again.

Kasper understood that Gröna Lund, like any theme park, dealt in illusions. People lined up for an hour for a ride that took seventy-five seconds and told themselves it was worth it. Cotton candy left buyers with cavities and sticky fingers. And still they came back. The brightly colored scenery beckoned, still full of promises. Maybe this time the laws of gravity would be undone: the cotton candy would be as soft as it looked, the trick would turn out to be actual magic. Reality was nothing like fantasy, but we could pretend it would be.

The scenery was so obviously scenery. Still, Kasper thought it shimmered.

And nothing shimmered as beautifully as The House.

THE HOUSE

Welcome to The House of Demons! Ever been here before? No, you’ll have to pay for a separate ticket, the wristband isn’t valid here. Let’s start off with a few rules. You cannot touch the performers and they cannot touch you. Flashlights, filming, and photographs are forbidden. Whatever happens, keep moving. Please enter through the turnstile!

You’re standing in front of The House now, the building practically plucked from the set of the Addams Family or Scooby-Doo, designed by the American company Scream Corporation. The doors are tall, and a stone demon—not actually made of stone—grins down at you. The mist in the garden hisses out of a hidden hose. The ride called the Broom whizzes through the air behind you, while the seagulls—famished for hot dogs—screech, and the sun beats down. You are as far away from a desolate moor or a ghostly forest as possible. Still, you can’t help but feel a vague sting of concern when the doors creak open. How frightening could it be?

You’re waiting in a pitch-black space between two double doors. A man’s recorded voice tells you a story about Doctor Dreamcraft, a scientist and occultist who opened a portal into another world, a world peopled by demons that manifested as your deepest fears. Since then, the voice claims, no one has seen Doctor Dreamcraft, and no one has dared enter The House.

The doors before you open. The first thing you see is a black wall decorated with made-up symbols. They’re meant to be reminiscent of symbols from satanic rituals, like upside-down crosses and pentagrams, but without offending possibly religious visitors.

When you walk toward the stairs leading down into the basement, you can hear thunder, organ music, and distant shrieks. You’re not sure which ones are recorded and which ones come from other guests.

In the basement, bars in a grid pattern extend along both sides of the corridor. Behind them, bones litter the floor. Coffins are haphazardly arranged along the walls. Some of them are open; inside them are bodies wrapped in filthy shrouds. Whimpers and loud knocks can be heard from the closed ones. Buried alive. A fear originating from the nineteenth century, when it was difficult to distinguish the intoxicating sleep of morphine from the eternal one. You’re about to leave the Tombs when one of the corpses rips off its shroud and throws itself against the bars with a crash that makes you jerk. A very much alive twenty-year-old with patchily applied white paint glares at you, hissing: “You’ll never get out of here alive.”

You act like that idiot in a horror movie.

You keep walking into The House.

The next room has a high ceiling. The organ music rumbles through it. A broad staircase leads to the next floor. Every eleven seconds, thunder explodes and light flashes through the colorful mosaic windows on the floor above. Surrounding you is Doctor Dreamcraft’s laboratory, kept behind a tall iron fence. Huge test tubes filled with glowing liquids, a stack of grimoires, more symbols painted on the floor. A cauldron with an arm in it tilts above the plastic flames in the fireplace. It remains unclear whether the good doctor is a scientist, a magician, or a cannibal.

Perhaps he’s a so-called triple threat.

You step onto the staircase, and a cloaked figure detaches from the shadows by the fireplace, dragging a stick across the fence. But she showed up too late. You’re already on your way up, toward the horrors of the second floor. Black cables dangle from the doorway you now enter. A mechanical anaconda snakes toward you, hissing. There are plastic reptiles everywhere. The next room features webs in which massive spiders are nesting. A male doll, wrapped in a web, moans faintly. His head twitches from side to side. The demons—the name for the workers in The House—call him Frodo. You turn the corner and trigger the sound of chopping axes and screams. Bloodstained menus have been taped to the walls. In front of you, daylight filters through the gaps of a closed door. You don’t consider the bars to the right of the door or the draperies behind those bars.

The timing of the next scare is perfect. Just as you open the door and are blinded by the light, the Chef, clad in an apron and an executioner’s hood, tears aside the draperies and swings a roaring chain saw toward you. You scream and laugh as you stumble onto the balcony. When the door shuts behind you, the Chef murmurs into her two-way radio that a single guest has just passed and is on their way to the Doll. “Do your worst,” the Chef says to the Doll, but you obviously can’t know this as you’re catching your breath on the balcony. Perhaps you glance at the emergency stairs leading into the garden. This is where the guests who want to end the tour can depart.

“The Doctor will see you now,” a voice to your right announces.

A janitor holding a broom is standing at the other end of the balcony. He holds up a door, and when he shuts it behind you, the screams from the theme park fade again. A narrow corridor, lined by vaguely Egyptian-looking sarcophagi, extends before you. When you pass a sensor, one of the lids turns transparent, revealing a monstrous creature within. A growl can be heard. Tensing, you pass a black door with a hatch at face level, but nothing happens. The Chef is busy scaring other guests.

