Crescent Moon Massacre
By
G.R.V. Stone
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2008 Derek A. Schneider. All rights reserved
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By the time the witch came down the hill and out into the cluster of apple trees, it was too late. She sighed hopelessly as the smell of burning skin invaded her nostrils. Thoralisa had been caught by the humans and the foul beings had burned her. She had to be sure.
Moving down and behind the small cabins that made up the village’s housing area, Agatha peered around the corner of one of the broken down old shacks. There, in the town’s center, was her sister’s funeral pyre. Agatha instantly recognized the burning form in the midst of the blaze even through the charred and blackened skin. It was the nose that gave her away. Long and bulbous, it resembled a dill pickle more than a nose. It was her own nose. The same nose that all women in their family had. In those raging flames she could see her future.
She decided then and there that she wouldn’t let it come to that. These humans, with their holy ways and their unwillingness to except those that seemed different than them, would pay for their actions. They would pay dearly.
Humans were an endangered species in Terra Ferna, and the law passed last year by the king made a harmful act against a human illegal and punishable by death. Though Agatha wasn’t afraid of death, she had no intentions of getting her own hands dirty. No, this was not a deed for a woman her age, witch or not.
The morning sun shone down on her ancient skin as she weaved in between the swaying cornstalks. The harvest was nearly upon the village and soon the field would be reaped for the ears of corn that grew with delicious plumpness. The witch had come about a hundred yards or so into the crop before she reached the straw man that was hung there. Crucified for the sake of unmolested vegetables.
“Hello, my friend,” Agatha said in scheming tone. The scarecrow didn’t answer. Instead, he continued to hang there, head down, unfeeling, unthinking.
Opening the satchel that was strapped across her chest, she pulled out the rabbit from inside, holding it by the nape of the neck. With her free hand she produced a knife from a sheath that was strapped to her calf. With a flick of the wrist, the knife made a slit down the rabbit’s abdomen and the creatures warm innards fell out and onto the ground at the base of the scarecrow’s post. A strike of a flint and a spoken incantation, the guts burst into flames and the fire spread around the ragman’s feet. The smoke was thick and came up from the ground, lacing around the straw body like a swirling snake.
The witch backed away from the scarecrow and let the smoke do its work. She raised her hands and used her vast knowledge of the craft to guide the mist to the straw man’s face. “Come, my friend. Don’t be afraid.”
Slowly, with a creak of leather straps and old, waterlogged wood, the scarecrow raised his head. Eyes that weren’t there before stared down at the witch. Eyes that were human, gleaming with life, and had no business staring out of the potato sack head of a man made of straw. Agatha reached beneath her robe and produced a rusty, crescent shaped sickle. She cut the straps that held the scarecrow to his cross and the body fell to his knees.
“You are here to do my bidding, scarecrow,” Agatha said. After several minutes, the straw man reached up with shaking hands and carefully straightened his large brimmed hat. Then, standing on legs that had never been stood on before, he walked toward the old woman like a fawn taking his first steps. “Take the blade, my friend. You will be the tool for my vengeance. The extension of my anger.”
The scarecrow took the blade in one gloved hand and stared at it with fascination in his all too human eyes. It was an old, rust covered thing yet it still kept its sharp edge.
“Go,” the witch commanded. “The village lies just beyond this cornfield to the west. Leave no one alive.”
The scarecrow turned to the west and trudged through the stalks with terrible determination, picking up steam as he got used to his legs. Agatha stared after him with malicious joy dancing in her yellow eyes. Soon, the humans would pay for their deeds. Soon, they would suffer through a nightmare the likes of which no other being had ever experienced before.
The sun beat down on Ted’s neck with relentless hatred. In all of his sixty-three years he couldn’t remember a harvest that was as hot as this one. He brought the plow to a stop and the mule gave a grumble to show his appreciation. The farmer pulled his hat off and wiped the sweat from his brow. Looking out into the crop he noticed the post where his scarecrow had once hung.
“Odd,” he said to himself. Coming to the conclusion that the damned thing had somehow fallen off, he started through the corn stalks to re-attach it. He was only a few feet in when he heard the unmistakable sound of rustling straw behind him. He stopped in his advancement and looked at his surroundings. Nothing. When he turned back to the post, he felt the cold metal of the sickle against his throat. A gasp escaped his mouth and he turned carefully to see who was holding the blade to his neck. From beneath the brim of the scarecrow’s hat, all too human eyes were alive and burning with rage. Through those eyes, Ted could feel the witch’s presence. He could sense her hatred and pain, and he knew that he was about to pay for what the townsfolk did.
“It wasn’t me,” Ted pleaded. “I had nothing to do with it. Spare me, please.”
The straw man pulled the blade across the farmer’s throat and the old blade ripped open the wound more than slicing it. A crimson wave spilled down the front of the farmer’s open shirt. A gurgling sound poured from the wound, these were accompanied by sprays of blood that covered the broken stalks where the farmer had fell. Now that the scarecrow had gotten his first taste of bloodshed, he was thirsty for more.
Somewhere along the line, Beatrice had lost her towel. The wicker basket that hung from her right arm was covered by a small blanket that had somehow come un-tucked from beneath the laundry. It could be all the way back by the stream for all she knew. Turning back to search for it was an unwelcome obstacle to her day, especially considering that she was half way home before she had noticed it was gone.
Despite the strangeness of the previous night, life had seemingly returned to normal in the little town. Burning a witch at the stake was not something that Beatrice had ever taken part in, but in the heat of the moment she had gone along with it, wrapped up in the excitement Pastor Killion had created. Once the body had started burning and the sickening smell filled her nostrils, and the terrible screams filled her ears, she was sure she would never want a hand in such an ordeal for the rest of her days.