At the farthest end of the corridor is a row of bars; behind it is Mats the Mummy, as he’s been named by the demons. Bandages dangle from his limbs, his head is a grinning skull, and when you approach, he tilts forward awkwardly. The jaws open and close. You gaze at the mummy with some disdain, but then the Doll leaps forward in its onesie and roars: “IWANTTOPLAY!” You jump and then laugh out of surprise. The Doll copies you. You turn another corner and jump once more when a hatch opens in the wall. The Doll’s rosy-cheeked mask peeks out through the plexiglass and cackles insanely. You can’t help but feel a little stupid.

The corridor you’re in begins tipping sideways with a subtle groan once you enter the Nursery. A melody from a music box and the eerie laughter of children; every toy is monstrous. There are two mirrors on the walls, one on each side of you. The Doll pops up in one of them, but you were prepared for it. Most of the demons feel that the mirror is a difficult bit to pull off. “COMEBACKANDPLAYSOON!” the Doll shouts. You walk down a narrow staircase, toward voices chanting in faux Latin. There are more symbols on the walls, painted in white. A statue of a devil rears up behind an iron fence. Then: a body draped across an altar suddenly contorts.

“Help me!” the Possessed yells. “They’re in me! They’re taking over!”

She starts to spasm, the screams turning guttural. You have to hand it to her—she’s working hard. Still, you’re not afraid.

In the next room, one wall is covered in mirrors, and you see yourself reflected several times over. There are three doors on the opposite side. When you open the one to the left, you’re faced with your own reflection. When you open the one in the middle, the Possessed throws herself at the fence, laughing. The right door leads out of the house. The final scene is rarely manned by personnel, and is simply referred to by its number.

And there, to your left, is the turnstile.

As you exit, you can’t help but think that it all went by quickly. The Broom sails overhead. Children and seagulls cry out. The gates creak loudly when those behind you pass through them. Somebody says: “I almost shit my pants.”

And somebody says: “Was that it?”

KASPER

It was a summer without rain.

The heat came in May, and by June the grass had yellowed, the ground cracking and turning hard. It was Kasper’s first day at Gröna Lund and it had begun badly.

He had applied to The House of Demons but had been accepted by the Magic Carpet Ride, the final stop at the Fun House. When the guests came whooshing down the slides, his task was to fold the carpet they’d traveled on and toss it into a hole. A conveyor belt transported said carpet back up again. This was the only position in Rides you could work without being taught, or broken in, as the workers at Grönan called it. He’d been dropped off by a stressed-out team leader, alongside another newbie called Dennis.

“Today’s a little bit chaotic,” the team leader said, demonstrating how to fold the carpets as effectively as possible. Kasper immediately forgot what she’d done and how. “Someone will be by and sort it out.” Her smile was bright and white. “You’ve got this, guys. Go for it! Drink plenty of water!”

That had been two hours ago.

“Do you think they’ve forgotten about us?” Dennis said.

According to his badge, he was from the suburb Älta. Two tiny flags informed the guests that they could speak with him in English and German. There was only a Union Jack on Kasper’s own badge.

“My friend’s on his second season and he told me they sometimes dump people in the Magic Carpet Ride for an entire day,” Dennis went on. “My arms are starting to cramp up.”

“Mmm,” Kasper said, stretching. His back had started to ache about an hour ago.

“I hope they haven’t messed it up,” Dennis said. “I was promised The Broom.”

It was the third time he’d said that. Apart from that, he talked incessantly about the different parties he’d attended, one of which was the big launch at the start of the season at Grönan. Kasper had missed it because he had ended up as a second choice, not having been offered a job until May. He’d stared at the e-mail then, at once happy and disappointed.

“But where are you really supposed to be?” Dennis asked suddenly.

“The Octopus and the Flying Carpet,” Kasper said.

“Ah, the Octo-route,” Dennis said, pulling a face that Kasper couldn’t interpret. “Was Rides your first choice, then?”

“I actually wanted House of Demons,” Kasper told him.

“Probably for the best that you didn’t get it. Must suck to stand around inside a dark house all summer.”

It’s pretty dark inside the Broom, too, Kasper thought but didn’t say out loud. He was trying to cope with his bitterness. He’d heard that there were 10,000 applicants for 1,200 jobs each year, only half of which went to new employees. He’d been lucky; it was just hard to feel lucky at the moment.

“My friend says the people in House are pretty weird. Stick to themselves,” Dennis went on, taking a drink from his water bottle. “Wait, sorry. You applied there.”

He laughed. It wasn’t a mean laugh. Kasper could easily have added something self-consciously ironic about his own weirdness; it was the perfect setup, a way to own any behaviors Dennis might consider strange. Better to laugh at himself before someone else could do it. But he hesitated, and Dennis spoke about recognizing the workers in House because of their black clothes, that he couldn’t stand haunted houses, that he was so easily scared that he’d almost been awarded “the School Chicken” at his graduation party.

“But I got the school’s ‘Solid as a Rock’ award instead,” Dennis said humbly. “Did you graduate this year?”

Kasper folded the carpet the latest guests had left behind, grateful that his hair hung in front of his face, hiding his expression from view.

“Just finished second year,” he responded.