As she crested the hill near the stream, she came to a stop and moved her eyes along the ground in search of the towel. What she found was a man standing near the stream and though she couldn’t see his face he didn’t seem familiar. Even though he was half turned away from her, she could clearly see the towel that belonged to her moving back and forth vigorously, as if the man were cleaning something that was just out of her sight.
“Hey!” she shouted as she marched toward him. “That’s my towel you’ve got there. I’ve only just washed it, you better not be getting it dirty again.”
The man stopped what he was doing at the sound of her voice. When he dropped his left hand to his side, Beatrice could see that her towel was covered with blood. She stopped in her progression and stared in horror as the man turned to look at her. He was no man at all, in fact. He was a scarecrow. A straw man that had somehow jumped right off of his post and was now coming toward her with a rusty sickle in his hand.
Beatrice began to back away and nervously fell backward on her arse. The scarecrow spared not a moment. He rushed forward with the sickle held high over his head. Just before the blade split her abdomen open, Beatrice let out a blood curdling scream.
Little Max Delton witnessed the whole thing. He was on the top of the hill near the stream, busy trying to dig a hole to Nexteria with his mother’s wooden spoons, when he saw the straw man from Farmer Ted’s cornfield cut Beatrice open. Max had always prided himself on being a fast runner, and right at that moment he stood up and ran faster than he had ever run in his life.
Once he had reached town, Max ran straight ahead toward Pastor Killion, who was supervising a group of townsfolk that where cleaning up the ashen mess that was created by the big bon fire his mother had told him about.
“Pastor Killion!” the boy shouted excitedly. “Pastor Killion! Down by the stream. There was a man made of straw. He killed Miss Beatrice.”
“Now calm down there, boy,” Pastor Killion said as he tousled the unruly black hair on the boy’s head. “What in the name of Ira’s good eye are you going on about?”
The other men gathered around Max and stared at him curiously.
“Miss Beatrice is dead. The scarecrow killed her.” Max took the pastor by the hand and began to pull him in the direction of the stream.
“Max, you’re talking gibberish,” Killion said. “Scarecrows aren’t living people.”
Pastor Killion continued his protest until the boy stopped and held one dirty finger up at the hill. “There he is.”
“Good Lord,” Pastor Killion said. Looking to where the boy was pointing, he saw it. The scarecrow had a potato sack stuffed with straw for a head, and his attire was a collection of old cloths that Farmer Ted had once worn during the annual Huskers Fair. Out of the breast pocket of the orange and yellow plaid shirt hung a small, cloth sunflower that had been made by Miss Hansel long before she died. A craft that the little town was known for. The scarecrow would have seemed quite harmless, if not for the raging, human eyes that stared out from beneath his farmers hat and the sickle in his right hand that still dripped with bloody chunks that had once been inside Miss Beatrice.
“Tim, Yates,” Pastor Killion said to two of the men. “Get the womenfolk and the children to a safe place. The rest of you, grab whatever weapons are at hand and get ready for a fight. Looks like we’ll be having another fire tonight.”
The straw man looked down on the town through his new eyes. He observed the townspeople running in every direction and still more who picked up objects to defend themselves. All because of him. He only stared at them for a moment, unfeeling, unthinking. He was born with one purpose and one purpose only and he couldn’t stop himself even if he wanted to. With the crescent moon blade gripped tightly in his hand, he walked down the hill.
Max ran to his mother and let her hug him close, something that he hadn’t voluntarily let her do for some time. At eight years old he felt as if he were getting too big for such things. Now, though, he relished in it. He wanted her to hold him and not let go.
“We have to get the kids to safety,” Yates said. “There’s a killer on the loose.”
“What?” Maxes mother asked with shock.
“I’m guessing the witch put a curse on us before she died,” Yates explained. “Get them to safety and don’t come out until we come for you. The men are gathering to put up a fight.”
“Pastor Killion’s idea no doubt.”
“Now’s not the time for a debate Lucy, take your boy and get out of harm’s way.”
Max felt himself swept up in his mother’s arms and carried away toward the large barn near the edge of town. It was always agreed upon that the cellar of the barn would be the emergency point for weather related threats, or any other threats for that matter. Looking back over his mother’s shoulder, Max could see the scarecrow slowly descending the hill in the distance and the men of the town rushing forward with shovels, pitch forks, scythes, and any other hand held farming equipment they could get their hands on. The straw man seemed unafraid and determined. Max knew that no good would come from this.
The scarecrow shot forward with surprising speed. An instant later, Joe Thorndale was clutching at a ragged rip in his chest where the pearly white ribcage could be seen through the bloody meat.
Yates continued to move forward with his mind on Lucy and Max. Lucy’s husband had died two years before and Yates had grown rather fond of her and her son. He didn’t want to see harm come to them over something they took no part in.
He lost sight of the scarecrow through the crowd for a moment, but seconds later saw the long armed upswing of the killer and a large spray of blood shoot up into the air, followed closely by the head of Red Johnson. Another spray of blood erupted over the crowd and Yates felt the warmth as it showered down on his face and arms.
“Rush him all at once,” he heard Pastor Killion shout from up ahead. “He can’t take us all at the same time.”