He’d hoped the questions would stop after that.

“Where?” Dennis said. “I mean, which school do you go to?”

“Fredrika Bremer.”

“Huddinge, right?”

“Haninge. Handen.”

“But you are eighteen? You have to be eighteen to work the Rides, right?”

He might as well have it over with.

“I turned nineteen in September,” Kasper said. “I had to retake a year because I switched programs. From Tech to Art.”

It was the truth. No one had to know the reason behind it, after all.

“That’s cool, man,” Dennis said. “I mean, figuring out that you want to do something else and then just going for it.”

“Where did you go?” Kasper asked, hoping to end this cross-examination.

“Nacka High School. Social Science,” Dennis said. He bobbed his head to a song that carried over from the Pop Express. “Sometimes I think I should have gone for Natural Science, so I might take a year to do those courses, too. My parents are engineers, so . . . What do your parents do?”

There was no simple answer to that question. His dad and mom had had more jobs than Kasper could recall: nurse’s aide, mover, personal assistant, postal worker, gardener, cleaner, substitute teacher, care worker, shop assistant . . .

“My mom’s a photographer,” Kasper said. “And my dad’s a musician.”

“A famous one?”

There was no simple answer to that question, either. In some circles, Kasper’s father, Håkan Nordin, was a legend. Two things earned him that particular status: In the beginning of the ’90s, when Swedish death metal became an actual commercial success, he was the bassist in one of the scene’s biggest bands, Exenterate, and played with them for almost fifteen years. And before that, he’d founded Dark Cruelty, a band that had earned cult status.

“People who are into death metal tend to know who he is.”

“Death metal!”

Dennis stretched out his index finger, little finger, and thumb in what he probably thought was the sign of the horns, but which actually meant “I love you” in sign language. Kasper did not correct him.

“I never got the difference, to be honest,” Dennis said. “Is death metal the one where they scream?”

Kasper took a deep breath. It always hurt a bit to simplify a subject he was so passionate about, but when people asked him this question, they were rarely interested in a lecture about subgenres in extreme metal and various screaming and growling techniques.

“Yeah, they scream,” he said.

A high-pitched shriek as two teenage girls came flying down Kasper’s slide, all short shorts and long legs. When the carpet came to a stop, they burst into hysterical giggles. Then they looked at Kasper and giggled even harder. He averted his eyes and paid attention to the carpet. The girls began roaring with laughter as they stumbled toward the exit. Kasper didn’t actually think they were laughing at him, but he still couldn’t help but worry. Do I look like some kind of pervert, standing around and ogling the guests’ legs? Like an antisocial freak who’s had to retake an entire year of school? Are there patches of sweat on my shirt? Is my zipper open? The rough carpet fibers scraped against his fingertips.

They’re just thoughts, his psychologist had told him while he was still seeing her. Other people don’t notice us as much as we think they do; they’re busy with their own things. Like Dennis, who carelessly continued to talk about what his friends had said about the rides in the Main Area.

“Anything beats the Minor Area and all the families. The children aren’t the worst of it, though—it’s the parents. They come here, too, obviously, but they’re literally everywhere in Minor. The most boring thing in the Main Area is the Hall of Mirrors. Unless you’re hungover, in which case it’s awesome. But the Octo-route . . .”

He fell silent, as if catching up with himself.

“What?” Kasper was beginning to get slightly sick of Dennis.

“All right, I’ll be honest with you,” Dennis said seriously. “The Flying Carpet is shit and the Octopus is on a barge.”

He raised his eyebrows meaningfully at Kasper, as if this conveyed something. It didn’t, so Dennis went on: “The barge sways and you’re stuck on it, watching the Octopus spin around and around for hours. Tons of people get seasick. And tons of kids puke.”

As if on cue, a white-haired little boy stepped off a carpet and vomited. Kasper scattered the lemon-scented absorbent powder on top of it, according to the directions he’d been given.

“Sorry, but I’m, like, emetophobic,” Dennis said. He was balancing on his toes, as if to get farther away from the pile of sick. “My friend says people sometimes pour water on top of that powder. Big mistake.”

“What happens?” Kasper said, sweeping up the vomit that had turned grainy, while holding his breath.

“It makes a sort of foam,” Dennis said.

Appendix 2. Excerpt from Kasper Hansson Nordin’s final project for the Art Program: Illustration and Design, Fredrika Bremer High School. Tutor: Ms. Gunhild Berg.

There are several genres of extreme metal. Death metal is one of them. Some of the characteristics of death metal are heavily distorted and down-tuned instruments, deep growling and/or screaming, aggressive drumming, and major shifts in key and tempo.

The lyrics usually concern exaggerated violence, inspired by horror movies, but also occultism, religion, mysticism, death, and evil in general.

It can be argued that death metal evolved out of thrash metal, with some inspiration from hardcore, and emerged in the United States in the 1980s. However, the genre was also shaped by and in the U.K. and Sweden.

Metal, and especially foreign acts such as Kiss and Iron Maiden, was very popular in Sweden in the 1980s. In the ’90s, several Swedish death metal bands became big both in Sweden and abroad.

But at the end of the ’80s, the Swedish death metal scene was still small, consisting of less than a hundred active people. Almost all of them were teenagers. My father was one of them. His band was called Dark Cruelty. And the singer was called Grim.

KASPER

At long last, Kasper and Dennis were relieved and could go for lunch. A few drops of water fell from the sky; you couldn’t even call it rain. Dark pinpricks dotted the asphalt as Kasper crossed the Main Area. Dennis had gone to meet the friend who had returned for his second season and was probably telling him all about the freak he’d been forced to work with. Then again, Kasper probably wasn’t interesting enough to make fun of. It was more likely that Dennis regaled his friend with a story about the child who puked.

It hadn’t always been like this.

Once upon a time, the adults around Kasper had called him a beam of light. He’s so easy to deal with, they’d said. He lightens the mood in the classroom, at soccer practice, at summer camp. If someone falls over and hurts themselves, he’s always there with a word of comfort. He has a group of friends, but gets along with all his classmates. A real ray of sunshine.

Kasper couldn’t remember when, exactly, he stopped feeling the smile on the inside and it became just something he wore on the outside; or when he discovered that the quick, easy solution was pretending that everything was fine, instead of talking about the things that hurt him. The distance between what he showed and what he felt kept growing. The mask became more and more difficult to remove. Until the day when everything collapsed. It had been two years since then. Everyone seemed to think that Kasper had recovered wonderfully, that he was back to his old self again. It was as though Kasper was the only one who wasn’t sure about who that old self was.

A boy came running with a slushie in his hand and tripped. Small knees and ice hit the pavement, a piercing scream joining in with the shrieks from the rides. The boy’s mother rushed toward him, throwing an accusatory glance Kasper’s way, as if it had somehow been his doing. He looked away. Maybe he should walk up to them, tell them where they could find the nurse. Instead, he quickened his steps. At Grönan, you were supposed to face the visitors with a smile and exude warmth and positivity. So far, he’d failed on every front.

He tilted his head back as he walked, allowing heavy drops of lukewarm rain to hit his forehead. The back of his neck was hot and sweaty, but he didn’t like the way his face looked when he wore his long hair up. Much like he didn’t like the way his skinny legs looked in shorts. When he’d chosen his uniform, he’d settled for the pants, and he regretted it now. His entire body was sticky with sweat.

Was he going to be able to do this? The raucous voices, the rattling and roaring coming from the rides tired him out, and this was a relatively calm moment in the Main Area. The weekend would be worse. Had he made a massive mistake?

Tor had suggested that Kasper apply to Grönan. Tor, who was five years older and Kasper’s stepbrother, had worked at the theme park for several seasons, and was rapidly promoted from Rides to UC, unit chief, and on to TL, team leader. Currently, he was working as a diving instructor in Australia while in college, but he still spoke warmly about Grönan.

“It’s like the world’s best summer camp,” he’d said at the home of his dad Atle and Kasper’s mom Anja this Christmas. “Everyone has a great time. It’s a bit cultish, but in a good way. A bunch of us already became friends at the launch party.”

Naturally, Kasper thought as he walked toward the door labeled STAFF, to one side of the Main Stage. Everyone loved Tor. Kasper understood why. Tor was the charming salesman type, but he also had a genuinely caring side. Kasper was almost sure Tor had put in a good word for him.

Was that why he’d taken the job? To not disappoint Tor? Or had he thought Grönan would somehow transform him into Tor? Attractive and relaxed. What a joke.

Kasper passed through the staff door and stepped into the alley, which split the theme park in two. He passed the smokers’ corner and opened the door to the Minor Area. He crossed between parents and their overheated offspring, high on sugar. A final, sad scattering of water fell from the sky. The asphalt stuck to his shoes as he aimed for the main entrance. The staff cafeteria, called the green room, was on the right. That was how they spoke at Grönan: instead of “job interview,” you said “audition.” You got your uniform from the CS, costume storage. The employees were, naturally, “cast members.”

“Artists,” his dad had said with a laugh. “I guess you can tell by the pay.”

Kasper stopped outside the green room, unsure which of the two entrances to choose. Through the window, he saw his colleagues seated at the tables, eating together. It looked as if everyone already knew each other. He was tempted to go to the changing rooms and eat the bag of chips he had with him. But he’d promised himself he’d at least make an effort.

He opened the left door and caught a glimpse of his pale face in a mirror. The show starts here! was written in green text at the very top of the glass. The message was obviously meant for the departing cast members, reminding them that they were walking on stage the moment they stepped into the theme park again. But a different show was happening in the green room: the social game behind the scenes.

Tor had said that the green room was like a school cafeteria and Kasper immediately understood what he meant. It wasn’t just the smell; the majority of the workers at Grönan were young. Like Kasper, some of them were still in high school. According to Tor, it was as cliquey as school, too. The different departments rarely mixed. The Restaurant people hung out with other Restaurant people, Rides with Rides, Games with Games, and so on. “Rides has the best people,” Tor had said, as if stating an objective fact.