Yates still couldn’t see through the crowd, but he could hear the brutal sounds of battle. The screams, the guttural grunts, the spilling innards hitting the ground with a sickly squelching sound. The other men were pushing in behind him and he was suddenly amazed at the hold the pastor had on the entire town. Every man in town seemed to be willing to die at the hands of this inhuman killer just because Killion said so. He had once again worked them up into a fevered frenzy, just like the night before. It then occurred to Yates, a man that had lived so long as a peaceful farmer, that Killion was no more a man of god than the scarecrow himself. Pastor Killion was a belligerent, self-important ass that would lead this entire country to damnation if he could, just to suit his own narrow view on life.
Yates stopped in his forward succession. The other men rushed around him, lost in their madness. All this time Lucy had been right and Yates had been too stupid to see it. With all of the resolve of a man with a sudden epiphany, he turned and ran from the fight.
“Fight with all you have, men,” Pastor Killion shouted over the bloodshed. “Send this foul creature back to hell!”
He still sounded confident, which was good to keep the men going, but as he watched the scarecrow skillfully wield the sickle and rip the townsmen to little more than shredded meat and tissue, he felt his confidence quickly fading. He had managed to maneuver around the scarecrow and up on the hill to command his small army of faithful fighters.
With a final swing of the crescent moon blade the scarecrow dropped the last two men and turned slowly to Pastor Killion. Beneath the large brim of the farmer hat, the straw man’s mouth was turned down in a twisted grimace that revealed a set of all too human teeth. The pastor now realized, albeit far too late, that he had underestimated the killer. The obliterated bodies of every man in town were quite enough evidence for that.
The scarecrow came charging up the hill and Killion took off toward the stream. Being the fat, lazy thing that he was, the pastor wobbled more than he ran and it wasn’t long before the scarecrow caught up with him.
In a matter of seconds, Killion felt the crescent blade buried in his back. He fell forward and clutched at the farm tool with his short, chubby arms just before it was pulled down the length of his backbone. Then it was gone and back again, creating another wound that was quickly ripped downward on the other side of his back. Then the killer’s hand has digging inside the wound.
As Pastor Killion felt his life ripped away along with his spine, his dying thought was of what he could have done differently to save the townsfolk from meeting such a fate. Fire, he thought. A straw man would have easily been burned by fire.
Max was surprised when he saw the hatch of the barns cellar open and Yates quietly drop down. Many of the women from the town gave him disgusted looks as he weaved between them on his way to Max and his mother. Some even hissed at his apparent cowardly act while still others begged to know if the killer was still standing. Yates ignored them all and, much to the boy’s surprise, took his mother up in a passionate embrace.
“You were right, Lucy,” he whispered in her ear so low that Max only barely heard it. “All this time, you were right. Killion is a madman.”
“What’s happening up there?” Lucy asked.
“Mayhem,” was all Yates could say.
There were perhaps twenty women cramped in the cellar, along with thirty-three children and now one man, and when the air outside grew deathly silent, one woman gave a harsh whisper. “Quiet! All of you be quiet or the scarecrow will know we’re here.”
The group obeyed this command and went still. For ten minutes, ten terrifying and dreadful minutes, there was no sound. Max had begun to think the killer had wondered off, satisfied in the carnage he’d caused. Then, the trap door of the cellar opened and the bright afternoon sun shone in. The entire crowd seemed to collectively tense up. A second later, the scarecrow dropped to the floor.
Some in the cellar gasped, while others screamed. Most of the children began to cry and clutch at their mothers’ dresses. Max only stared at the straw man, more with interest than fear. Even with the blood of every man in town (except for Yates of course) covering his clothes, the boy did not feel threatened by the stranger.
The scarecrow surveyed the women and children packed in the cellar, many of them now crying with the realization of death weighing on their minds like a heavy troll on a mule’s back. When the strange eyes met Max’s, the boy saw something odd there. The terrible grimace and the angry eyes suddenly softened. The scarecrow looked at the gore covered blade in his hand and Max saw an emotion wash over his potato sack face that was all too human.
Agatha the witch came down the road just outside of town in a horse drawn cart that was packed with all of her belongings. She cackled wildly at the sight of the scarecrow waiting for her on the side of the road, his clothes drenched in the blood of the villagers, the sickle hanging limp at his side.
Bringing the cart to a stop, the witch stared down at her assassin. “Is it done, scarecrow?”
“Yes,” the scarecrow answered.
Agatha was surprised at the voice that came from the straw man. She supposed she didn’t know her own magic’s strength. “All of them are dead? Every single one? Women and children as well?”
“Yes,” the scarecrow answered again.
The old crone gave a shrill laugh. “Excellent work, my friend. Excellent!”
As she snapped the reins against the horse and set the cart moving again, her screeching laughter reached a fevered pitch. When she disappeared over the next hill, her cackles could still be heard floating back on the increasingly cool breeze.
The scarecrow stood staring at the hill for a long while. With the witch gone, both from his sight and his mind, the scarecrow was unsure of what to do next. He turned and looked down the road in the opposite direction. Then turned back and looked again to the south, where the witch had gone only moments ago.
There came a creaking sound from the town and the straw man turned to see the women and children of the town emerging from the large barn along with the one remaining male member of their populous. They lined up outside of the barn door and stared at the scarecrow with curiosity. The straw man waved at them with one bloody hand. One boy with black, unruly hair waved back and his mother quickly forced his hand back down to his side.
The scarecrow looked down the road both ways once again, then began walking north away from the witch, away from the town, and into his own future. A new life full of possibilities.
The End
Dead Infest
By
G.R.V. Stone
Lucy woke up with a start.
“You alright, Mom,” came a voice beside her.
“Yeah, just a weird dream,” she replied. Though, she couldn’t recall what the dream was about. “I think.”