When Kasper had applied to Grönan, he had applied to The House of Demons, which was its own unit under Rides. He’d wanted a second choice, though, and had thought that manning the roller coaster was better than selling burgers or cleaning. Working with the extroverts in Games and standing next to a wheel of fortune was a personal nightmare. Still, he’d had his hopes up for The House of Demons—and ended up in Rides with people like Tor: sociable, confident, and about to become best friends with one another.

Kasper paid for his fried fish with his employee card and looked around. He thought he recognized some people from Rides but wasn’t quite sure. He ran the scenario through his head: walking up to them and asking if a seat was free and then being stared at as if he were an intruder. No. Not today. Tomorrow he’d hopefully get to know some people from the Octo-route. Kasper sat down at a table, empty except for a girl in black clothes, her hair dyed a deep, dark red.

At first, he didn’t consider where in Grönan she might be stationed. Or maybe he’d known and that had been the reason he’d joined her in the first place. Afterward, he couldn’t tell for sure. But Dennis had mentioned that the employees in The House wore black rather than the standard uniform, with its shades of green. They had to be able to blend in to the haunted house’s dark corridors.

Kasper sipped his apple juice and the girl reached across the table for the salt. That’s when he saw it—the tattoo on her inner forearm.

Dark Cruelty’s logo.

Was he mistaken? He couldn’t be. It was the ornate, indecipherable logo he knew, designed to exude evil and mystery.

Kasper stuck a piece of fried fish in his mouth but could hardly taste it. From the corner of his eye, he saw the girl tuck a lock of hair behind her ear.

It was deeply ironic. Here was someone he definitely shared interests with—a horror fan, or she wouldn’t be working in The House, and clearly into metal. She would definitely be into talking to Kasper Hansson Nordin, son of Håkan “Maimer” Nordin, the founder of the band whose logo was etched into her skin.

Which was why talking to her was completely out of the question.

Nice tattoo. Do you know who my dad is?

The mere idea made Kasper cringe inwardly.

Besides which, the tattoo could be a warning sign. Some fans of Dark Cruelty were, in his dad’s words, “intense.” A girl who wore every band member’s name in lockets around her neck had been writing to his dad for years, demanding he send her a lock of his hair, and preferably Grim’s, too, as if his dad had a stash of his dead friend’s hair lying around and ready to mail.

Kasper threw a quick glance at the girl’s badge. Iris. Unit Chief. So she was an actual manager in The House. Two small flags on the badge signaled that she spoke English and Finnish. His eyes were drawn to the tattoo again.

“So are you a fan, or what?”

Kasper looked up. Iris was pointing at the tattoo.

“Or are you just trying to see what it says?” she continued, her smile crooked.

“No, I know what it says,” Kasper said, feeling his cheeks heat up.

“You were staring.”

“I was just surprised.”

It slipped out. Iris raised her eyebrows.

“Why?”

Kasper could see the suspicion in her eyes. Female metalheads were often quizzed and challenged, forced to prove that they were “true” over and over again. Both Kasper’s mom and his dad’s ex, Leah, who played and sang in a metal band, had talked about it.

“Because I was just talking to someone else about Dark Cruelty,” Kasper hastened to explain. “So it was a weird coincidence.”

“Oh,” Iris said, relaxing slightly. “May I ask why?”

“It just came up,” Kasper said.

“So the other person was a fan?”

He couldn’t be bothered to talk around it anymore. Letting go felt nice, somehow. At least it would make something happen.

“Håkan is my dad.”

Iris blinked.

“Håkan,” she said. “You’re . . . You’re kidding me. You’re Maimer’s kid? You’re kidding me. You are!”

“No,” Kasper said.

“And I was like, ‘Are you trying to see what it says?’”

Iris hid her face in her hands and groaned.

“Sorry,” Kasper offered.

Iris looked up again, her expression faintly outraged.

“Why are you apologizing? This is embarrassing for me. I can’t handle this, I’m sorry . . . That band has meant so much to me. Well, clearly. Holy fuck, you look just like him, I see it now. Jesus, I am embarrassing myself so hard.”

She started to laugh. She laughed so hard she teared up. Kasper couldn’t help but smile.

“I ruined your lunch,” he said.

“No, I ruined your lunch,” Iris said and snorted. “Being an insane fan, and all. Sorry, my name is Iris, and you are . . .”

Her eyes caught on his badge and Kasper awaited her reaction. Because he was named after Kasper “Grim” Johansson, the singer in Dark Cruelty.

“Fuck me,” she said quietly. “Of course, they were best friends. That’s so fucking beautiful and so, so sad. Ah, Iris, shut your mouth.”

She hid her face in her hands again. Kasper could hear her taking deep, sniffling breaths.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes,” Iris said. “But no. Sorry. These kinds of things must be so annoying for you.”

They could be. Despite the pride Kasper felt for his dad, other people’s reactions could be a little much.

“I don’t think you’re annoying,” he told her honestly.

It almost sounded flirtatious. He blushed again, but when Iris looked up, she was several shades pinker. Her brown eyes gleamed wetly.

“You sure?”

“I’m sure,” Kasper said. “You’re funny.”

It sounded so dumb that he laughed. Iris joined in.

“So my suffering is just entertainment to you?”

“Absolutely,” Kasper said.

“Well, I’m glad I can pay you back in some way, after having ruined your lunch.”

“You didn’t—”

“Is this your first season?” she interrupted.

“Yeah. I’m in the Magic Carpet Ride at the moment.”

“Fuck,” Iris said.

Another black-clad girl approached them, placing her tray opposite Iris. A small gem glittered in one nostril.

“Sorry, but your lunch is over,” she told Iris. “Duty calls.”

“I’m on my way, but this is Kasper.” Iris gestured at him. “Kasper, this is Selam. She and I are the UCs in The House.”

“Hi, Kasper,” Selam, who was apparently from Gothenburg, said. She turned to Iris again. “Have you been crying?”

“Laughing and crying,” Iris said. “Or, well, I don’t know. It’s a long story.” She looked at Kasper. “We cannot abandon you at the Magic Carpet Ride.”

“You’re in the Magic Carpets?” Selam said. “Shoot me.”

Kasper was about to explain that it was only temporary, but Iris got there first.

“Do you want to work in The House?”

Kasper was about to respond, but Iris interrupted him again:

“I’m not asking because I’m a crazy stalker. Because I am not a crazy stalker, I swear. I just have your dad’s band tattooed on my arm, but that’s fine, I am an idiot, that’s all, folks.”

She threw her head back and mimed screaming at the sky.

“We’ve lost some people, so we need to replace them,” Selam told Kasper between bites. “But we need to talk to the TL first.”

“Yeah, of course,” Kasper, who couldn’t believe this was happening, managed.

“Or maybe you don’t like The House,” Iris said.

“I actually applied for it.”

“Ha!” Iris exclaimed. “I knew it. The House is the best.”

“The Haunted House in Liseberg is better,” Selam said.

Iris hissed, “Blasphemer.”

“I simply speak the truth.” Selam turned back to Kasper. “It’s not everyone’s thing, standing around in a dark house all summer.”

“And we make little children cry. If you can’t handle that, you can’t work there,” Iris added.

“I can handle it,” Kasper said.

“Kasper, the Not So Friendly Ghost,” Selam said with a smirk.

On his way out of the green room, Kasper saw himself in the mirror again. There was something in his gaze that he hadn’t seen for a very long time. As if he’d been infected by Grönan’s shimmer.

Appendix 3. Excerpt from a forum.

20■■■■■■■■■■■

■■■■■■■■■■■

Suspended Account

Posts: 58

Anyone in here sitting on facts about Kasper “Grim” Johansson? Brother-in-law claims young Johansson was some kind of self-proclaimed warlock and that the other members of Dark Cruelty ritually murdered him in a subway tunnel. Am aware that some bizarre shit went down in the metal scene in the ’90s, but this was a bit earlier than that, and I think a satanic subway homicide would have ended up in the press in the ’80s? Looking for details. Cause of death, f x?

Edit | Delete | Reply

20■■■■■■■■■■■

■■■■■■■■■■■

Member

Posts: 1612

Wasn’t much to write about in the papers as the police wrapped up the preliminary investigation in no time. Check the thread and you’ll find links to the few articles that exist. That said: your brother-in-law is full of it. I’d estimate about 90% of what people say about Grim is crap. I know some people who were in the scene at the time. G. moved down to Stockholm from Hudiksvall or some other backwater northern town to sing in D.C. A weirdo. Screw loose. Interested in occultism, but most of his bandmates didn’t share that interest. Yeah, some mentals think they murdered him to get attention for the EP that was released the same year. But if so, why did they break up the band when he died? Which they did. A rumor on par with that one in pure idiocy is that Grim was slain by a demon while conducting a magic ritual. He was just a broken person valorized by other broken people. Decent vocalist, though.

Edit | Delete | Reply

20■■■■■■■■■■■

■■■■■■■■■■■

Suspended Account

Posts: 3872

I’ve been listening to extreme metal for over thirty years. We definitely used to think bands like Dark Cruelty were real misanthropic madmen holed up together in a cave somewhere. i.e., before the Internet ruined the mystery. That rumor about the demon is one of many spread by Dark Cruelty’s guitarist, Malte Lundell (called himself Iago until the parrot in the Aladdin flick showed up . . .). Went around talking shit about the surviving band members in fanzines in the ’90s. Sent them death threats, the way people did in the evil old days. A genuine psychopath. But his music is insanely good and he loves the motherland so I’m willing to forgive him hehe. As for Grim, I thought we all knew he died of something congenital?

Edit | Delete | Reply

20■■■■■■■■■■■

■■■■■■■■■■■

Suspended Account

Posts: 788

Read up on the case. A killer is loose. At least one.

Edit | Delete | Reply

KASPER

The very same day that Kasper met Iris and Selam in the green room, it was confirmed: he would be “broken in” in The House the following day.

He practically floated up the escalator from Handen’s train. Emerging from it, he cast a look at the building on the left, where the child and adolescent psychiatry office was housed two floors up. The times he’d spent in that clinic, with its green doors, felt further away than ever.

He entered the tunnel called Cave of the Naiads and walked past the closed-off staircases that had once led to the bus station. It had been moved, replaced with apartment buildings. Not that the bus station had been a particularly charming place, far from it, but Kasper didn’t know what to make of the changes of the past few years. A part of him wanted things to stay the way they’d always been.