The girl returned her attention to the TV screen.
The movie had just started. Lucy thought she must have dozed off during the coming attractions.
“Hey, Mom,” this was her oldest daughter at the end of the couch. “Do we have anything we could snack on?”
“I don’t know,” she answered, still trying to shake the strangeness of the cat nap away. “Let’s go look.”
The younger girl pushed the pause button on the remote and the three of them went for the kitchen.
Lucy opened the fridge with the two girls just behind her. “Well,” she said, “we have some strawberries in the drawer, we should eat them before they go ba-“
The screen door gave a screech just before the back door swung open and hit the wall hard. At first thought, Lucy assumed that Jim had come home drunk again, but the man that came through the door now was no longer a man at all, but a walking pile of rotted flesh.
The stranger took two lumbering steps forward and let out a low groan. The girls were already screaming, but Lucy had somehow kept her calm. She reached over in front of the oldest girl and pulled the large butcher knife out of the drawer. Then she held it with the blade down, ready to stab the zombie if he got any closer. The dead thing didn’t understand the threat and lunged forward anyway.
In a quick and fluid move, Lucy wrapped her arm around the zombie’s and placed her hand on his back. Forcing him to bend over, she came around with her other hand and buried the knife in his neck.
The monster moaned again, only this time it came out as a muffled gurgle and he slowly began to straighten.
Lucy still had a good grip on the knife and she put pressure on the blade, forcing it through the neck, tearing into long dead tissue and muscle. With a sickening squelch, it came out the other side and the zombies head flipped over like the lid of a cookie jar.
At their mother’s insistence the two girls made a wide arch around the dead thing as it stumbled for a few more seconds. Then, it fell. Whatever life that had been in it was gone.
There was a loud thump from upstairs and Lucy knew the zombie had not been alone. Of course not, she thought, were they ever alone? No! What exactly was she basing this thought on? Horror movies?
She didn’t know, but she was well aware that she had to move quickly.
Back into the living room and under the stairs to the small room that Jim called his den. She walked across the floor and right to the gun cabinet. Luckily, she found her keys in her pocket and went right to the one she needed. Still calm, breathing easy, she pulled the 12 gauge from its home and grabbed the shells off the bottom shelf. She shoved the box in to the older girl’s hand. She had never gone hunting with her husband before, but she did know how to use the weapon.
In thirty seconds she was loaded and pumped, daring the next dead thing to try and fuck with her.
“Stay close,” she said to the two girls, though it probably wasn’t necessary.
Out the back door and onto the covered porch she found two more zombies shuffling around aimlessly between them and the old pickup near the barn. Where had they come from? Showing up on a farm in the middle of nowhere. The nearest cemetery was nearly ten miles away.
“Come on,” she commanded and the girls followed. Down the steps, she waited until the barrel of the gun was nearly touching the man’s decayed nose. He stared down at her as if he had just found a tasty treat that someone had forgotten to eat.
Lucy pulled the trigger and the man’s head exploded, sending pulp up into the air like grisly confetti. The other zombie was moving fast and as Lucy pumped the shotgun and brought it down, the barrel hit the rotted man in the stomach. Another 12 gauge blast and the man split apart with a liquid splash of worm ridden innards.
When she opened the truck door, Lucy was surprised to find the steering column torn out of the dashboard. Could these things really be intelligent enough to do something like this?
She didn’t think so. There had to be more going on here.
Another zombie had snuck up on them. A woman this time. The girls were screaming. Lucy brought the gun up, but the woman caught the barrel in a hand that was almost entirely skeletal by now. She pulled the gun out of Lucy’s grip and snapped it in half like a dead tree branch.
“Run toward the barn!” she shouted. The girls obeyed and Lucy was right behind them after dodging a clumsy attack.
Another zombie appeared from the darkness around the side of the barn. Lucy pulled up the pitch fork from a bale of hay and jabbed the end into the man’s face. His eyeballs imploded around the forks prongs and when Lucy pulled up the monster’s rotted head came apart like melted cheese. She slammed the pitch fork on the ground once to remove the rotted head, then turned to the girls.
“We have to find a car,” she said.
“Tommy Hudson,” the older girl suggested. “He said his mom always leaves her keys in the car. He sneaks out sometimes after they go to bed.”
“Alright,” said Lucy. “We’ll go through the cornfield. Stay right behind me.”
With the pitchfork in hand and the girls on her tail, Lucy entered the cornfield and kept her eyes open for anymore zombies.
The stalks were tall and brittle. Her heart rate had finally climbed a little.
About a hundred yards in, Lucy felt a sting in her neck. She put her hand up and found a tranquilizer dart.
Things were getting blurry. Uniformed hands reached for the girls through the stalks. Not zombie hands, but soldiers.
More hands.
Wrapping around her as she fell.
Haziness. Like swimming in beef stew.
Where were they taking her? Where were they taking her daughters? What are the girls names? She couldn’t remember. Then it hit her full force, just before she blacked out. She doesn’t have kids.
“Test two hundred and fifty-seven, completed successfully, General,” Jim Graves turned from the monitor and looked up at the man behind him.
The general stood with his arms folded, studying the screen as if there was still something to see. “What about the kids?”
“Child actors,” Graves answered. “They think the whole thing was a set for a horror movie.”
“Excellent work, Graves.”
With that he turned and pushed the elevator call button.
“Where are you going, sir?” Graves asked.
“It’s late. I’m going home to have dinner with my family.”
“What should I do?”
“I’d suggest you do the same. Everybody needs a break, kid. Oh, and get rid of the witch.”