Handen, meaning the hand: a strange name for a very ordinary place. There were municipality buildings, a shopping mall and green spaces, a bunch of nondescript apartment buildings surrounded by industrial parks, fancy residential areas, and low-rent apartments with bad reputations. A place in-between or a center, depending on who you asked.

When Kasper had been a child, his dad told him the story of how Handen got its name. A road once ran through the town, carrying those doomed to die at the executioner’s spot called Galgstenen. The carts the prisoners were transported in shook so violently, and the prisoners were so tightly chained, that body parts occasionally flew out of the carts. A hand fell off and landed in the middle of the road. “And a few miles from here, you’ll find places named after the arm and the shoulder,” his dad lied. Kasper wanted to hear that story over and over again. Then he’d been taught in school that it was probably derived from some local inn, or possibly the Hanveden forest. As the teacher seemed unsure, however, Kasper chose to believe his father’s version. Dead man’s hand.

Handen had always been the center of Kasper’s world. His dad had also grown up there and his grandma had been within walking distance when Kasper was little. His friends were, too. Rudan Lake. The soccer field. And the Cultural Center, a white cube by Poseidon’s Square, between Haninge Center and the new apartment buildings. The library inside it had tall windows that made it feel like you were reading among the trees that grew on the other side of the glass. Kasper had spent hours in that library as a child, fascinated by stories and myths. There were traces of them all over Handen. Odenvägen, Odin’s Road. Streets named after Odin’s eight-legged steed, Sleipner, and Idun, the goddess of youth. The Cave of the Naiads, the water nymphs, led to the god of the sea, Poseidon’s Square.

When Kasper reached the square, he checked the outdoor seats but didn’t see anyone he recognized. The fountain was shut down, probably because the municipality had to save water. The heat was overwhelming despite the lateness of the hour. Windows and balcony doors gaped open, voices and sounds from television shows filtering out. The sky was pale. Kasper turned to the right of the Cultural Center and continued in among three-story houses.

He’d already written to his mom about the new job, but not to his dad. He wanted to personally tell him that it was thanks to Dark Cruelty that he’d gotten it.

His heart skipped a beat.

A familiar figure exited a door and continued straight toward Kasper.

Marco.

No. It wasn’t him, just a guy with a similar hairstyle and build. When Kasper got closer, he couldn’t understand how he could have confused the two of them. Still, he hurried home.

The guitars echoed into the stairwell. Early Judas Priest. The door was unlocked and Kasper was greeted by a pair of gigantic Converse that had been abandoned on the hallway carpet. They definitely didn’t belong to his dad. But he could hear his dad’s voice coming from the kitchen, in the middle of one of his long rants. Kasper could only catch the occasional word, but he sounded animated.

“I’ve always . . . Ernesto, on the other hand . . . ah, who the fuck knows. . .”

The voice fell quiet and someone’s steps receded. Kasper entered the kitchen. The windows were open wide. The table was cluttered with beer cans and two empty pizza boxes—and there was Tony, sitting at the table, bent over his phone. A Sodom tee stretched over his broad chest. There was no sign of his dad.

“Hey there, old man!” Kasper said. Tony looked up.

“You rude little shit!” he roared.

A second later, Tony threw himself forward, embracing Kasper and pounding his back in a way that made his inner organs jiggle.

Tony Lehtonen was a giant, long and muscular with curly blond hair that flowed down his back. It wasn’t frizzy, in the manner of many older metalheads. Tony had always taken care of his hair, even when unwashed and straggly was trendy. Besides, he was married to a hairdresser now. Tony’s eyes were bright blue, his nose smashed after slipping on the ice during a hockey game. He looked like the archetypal Viking. The stage name Berserker, which he’d used as the drummer in Dark Cruelty, suited him almost too well.

“Your dad’s having a cigarette,” Tony said, nodding at the living room, where the door to the balcony was ajar. “So I’m staying away.”

“New Year’s resolution still going strong, yeah?” Kasper said.

“Even on the road,” Tony said with some pride.

He’d recently returned after touring with Malodor, one of Stockholm’s older death metal bands that had made it in the nineties. Tony started playing with them after Dark Cruelty split up, and they’d been active intermittently since then.

“Almost lost my shit when I ran out of snuff in Rotterdam, though,” Tony said, shoving some of said snuff under his upper lip. “Good thing Stasse always has something stashed away.”

He sank back down on the chair. As usual, it looked slightly too small for him. Kasper leaned back against the sink.

“Håkan said you’re at Grönan this summer,” Tony said.

“Yeah,” Kasper said. “First day today.”

He pulled at his T-shirt, which stuck to his body.

“That’s a real dream job, huh?” Tony said. “Remember when we went to see Alice Cooper?”

“Of course.”

The two of them had been to countless gigs together. When Kasper was a child, Tony used to carry him on his shoulders. Then he’d perch up there, earmuffs firmly on, his view far better than his mom’s and dad’s. While they were still married, the entire family would spend a lot of time with Tony. But then there was the divorce, and Tony met Emira, his current wife, and had a kid. Kasper didn’t see Tony as frequently anymore, but he was still like a close relative. The uncle Kasper had never had.