“You mean; ‘get rid of her’” Graves said running one finger across his throat.
“Of course not, numb nuts,” the general chuckled as he stepped into the elevator. “I mean; tell her to scram and take her zombies with her.”
“Right.”
Then the general was gone and Graves was left alone in the tiny surveillance room. He didn’t like talking to the witch, even on the intercom.
Depressing the blinking light on the switchboard, he said; “Miss Rottwell?”
“Yes,” the old crone’s voice came back.
Graves’ skin broke out in goose bumps. “Uh...You’re free to go now. Also, the general wanted me to remind you to take your zombies with you. Um…We would like to thank you for your assistance….Have a nice day.”
With that, Graves stood, put on his jacket, and went home. Tomorrow there would be another test, but soon she would be ready. Lucy would be ready for the world.
The End?
The Bloody Eye
By
G.R.V. Stone
“Noooo!” Mike cried. He had just witnessed the single most upsetting thing he had ever seen in his life. The Cubs were once again knocked out of the running for the pennant. This was nothing new to Cubs fans of course, but this time was a little different. This time he had placed a stupid wager on the line.
“I told you!” Jason shouted. “I knew they’d choke. I knew it.”
Mike dropped his head into his hands and shook it back and forth. “No! No! No!”
“Oh yeah,” Jim said. “You got to do it, man. Where are the clippers? Go get the clippers.”
“Alright, alright,” Mike said. “I’m going for Christ’s sake.”
He stood from the couch and walked toward the stairs.
“Hey,” Stevie called up to him. “It’s got to be all the way, dude. When you’re done with those clippers, you got to hit it with the razor. To the scalp, baby!”
“I got it,” Mike said. He went into the bathroom and closed the door.
After running the electric clippers through his hair, he sprayed on the shaving cream and lathered it around his cranium. Slowly, he dragged the razor over his shortened hair, leaving the skin beneath shining in the fluorescents of the tiny bathroom.
At the sight of something peculiar, he leaned in and examined the very top of his forehead where his hairline began. There was a small mole present that he had never noticed before. Of course, he’d always kept his hair a good length and there was really no reason why he should have noticed it before.
Carefully, he brought the razor around the ugly blemish and tried to avoid taking it off along with the hair around it. He failed.
The razor flicked the think right off and blood immediately began to seep from the cut.
Mike grabbed a wad of toilet paper and began to dab at the blood.
“Shit!” he said to himself. He decided there was no point worrying about it until the job was done. So, he continued to shave the remainder of his head, stopping occasionally to soak up more blood with the toilet paper.
Once it was all done, he splashed some water over his bald noggin and looked at himself in the mirror.
“That’s not too bad,” he complimented while rubbing his hand over the top. Now, if he could only get that thing to stop bleeding. With the toilet paper pressed to his head, he went downstairs to show his friends.
“Well, what do you guys think?” he asked.
They all began to clap and shout out cat calls.
“Screw you guys,” Mike said with an embarrassed smile.
“Dude, you’re bleeding,” Jim pointed out.
“Ah, I know. I can’t get the fucking thing to stop.” Mike dabbed at the cut again. “Hey, I’ll be right back. I want to see how bad it is.”
“Just holler if you need any help,” Jason called. “I’m sure one of us would call 911.”
The others laughed at this, but Mike said nothing.
Back in the bathroom with the door shut behind him, Mike leaned over the counter and looked at the former mole closely. The blemish was still there, but now it was hanging off by a thin piece of skin. He pulled at it and a large chunk of flesh fell off and splashed in the sink. He looked at the gore in the sink for a few seconds, then turned his attention back to the small hole in his head.
“What the fuck?” he asked under his breath. Leaning back in, he picked at the opening with shaking hands. Another piece of meat fell from the wound like a fragile egg shell that crumbles at the touch. He knew he should leave it alone before it got worse, but he had always been the type to pick at scabs and pimples with a submerged feeling of glee, and this was no different. He stuck his finger in the small hole and with a sickly squelch a full inch of tissue was pulled away. It landed in the sink with a splash. Mike ignored it. His attention was instead gripped by the strange, murkiness of the surface beneath the skin. He leaned in closer and studied the opening. Then there was movement.
“AH!” Mike shouted out. He jumped backward and sat down on the edge of the bath tub.
A knock on the door. “You alright in there, dude?”
It was Stevie. Mike had to find a way to get rid of him.
“I’m fine, Stevie,” he called back. “That chili we had is doing a number on me.”
Stevie chuckled. “Bald, bleeding, and befecating, sucks to be you, man.”
“The word is defecating you dumb shit!” Mike cried out.
There was a long pause and Mike was sure Stevie had walked away. Then he heard; “Knew that, dude. Just messing with you. Little play on words action.”
“Christ! Could you leave me alone while I’m trying to take a dump?”
“Alright! Damn!”
Mike could hear him walking away. Then, he heard his heavy footfalls on the stairs.
When he was sure there would be no more interruptions, Mike stood and looked back into the mirror. There, in the middle of his forehead, was an eye. It had the same hazel color and when he moved his normal eyes, it moved with them. He suddenly had a disorienting feeling. As if he were looking at himself not through a mirror, but through a doorway into another world.
Using a towel, he wiped the mess around the eye away to find the bleeding had stopped. It was almost as if the eye had been covered by a protective pocket of blood. Or was it afterbirth? Mike wasn’t sure.
He wanted to know what the outside world looked like through three eyes, so he walked out of the bathroom and down the hall. His sight seemed to be the same, only much clearer than before. He hadn’t realized just how much a trip to the eye doctor was needed.
Coming halfway down the stairs, he peered down at his friends sitting on the couch. He could see Jason and Jim there (a beer can opening told him that Stevie was in the kitchen), watching the pre-game show for the next game. There was something different about them, though. They appeared to be surrounded by light. Mike decided he needed a better look. He grabbed the Cubs hat from his room, placed it on his head over his new eye, then went downstairs and sat with his friends.
“I can’t believe you’re still wearing that hat,” Jim teased.
“I’m a fan to the end,” Mike responded, trying hard to sound normal. “Besides, I have to have something to cover up this head.”
After a few seconds, his two buddies were pulled back in to talk of baseball on the TV and Mike took the opportunity to lift his hat enough to see them with his new eye. He was amazed by what he saw. An angelic light covered them and Mike could even make out the shape of a head just above theirs, though the entities appeared to be faceless. Above the head, there was a blazing halo and sprouting from the back was a set of wings that moved slowly up and down.
What was he seeing here? Could it be their auras? Their souls, perhaps? Maybe he was seeing their guardian angels, he couldn’t say for sure.
When he heard Stevie approaching from the kitchen, he slid the hat back down and the visions were gone. The fattest of the foursome, Stevie sat down on the recliner with a bowl of chips and without looking at Mike said; “You’re out of chips, dude.”
Certain none of them would noticed, he slipped the hat up and looked at Stevie in a new light. The aura (for that is what Mike seemed to think the most likely explanation) that surrounded his friend was red, orange and blazing like a runaway inferno. This one however had a face. A face that was made up of a burning yellow mouth and matching eyes.
The thing above Stevie’s head turned and looked at Mike. “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU STARING AT?” it said in a voice that was not of this world.
Mike quickly pulled the hat down and faced the TV with a newfound fear nibbling at his psyche.
“Mike!” Stevie said eyes still on the screen. “Dude, you’ve had my leaf blower since last fall. I’m going to need that back, man.”
Mike didn’t answer right away. An idea was forming in his head.
“Hey,” he said. “It’s right out back. Why don’t we get it in your truck now so you don’t forget it?”
“Dude!” he said with a mouth full of chips. “Baseball is on.”
Mike stood up to help persuade him. “Come on man. It will only take a minute. The next game hasn’t even started yet.”
He placed the chips down on the table. “Fine, but let’s make it fast.”
Down at the bottom of the sloping backyard was a tool shed. The door was standing open and just inside was Stevie’s leaf blower.
“Help yourself, man,” Mike insisted.
As Stevie stepped inside the shed, Mike wrapped his hand around the ax that was wedged in the tree stump where he chopped wood.
“Dude,” Stevie said. He seemed to begin or end every sentence in this way and Mike only just realized how much it annoyed him. “Your house is so awesome. I hate living in that dinky ass shack.”
Mike wasn’t really paying attention to what Stevie was saying. He was too busy lifting the ax over his right shoulder and taking aim at his friend’s neck.
When Stevie turned and saw what Mike was up to his only reaction was “DUDE!”
The hat was off. The eye showed him the truth. His aim was true. But, the ax was a little dull.
The blade hit Stevie’s neck with a heavy “thunk”. It only sank about three quarters of the way in and massive amounts of blood came spraying out of the wound. Stevie’s mouth moved, trying desperately to scream, but unable to access his voice. He grabbed Mike by the shoulders and the two of them tumbled to the ground. All the while, Stevie’s demonic aura screamed obscenities at it’s attacker.
“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING, YOU FUCKING PANSEY?”
After some struggle, Mike managed to push the larger man’s body off of him. He stood, covered from head to toe in Stevie’s blood. Raising the ax again, he brought it down through the remainder of his friend’s neck.
Breathing hard, Mike retrieved his hat and returned it to his head. Then, he let the end of the ax rest on the ground while he leaned on the handle and looked down at what he’d done. The demonic aura was dissipating into nothingness.
“Holy shit!” he heard the voice from the lawn. When he turned, he found Jason and Jim staring at the bloody scene in disbelief.
Mike looked at them, then back to the gore in the grass, the body still twitching.
“Guys,” Mike said. “I know this looks bad, but there’s a perfectly good explanation for it.”
“You chopped Stevie’s head off,” Jason stated.
“You know,” Mike continued calmly, “anything’s going to look worse when you over simplify it like that. There’s much more to this than you think. See?”
He pulled the hat off and when the two men caught sight of the third eye in their friend’s head, they ran screaming for the front yard.
With the blood streaked ax still in hand, Mike followed them shouting; “Wait! Hang on, guys! It’s not that bad.”
By the time Mike had reached the front yard, his friends were in their cars and speeding down the street.
Mike quickly forgot about them. With blood covered cloths and a gleam of madness in his three eyes, the man with the ax stared out at his neighbors bringing in their groceries or mowing their lawns, many with demonic auras hanging over their heads. He could now hear the sound of sirens carried on the wind. The police were coming for him. He knew he had a lot to do before they got there.
With ax in hand, Mike walked into the sleepy suburb street and went to work.
The End.
The Amazing Head Handle
By
G.R.V. Stone
What exactly was Lionel Irving seeing as he stepped into the shower?
The morning had started like any other. The alarm clock went off at six o’clock and this aging congressman had rolled out of bed to start his morning routine. Shave, shower, a bowl of cereal, and a coffee to go, he hadn’t deviated in nine years.
This morning however, he had noticed something different. As he climbed into the shower he caught a glimpse of his shadow on the wall. At the back of the shadow’s head there was a defined protrusion. What looked to be a handle jutting right out of his skull. He reached back with caution and felt his head where the strange object would be.
He found nothing. Just the same old Lionel Irving, buzzed haircut he had had for years, although there was no longer any hair to cut on the top of his head.
Yet in the shadow on the shower wall, a shadow that was cast by his own body breaking the artificial light that was shed by the round bulbs that burned brightly above the bathroom mirror, there was a handle poking out from the back of his head.
He put it out of his mind. As a politician and a man with a quickly crumbling marriage, he was easily capable of shoving unpleasant things out of his mind. He proceeded with his shower, got dressed, and went downstairs for his breakfast.
Julia was sitting at the breakfast table and reading the morning paper, a steaming cup of coffee in front of her.
“Good morning,” he said to her as he walked through the kitchen to the pantry.
She said nothing in return. This was something Lionel was used to and had decided long ago to confront with his own polite kindness.
“Did you sleep well?” he asked pouring his cereal.
Still no answer.
The morning sun was shining in through the kitchen window, and as Lionel went to retrieve the milk, he noticed his shadow painted across the cabinets. He noticed the handle still present there. Again his hand went to the back of his head. Nothing but the bristly hairs that were always there.
“Julia,” he said. “Do you see anything back there?”
He ran his hand back and forth where the handle seemed to be in the shadow.
“You mean besides the balding head of a pompous asshole?” she picked. “No, I don’t see anything.”
“Can’t we at least try to be civilized toward each other?”
“I have to do it when we are in the public eye that is as much as I can manage.”
He went back to his cereal without a retort. He didn’t want to get pulled into another argument.
So, he stood at the counter, eating his breakfast, and stealing glances at the strange head handle from time to time, displayed in all of its hazy glory on the back of his head.
Again he pushed the thought away. With coffee in hand he stepped out into the warm sunny morning, determined to have a good day despite his wife’s looks of disgust and the strange deformity that plagued his shadow.
Today, he would go to work and get things done as he always had. Then, it was dinner and a good time with his mistress later. He hadn’t seen young Stephanie in some time and he was looking forward to their meeting all week. Congress was only in session for another three days and he was planning on asking her to escape with him to the Caribbean afterword.
In the Lincoln now, he drove the same route that he had every day. Sat at the same red lights. Moved along with the meandering traffic through the same road construction sites.
When he arrived at his office, he said “Good Morning,” to Mabel, just as he always did and Mabel followed him in to his desk where she ran through the day’s schedule. Like she always did.
As he looked at her he saw it again. Displayed on the office wall. The Handle.
“Mable, are you seeing this?” he asked.
“What am I supposed to be seeing,” she inquired while looking at the wall.
“Look at my shadow,” Lionel pointed out. “Do you see that shape sticking out of my head?”
Mable stepped forward and studied the shadow closer. Then she looked back at her bosses head. “That’s strange! It almost looks like a handle.”
Lionel let out a relieved sigh. “Then I’m not crazy? I’m not just seeing things?”
“No, I see it,” she said. Then she walked over to him and ran her hand over the back of his head. The shadow of her hand seemed to move right through the protrusion. “Huh! That’s about the damndest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”
Mable couldn’t put it into words just how she felt when she ran her hand over that spot where the handle should be. An indescribable fear seemed to wrap itself around her spine. A fear that was so torturous she nearly screamed at the pain it caused her. She wanted nothing more at that moment than to be out of the congressmen’s presence.
“I’ll bring you some fresh coffee,” she said as she left hurriedly from the room.
“Oh!” said Lionel, a little confused at the secretaries sudden exit. “Okay.”
From then on, the day went along as usual. He made his dirty deals, he argued with the filthy liberals from across the aisle, he cast his vote and made his opinion known for what he believed would make the country better, which in his view meant more profitable. All in a day’s work.
Yet, through it all, the handle was still there. He would notice it every time he went to the bathroom or when he was out to lunch and the late afternoon sun spilled his shadow out on the ground before him.
It wasn’t until he left the office for the day that things took an unusual turn. And they only got worse from there.
He had just pulled the Lincoln over to the on ramp. The interstate traffic was lighter than usual and he was moving along at a good speed. Soon he would be in his lovers arms and for at least an hour, all else would be forgotten. All of the dealings, all of the squabbling politicians, even the phantom handle that stuck out of his head would be gone from his mind.
With the suddenness of a cracking whip it happened. The car in front of him was an old Chevy Sprint and just as it hit a ragged pot hole, its front axle snapped. The tiny car careened forward and began tumbling down the freeway and over into the right lane.
Lionel put on his breaks to slow down just as the car shambled in front of a large tractor trailer. The semi driver slammed on his own breaks and veered into Lionel’s lane. With horror, the congressman realized his car was going to be wedged beneath the trailer. He dove sideways into the passenger seat (thanking his stubbornness at refusing to wear his seatbelt) and when the crash came he felt a scraping pain just as he blacked out, but he knew he had made it. And he did. Well, most of him anyway.
He awoke to the beeping sound of a heart monitor. There were doctors around him, busy at work with the damage that had been done to him in the accident. Laying flat on his belly on the operating table, he had the vague sense of tools and hands poking and tugging at his back.
“I want to see,” he said weakly.
The surgeon seemed to be surprised at this. “Congressman, it may be upsetting to you. Please, try to relax.”
“Let me see!” he said forcefully.
There was some hesitation, then a large mirror was wheeled over in front of him. Lionel craned his neck up and saw the grizzly damage that had been done to his back. He could see the shining white of his ribs and spine protruding through the dark red meat that used to be skin. It looked as if some hungry giant had taken a scoop out of his back with a massive spoon.
“Oh my god!” Lionel moaned.
“We’re doing everything we can,” the surgeon said. “Unfortunately, there’s not a lot we can do.”
He couldn’t look any more. He turned his head to the left and closed his eyes. Through his drug induced haze he was vaguely aware of a ghostly pain. It reminded him of one of the many scraped knees he had gotten as a child. Only his entire back was scraped away.
Then, he was aware of something else. There was another presence in the room. Something dark and sinister. He opened his eyes and on the wall beheld the shadow that had followed him around the entire day. The handle was still there sticking out of his head, only now there was something more. He could see another shadow, just barely, out of his peripheral vision. Something lying in wait, pulsating with impatience.
There was a stab in his chest.
“He’s going in to cardiac arrest,” one of the surgeons shouted.
Then the new shadow came into view. It was an arm. A wretched, scraggly thing that was festering with boils and scabs so large they were even discernable in the shadowy form. The fingers that stretched out from the thin hand were slender, boney, and tipped with long, pointed nails that curled downward. The hand edged ever further toward the handle, trembling with anticipation.
“No,” Lionel groaned.
The heartbeat on the monitor was sliding into a fevered pitch. The doctors moved frantically around the room. The ugly, trembling hand slowly edged closer.
Closer.
Closer.
Until it was right above his head.
With his last bit of strength, Lionel pulled a shuddering breath into his lungs and as the beeping monitor flat lined, he let it out in a roar; “NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
The hand gripped the handle and Lionel felt it tug more at his mind than his head. There was a ripping chunk sound like a rotten pumpkin being split apart by strong hands. Then the blackness swallowed him.
There was a sense of movement in the darkness. He was being moved around, but not led around by the arm or pushed around from his ruined back. He felt more like he was a pitcher of lemonade. This was followed by the feeling of a blazing heat like he’d never experienced.
He didn’t want to open his eyes. He didn’t want to see what that nasty hand was connected to. But when the voice came, he couldn’t resist.
“And there you have it,” the voice said. It sounded like the whisper of ancient death from a hollowed tree. “The Amazing Head Handle. Patten pending.”
In response to this came a round of applause. Lionel opened his eyes and took in his new surroundings. The demon that held him up was hideous from his thorny forehead to his boil covered skin.
“With the handle attached,” the demon continued, “harvesting new souls will be easier than it ever has been.”
Lionel wanted to scream, but all that escaped his trembling mouth was incoherent mumblings.
“Truly a brilliant invention,” another voice called, this one deep and as ancient as the earth itself. “We hope to have it in production by the end of the month.” This demon was much larger and had a huge set of black horns growing from his head that spiraled around to a sharp point.
“Thank you, Lord Asmodeus,” the first demon said.
In front of them was a group of demons of varying sizes all taking notes on the clipboards that were tucked in to the crooks of their elbows.
“On to the next project,” Lord Asmodeus stated.
The group followed him out of the room, which seemed to be a laboratory set into a large cave, and Lionel was left alone with the inventor of the head handle.
“Alright, little soul,” the demon cooed. “It’s time to start paying for those sins. You got a long eternity ahead of you.”
With that, a trap door opened in the floor and the demon gingerly tossed Lionel in. As he fell and the flames began to lick at his skin, he couldn’t help wishing that he would have made a better life for himself. He wished he would have avoided the underhanded dealings, he wished he would have been kinder to his fellow man, but above all he wished he would have never married that bitch of a wife that had forced him to cheat on her.
The End
Nightmare’s Nightmare
By
G.R.V. Stone
It seemed like a scene out of one of those slasher movies that popped up on the silver screen all too often these days. The four teens with car trouble on an old country road had just wandered into a small town that seemed completely void of all life. Sarah fully expected to see a tumbleweed go rolling by any minute.
Carl, the oldest of the four, led the way down the dust covered streets. Sarah followed close behind and trailing them were Buddy and his girlfriend Gwen. The two of them were very young and very much in love and appeared to be incapable of keeping their hands off of each other even in a time of crisis.
For Carl and Sarah, things hadn’t gone so far as invading one another’s mouths with their tongues. Sarah knew she liked Carl and she hoped that he felt the same way about her, but they were still awkward together.
“Carl,” Sarah begged. “Can you please tell us where we’re going?”
“How the fuck should I know?” the older boy snapped. “There’s got to be a gas station close by.”
“Even if there is, it’s most likely deserted. This is a fucking ghost town.”
Carl stopped and turned to look at her. “If you have a better idea, by all mean throw it out there.” Then he addressed the two that were falling behind. “You two can stop swallowing each other’s faces and join the conversation any time.”
Buddy and Gwen pulled apart and looked at Carl, red embarrassment rising to their cheeks. Buddy cleared his throat. “Whatever you think, Carl. We trust your judgment.”
Carl started to speak again, but was interrupted by a loud crash from a hardware store.
“Shit!” Sarah exclaimed. “Carl, what was that?”
“Maybe this town’s not so deserted,” Carl offered.
At that moment, two things happened seemingly at the same time; the door to the hardware store flew open and the sound of a chainsaw roared to life. The maniac came sprinting from the doorway with the chainsaw held low in front of him. The four teens turned to run, but the maniac was too fast. He brought the chainsaw up and it cut cleanly through flesh and bone. Soon the dusty street was awash with crimson liquid and steaming guts and the maniac was in ecstasy with each swing of the tool in his hands.
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