“Grönan, eh?” Tony said. “Manning the roller coasters or frying up food?”

“I actually got to switch to The House of Demons today. The haunted house.”

Tony exploded into laughter.

“Awesome! You’re getting paid to scare the shit out of people on a daily basis?”

“Exactly,” Kasper said, smiling.

“Awesome!” Tony repeated, bringing a beer can to his lips, taking a sip, and shaking the rest into his mouth. “This goddamn weather. Everything’s piss warm in one second.”

“I’ll get you a cold one,” Kasper said.

“Thanks,” Tony said as he grimaced and flexed his wrists.

A couple of years ago, he got an inflammation in the joints. Kasper’s dad said he’d never seen Tony that scared before. Since then, he had dutifully done his physical therapy exercises; not being able to play was his worst nightmare. Kasper could relate. Some of the illustrators he followed would post about pains and aches in their hands and wrists. Kasper felt a surge of worry just thinking about it.

“How’s your mom and sisters?” Tony asked.

“Fine,” Kasper said, taking a beer and soda out of the fridge.

“And the Norwegian terror?”

Tony actually liked Atle, but he couldn’t help himself.

“Training for an Ironman,” Kasper said, handing Tony the beer.

“Maniac,” Tony said, clearly impressed. The can hissed when he popped it open.

Kasper had a sip of his soda and immediately remembered that it wouldn’t actually lessen thirst, but increase it—one of the numerous health tips that his stepfather, Atle, shared with him. Kasper remembered all of his advice but rarely followed it.

“Your dad says you’ve been doing well this term,” Tony said. “In school and everything.”

He almost looked shy when he said it. Kasper obviously knew what he meant by “and everything”: that Kasper had stopped taking his antidepressants but still managed to go to school and act like a normal high school student. He had a regular sleeping schedule, he did his homework, he’d even gone bowling and to the movies with his classmates.

“Yeah, definitely,” Kasper said. “But I’m happy about vacation.”

“Yeah, thank fuck for vacations,” Tony said with a laugh.

He seemed relieved that Kasper hadn’t delved too deeply into the subject of his mental health, but Kasper didn’t take it personally. Tony didn’t really talk about feelings, but he’d come running if Kasper ever needed his help. He’d proved it.

“Are you heading out tonight?” Kasper said just as his dad returned to the kitchen.

Håkan Nordin was a head taller than his son, wiry and weather-beaten. Tattoos covered his arms, peeking up from beneath the collar of his Autopsy T-shirt. His ex, Leah, had done many of them—as she was a tattooist as well as a musician. His long salt-and-pepper hair came down below his shoulders, and his beard and mustache were perfectly trimmed. He was wearing the glasses he only ever wore at home.

“Your son’s asking if we’re going on a bender tonight,” Tony said.

“Nah, we’re staying in for a good old talk,” his dad said. “Watching a film.”

“Maybe something Italian,” Tony said. “Giallo Italiano!”

“Nice,” said Kasper. “I might join you.”

His dad peered at him through the glasses.

“You seem to be in a good mood,” he said, smiling. “Was it a good first day at work?”

Kasper began to grin as he told them about the encounter with Iris. His dad and Tony listened attentively, exclaiming, “No, really?” and “I’ll be damned!” and laughed in all the right places.

“What are the odds, though?” his dad said. “That she has a DC tattoo and then you show up, out of everyone . . . Crazy.”

“Who’d have thought your old dad would turn out to be useful, after all.” Tony grinned. “Couldn’t have seen that one coming.”

“He’s not that old,” Kasper said.

“The lack of respect, from the pair of you,” his dad said, clearly moved. He squeezed Kasper’s shoulder. “I’m glad you got what you wanted. Ghost House.”

“The House of Demons,” Kasper corrected him.

“Demons!” Tony exclaimed. “Haven’t seen that one in ages.”

“I’ve got it on Blu-ray,” his dad said.

A few hours later, Kasper was in bed and on YouTube, watching secretly filmed videos taken inside The House.

It had been a nice evening.

His dad had rushed out and bought them ice cream to celebrate Kasper’s new job in style. Then they’d watched the Italian ’80s film Demons, or Dèmoni, about a bunch of idiots being attacked by zombies in a movie theater. After that, it was time for Tony to head home.

“We’ll talk to Ernesto tomorrow,” Tony told his dad, both of them standing in the hallway. Then he turned to Kasper. “You just go for it, all right? Show no mercy.”

His dad shut the door behind him.

“What are you talking to Ernesto about?” Kasper asked.

Ernesto Moberg had also played in Dark Cruelty, under the pseudonym Morbid Eradicator. He was the only member of the band, and one of the few metal musicians in Sweden, who made a living off his music. His heavy metal band Vile Prophets was big in the United States and South America. Kasper’s dad had been a guest musician on a few of their albums, and both he and Tony had gone along on tours when the ordinary members had had to call off for one reason or another. With that in mind, them talking to Ernesto wasn’t strange in and of itself. There was, however, something strange in the air. Kasper recalled his dad’s animated voice: