CHM #10 Apr 2021
Author: CHM LLC
Date: 2021-03-30 05:00:00+00:00
Description: The Ticket Taker by Trisha McKee The Apprentice's Nightmare by Mack Moyer The Beastly Echoes of Necropedia by L.P. Melling Hand of Fate by Colleen Anderson Space Lizards by Matthew Penwell His Unconquerable Enemy by W.C. Morrow (1889)

Copyright © 2021 by CHM LLC

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Cover Art: Toeken (https://atoekeneffort.weebly.com/)

Cosmic Horror Monthly
www.cosmic-horror.net

Greetings dear reader,

April showers bring cosmic horror reading hours. We’ve whipped up a great issue for you this month and we’re so glad you’re here.

To get things started, a teenager’s first day on the job at a strange, run down movie theater, like any first part-time job, takes numerous turns each more horrifying than the last in The Ticket Taker. Then, a steel worker seeks an apprenticeship with a midnight horror movie legend only to get far more than he bargained for in The Apprentice’s Nightmare. A man conducts a startling investigation after stumbling upon a sinister but elusive article in the darkest part of the web in The Beastly Echoes of Necropedia before a manned mission to our neighbor, the red planet turns to blood-soaked horror in Space Lizards. At last, we’ll journey down into the crypt past the cold and the cobwebs for a tale from a legend of the weird called His Unconquerable Enemy.

P.S. We would love to know what you think about Cosmic Horror Monthly. If you should feel so inclined, please reach out to us at publications@cosmic-horror.net!

C.R.

*~*~*

The Ticket Taker

By Trisha McKee

Irene was still new to driving. It had only been two months since she had passed the driver’s test by the skin of her young teeth. So as she drove down a deserted road in a town twenty minutes past anything she was familiar with, she wondered if she had taken a wrong turn.

It was her mother that had insisted she drive out to see about the job. “It could be fun,” she’d suggested, although the unnaturally high pitch of her voice gave away her true thoughts. She’d known Irene would hate it.

Going to the movies was always a treat… when it was the big theater showing the latest chick flick or comedy, Irene was all for it. She could even tolerate the action films when her boyfriend Chet got to pick. Usually with a large group of friends eating fresh popcorn with melted butter drizzled all over. That was fun.

But this… she groaned, spotting a shadow in the distance. Was that the building? She drove toward it, making out a dilapidated structure. The roof sagged on one side, the paint was chipped all over, and the large sign had fallen on one side. The only hint that it was open was by the few cars in the parking lot and the light shining through the broken windows.

Her mother had heard about an out-of-the-way theater that showed only old horror flicks. She was told they were hiring, and she’d insisted Irene needed something to do with her summer nights. Irene had understood what she meant. She wanted her to spend less time with Chet.

Irene parked her car and got out, looking at her surroundings. There was nothing but a gravel road and overgrown grass… and this faded building. She walked over the uneven stones unto the cracked, bumpy sidewalk.

The ticket booth had a broken window, shards of glass on the counter, and at this point, Irene was positive that the building was abandoned. Her mother had misheard.

“We’re closed.”

Irene jumped and then leaned forward, trying to make out the shadow beyond the broken glass. An older man with a curved back shuffled further into her view, and she tried not to gasp. His mouth hung open, his tongue fat and white peeking out of a gummy corner and the inside was a black void, no teeth, no hint of gums. Just a muddy blackness. His eyelids were heavy, covering enough of his eyes that no color was evident.

He pointed at Irene with a crooked finger, the nail a deep yellow. “We’re closed. You need to go.”

She heard noises inside. The whirling of a film reel, a block of dialogue, a wisp of a note. There was a movie playing somewhere in the building. Instinct told her to turn and leave, but she knew her mother would call to see if she’d made any type of effort.

“I’m here for the job,” she confessed, straightening.

The man squinted his eyes and studied her. “You’re a girl! No.”

“Hey! That’s sexism! You can’t do that.”

Again, there were a few moments of awkward silence as the man stared. Finally, his raspy voice asked, “Do you have any boyfriends?”

“Yeah, a big mean one. Why?”

“Does he like scary movies?”

She shrugged, already over this place. “I guess.”

“You call him. Tell him to come. Tell him to bring his friends. Then you got the job.”

It was then that Irene noticed the man’s words were not matching the movements of his mouth. Her pappy Roland had suffered a stroke weeks before he died, and she remembered something had been off with his face too.

“Fine. I’ll call my boyfriend.” She watched as he scurried out of the booth and opened the front door for her. She had to bend down to avoid hitting the top frame of the door that hung loose. “Seriously. Is this place safe?”

He led her into the main lobby where there were tattered armchairs covered in grime and dust, and ripped posters of old horror flicks pinned to the walls, the corners curled. He pointed out the popcorn machines.

“This. You scoop.” He demonstrated with the rusted scoop, jabbing it into a pile of stale popcorn. Then he led her back to the ticket booth, taking his arm and brushing the glass pieces off the counter.

“Sir! You’re going to get cut!” But she stared as he swept his arm across the counter over and over until it was clear of any sharp fragments, his skin never once broken.

He pointed to the window. “Here. They come up here, you go and let them in.”

“How much do I charge?”

“Nothing. It’s free tonight. Get them here tonight. Call.” He waited and then snarled, his lips parting as white strings stretched from the bottom to the top lip, that black void in his mouth as murky as ever. “Call!” he squealed in a voice unlike any Irene had heard before.

Still, she hesitated, listening to the movie playing in the next room, the walls thin enough that she could make out the roar of a monster. Would Chet even want to come?

“Hey,” Chet answered on the first ring. “When you coming over? I’m bored.”

“Chet. I’m at that new job. The movie theater.”

“Oh yeah. How is it? It sounded kind of cool. Old scary movies. You busy there?”

“They’re showing movies for free. The guy in charge wants to know if you and your friends want to come watch some movies.”

He laughed. “Free movies? Hell yeah. Where is this?”

She gave him directions and reminded him to bring his friends. She hung up and smiled at her new boss, feeling proud that she had managed to drum up business. Maybe she would be made manager. It seemed easy so far. “Hey. How much do I get paid?”

Irene had thought the man was short, but as he straightened, she realized he was well over 6’5” and something about that made her nervous. “You get paid what was agreed upon.”

“We hadn’t even discussed it. Like, I’m not bragging, but I made ten dollars an hour just scooping ice cream.”

“Yes, we’ll double that. Of course.”

“What?” She yelped, and then immediately tried to clear the shock from her expression. She did not want him thinking it was too much. “Oh. I mean, great. Sounds fair. What are my hours?”

“Tonight. You work. Go to the window and wait. Show them in when they arrive.” He shuffled off, a cloud of dust dancing around his feet. She wondered if they were in the process of renovating, bringing the building back to code. Perhaps this was just a preview night to see if anyone would bother driving out to the middle of nowhere.

Curious, Irene slowly wandered down the hall, following the noise of what must have been the only theater room in use. She cracked open the door, the beam from the projector highlighting the dust particles. There were a few people scattered throughout the room. The wallpaper was peeling, and the chairs were run-down, the velvet backing ripped and some chairs broken from the floor, tilting sideways and backwards. But there were people staring at the screen.

She returned to the front, taking her place in the ticket booth, seeing that the cash register had been ripped out, the drawers were missing, and glass still posed a hazard on the floor. She thought of that guy’s arm sweeping the glass without a concern, without one drop of blood, and something nudged at her subconscious. Something edged into her mind, a dark seed of warning. Maybe this was not the place to earn extra cash.

But just as she gathered the courage to find the man and tell him she was leaving, Chet pulled into the parking lot, his expression communicating his distaste. He and his friends Gary and Jason slowly climbed out of his new jeep, and she braced herself for his tirade over what the gravel would do to the paint job.

“Irene! What the hell! This place is a dump. No way they’re showing movies here.”

“They are. I promise. I was just in the theater. There’s a movie playing right now.”

She went to open the door but found another man there peering through the window. He was just as tall as the other guy, his skin a sickly gray. He turned to stare at her, and she drew back in fear. His eyes looked pure black. As her own eyes adjusted, she realized it must have been a trick of the light. But he had that same empty mouth.

The guys came inside, staring at the man and then turning to Irene. Chet moved forward slowly, his large frame still no match for the man in front of him. “Irene, what the hell is going on?”

The man motioned toward the popcorn. “Do you want some food before you go in? It’s all free tonight.”

“No, we don’t want your stale-ass popcorn.”

“The movie is about to start.” The man turned and started to walk toward the steps.

Jason leaned forward and whispered, “Irene, seriously. What is this?”

She shrugged. “I think they’re trying to bring this theater back. Fix it up. They’re showing free movies. So… free movies.”

The guys continued to stare at her skeptically until the man turned and cleared his throat. “Come on. The movie’s starting.” Irene noticed that his words were not matching the movement of his mouth. But the group of guys stared back at him and then sluggishly stepped forward.

“I’ll come in and see if you guys are okay in a bit. Okay, Chet? Chet?” But he was already focused on seeing the movie and didn’t even turn around.

Irene managed to find a broom and worked at sweeping the glass into a far corner where it was unlikely to do much damage. Then she remembered she had a water out in the car. She pushed on the front door, and it did not budge.

“Is there a problem?”

She spun around and saw the first man, and this time it looked as though there was a cloud of gnats swarming around his open mouth. She stammered, “I—I wanted to get something out of my car. I’m thirsty. Hungry.”

He motioned toward the counter. “There’s all kinds of candy back there. We keep the door locked during the movie. Safety precaution.”

“Safety precaution? You can’t lock doors. Fire hazard. Hey, I need to—” But he was already walking away.

Irene realized she was hungry and decided to check out the assortment of candy. There was a good selection, and she chose her favorite chocolate bar, unwrapped it and brought it up to her mouth before she saw something wiggle. Looking closer, she saw maggots crawling in and out of tiny holes in the chocolate. She screamed, threw it down and ran out from behind the counter.

“Mom!” she cried into the phone. “Mom, this theater is just an old building full of dirty, old people. I need you to come get me.”

Her mother sighed. “Irene, stop trying to get out of work—”

“Mom, please. Please listen. They locked the door. I can’t get out. I need you to come get me. Please. I’m scared.” She started to cry, and there were a few beats of silence on the other end.

“Okay, hun. Give me some time to get out there. Are you safe?”

“I don’t know. They locked the door and won’t let me out.”

“I’m on my way.”

She hung up and then went to find Chet. She would give him a head’s up. Maybe if they all tried to leave, he would let them out. Then she could call her mom and tell her not to worry. She heard the movie and again tiptoed into the theater.

Chet, Jason, and Gary were all sitting separately, in different rows, and she found that odd. But she rushed down the aisle and tapped on Chet’s shoulder. He continued watching the movie.

“Chet. They locked the doors. They’re not letting us out. Chet. Hey!” Irene shoved his shoulder, but he continued staring straight ahead. “Dammit, come on. Your mother is so going to hate me more than she already does.”

She turned and walked a few rows back to where Jason was sitting. “Hey. Jason.” She waved her hand in front of his face. “Nice. You assholes.”

She walked across the aisle to where a stranger was sitting, his eyes unblinking. “Sir?” And her blood ran cold. No one was responding. Either Chet and his followers had managed to convince everyone to prank her, or something sinister was in play.

Irene felt the hairs on her arms stand up as she stood there and watched a room full of men stare ahead unmoving, unblinking with the monsters on the screen roaring and growling and stalking.

This might be some distasteful joke, but Irene was not willing to risk it. The door to the theater started to creek open. Panicked, she dove into an empty row, army-crawling her way to the end and then sliding her thankfully slim enough body under the seats.

“This is the batch of Planters collected tonight,” one guy stated, but the voice seemed to vibrate in the air, a tin can like quality to it. Irene moved so that she could peek out and saw the two men she had encountered walking with two more men that were similar in height and gait. In between the men walked a statuesque woman. It was obvious she was something other than human. Her skin was tinted blue and glowed a pearly white, her long hair a myriad of colors with actual sparks flying from the ends as she moved.

She was mesmerizing and haunting all at once, and Irene felt ice cold tremors invading her body as she watched her. The woman-creature glided, and Irene noticed that her feet did not touch the ground.

“Very good,” she declared, her mouth not moving as she spoke. She proceeded to go to every guy sitting in the theater and press her nose against the top of their head. As she pressed her head against Gary’s head, she stilled.

“This one has no seeds. He cannot properly plant.”

As she walked away, one of the guys went up to Gary, clamping his hand down on his head. His fingers pressed into Gary’s scalp until it started to cave in, the man’s fingers pressing into brain matter. Then with a jerk, he twisted Gary’s head until Irene heard the snap. She pressed her palm against her mouth to keep from screaming.

“The rest are good. We will take them to the women tonight. With the females’ strength and the humans’ appearance, we will have the strongest hybrids.” The woman-creature turned to the man beside her, appraising him with obvious distaste. “Perhaps we can fix our previous blunders.”

They left the room, the movie still playing, the people still staring straight ahead. Irene counted to twenty and then scooted out. She stood and rushed down the aisle, consciously avoiding the sight of Gary’s oddly twisted head, but she felt the stare of his still-open eyes.

Checking the lobby, she then rushed into an empty theater room just as she felt her phone vibrate. “Mom?”

“Irene. Where are you? I followed the directions I was given, and there is nothing here.”

“Mom! Keep driving. It’s here. Those directions brought me here.”

“No, honey, it’s a dead-end. Think, Irene. Did you take any turns that weren’t specified? Anything?”

Irene swallowed a scream and worked at keeping her voice low. “Mom, no! No. I swear. I gave the same directions to Chet and he is here. But mom, they killed Gary.”

“What? Irene, is this some kind of joke?”

“No! Please, mom. Mommy, please come get me. Please. Help me. Mommy!” She started to cry, but then the door creaked open, and she plunged the phone into her pocket and scooted herself under a row of seats.

“She has to be here somewhere.” Two men stomped down the aisle, glancing back and forth. “There’s nowhere to go.”

She held her breath until she heard them leaving. Then she tried to clear her head, to plan. Something had to give. She had to get a break. This was not the end.

The door creaked open again, and Chet’s voice sailed into the room. “Irene? Are you here? I’m scared.”

She cried out and then started sobbing in relief, wiggling out and standing. “Oh my God, Chet, we have to get out of here-” She froze. The man in front of her was Chet, except there were silver beams shooting out of hollowed eye sockets. He stiffly turned and called out, his mouth not moving, “She’s in here.”

She was grabbed and pulled, and there was no fighting back. Their strength was inhuman, their power overwhelming. They tossed her into a pitch-dark room, and she tumbled over something lumpy. She tried to get her balance but tripped over another lump. As she fell, her hands landed on something soft, squishy, and she realized she was on top of a pile of bodies. She realized there was skin and hair and a scream was wrenched from within her. It was a pile of girls, like they’d been discarded. No need for females. They weren’t Planters.

A noise like an air conditioner coming got her attention. A gas was being pumped into the room. Irene said a silent thanks and accepted what she hoped would be a painless end.

She had never even enjoyed monster movies.

End.

*~*~*

Trisha Ridinger McKee resides in a small town in Pennsylvania known for its ticket takers. Since April 2019, her work has appeared in over 70 publications, including J.J. Outre Review, The Oddville Press, The MacGuffin, Crab Fat Literary Magazine, several anthologiesand more. She is the author of the Beyond series available on Amazon.

Find her on the web at www.trishamckee.com

The Apprentice’s Nightmare

By Mack Moyer

The January night devoured the sunlight earlier than usual, clamping the world in its frost-fang jaws precisely at five o’clock. Henry Aberdeen and I were in my truck, rattling down Lehigh Road back toward Aberdeen’s house when we saw it.

Aberdeen was drunk again and growling about post-production CGI when the flare overhead caught his eye. He made me pull over then pointed it out to me, slashing a red trail through the sky.

“Sa’fuckin meteor,” Aberdeen said, his bloodshot eyes trained on the thing as it shot down overhead, black smoke trailing as it thudded into the empty field flanking the road.

“Yeah cool,” I said. I wanted to get back to work, but I doubted Aberdeen would be in shape to do much of anything once we got back.

Aberdeen stared at the plumes of dust rising up from where the meteor had made impact. I couldn’t sit still, not after that last Adderall. I didn’t like the way the chemical crackled through my veins, but it was necessary to ward off sleep, to keep at bay the exhaustion gnawing at my bones.

I hadn’t slept well since my father died. Each night, if I were lucky, I’d manage maybe three hours of sleep before the nightmare came. The nightmare was always the same. My father laying on the plywood deck of a high-rise construction site. Me, standing over him, staring into the gaping chasm that had been his torso. He’d smile a blood-soaked smile, his tobacco-stained teeth smeared red, and he’d whisper, “Just like the movies, buddy.”

I’d wake up, flopping out of bed or screaming or both, with the image seared into my frontal lobe. It got so bad that I began to fear going to sleep at all.

That’s what brought me to Henry Aberdeen, up here in the rural armpit of Northeastern Pennsylvania. Yet, the vague hope that I’d be able to rid myself of the nightmare seemed distant now as Aberdeen gazed at the smoking crater.

I was just starting to think that Aberdeen had fallen asleep when he turned to me, his face flushed in the dim glow of the dashboard. “Ride up to it,” he said. “Wanna get a look.”

I didn’t argue. I knew better than to get him riled up.

“Cut your fuckin’ headlights,” Aberdeen said as the truck rolled toward the crater. He leaned close to the windshield, stubby fingers clutching the dash. “Look’a that thing.”

The crater glowed red, like a dragon buried under the soil, glaring up with an angry eye. I hit the brakes twenty feet out. “Fuck are ya doin?” Aberdeen snarled.

I began sweating profusely, felt it trickling down from my armpits. My palms were slick against the steering wheel and I was struck with nausea as I stared at the dragon’s eye up ahead. The truck grew stifling. My lungs ached for fresh air, but I didn’t dare roll the windows down, terrified to breathe in the toxic brimstone wafting up from the crater.

Aberdeen’s rounded knuckles knocked into my shoulder, giving me a jolt. “Johnny, just drive up to the fuckin’ thing,” Aberdeen said.

I let my foot off the brake pedal and the truck lurched forward. Aberdeen didn’t signal for me to stop until we were right next to the small crater. He got out of the truck, his portly frame rolling forward, a side-to-side waddle that gave the impression he could tip over at any moment.

Aberdeen leaned over the crater, sweat streaking down his face as he stared into the dragon’s eye. “Gemme my gloves, Johnny. Pry bar, too.”
I fetched his things from the pile of clutter behind the seats—empty beer cans, tools, drill bits, wrappers from microwavable gas station cuisine. The thing in the crater had cooled by the time I gave them to Aberdeen, now just a black mass lodged in the soil.

Aberdeen pulled the worn nylon work gloves over his sausage-link fingers and used the pry bar to exhume the thing from the soil. Though it had cooled considerably, even from a distance I felt the heat radiating from it. I imagined it hurtling toward us from some dark corner of the cosmos and grew nauseous again, overtaken by a powerful sense of vertigo.

Fat as he was, Aberdeen was still a powerful man. He shed his coat as he worked, the muscles bulging under the sleeves of his white V-neck T-shirt, stained with pasta sauce and cigarette ashes. He pried the thing out of the crater and hefted it onto the grass. He inspected it with the small penlight attached to his car keys.

This was no meteor. It was rectangular in shape, about the size of a shoebox. The brief flashes of the thing from Aberdeen’s penlight caused my already weak stomach to contract with sharp shooting pains. I vomited in the grass, Aberdeen was too enamored with his discovery to notice.

His eyes grew skittish, his gaze flicked this way and that, as if he expected thieves to descend on him to steal away his prize. Aberdeen hoisted the thing into the bed of the truck.

“S’go home Johnny,” he said.

*~*~*

I’m an ironworker. A rodsetter, specifically. Don’t get us confused with the structural iron guys who couldn’t hump a single length of five-bar across a work deck. My dad got me into the union. He’d been a foreman for the Local 405. When I turned eighteen, I passed the apprenticeship test and a week later I joined my dad’s deck gang on a high-rise.

I wasn’t much to look at--scrawny, weak--but I could carry a hundred pounds of rebar on my shoulder without whining about it. My dad taught me how to lay steel and tie rods the right way, running right up the carpenters’ asses as they put the finishing touches on their formwork.

My dad warned me going in that I’d have to work harder than the other guys. I was the foreman’s kid. If the guys smelled any nepotism, they’d run me right off the job. “And that’s the way it should be, buddy,” my dad had said.

I earned my stripes, by which I mean sixty-four stitches on my right arm, while helping my dad land a load of steel on the top deck. The wind was a bitch that day and the tower crane operator was cabling down too fast. My dad signaled for him to ease off but, before the operator could, a wind gust caught the load and spun five tons of razor-edged rebar right in my direction.

A long mouth opened along my arm, the fascia and flesh weeping red like wine dribbling down a drunk man’s chin. I didn’t make a peep about it until after I helped Dad detach the load from the crane cable. After that, I earned some respect. I became one of the guys and, when the stitches came out, I had a pale ragged snake on my right tricep to prove it.

Four years later I became a journeyman, a proper rodsetter constructing black steel skeletons in the Philly skyline. I loved my job. I loved working alongside my dad.

Anyway, it turned out my dad had even worse luck with tower cranes than I did. I’d hardly been a journeyman for six months. My dad was running the column gang on a high-rise near the University of Pennsylvania, right off Market Street. We were thirty floors up. I never found out who was at fault for it. Maybe the ratchet strap malfunctioned after the steel was already in the air or maybe the guy who rigged the load wasn’t smart enough to inspect it properly.

I was signaling the crane that time. The load didn’t look right but there wasn’t much I could do about it, not when it was dangling fifty feet overhead. I heard a snap. The load listed to the left. A single twenty-foot rod slid off the load, an ebony blow-dart shot down from the sky.

My dad was on the other side of the deck, arguing with a carpenter boss about deadlines. He never saw it coming. Black razor steel kissed him from his left shoulder down to his right hip and my dad opened like a blooming flower.

*~*~*

Now sitting on Aberdeen’s workbench, the awful beauty of the thing was laid bare. Mid-relief sculptures covered the obsidian material, a continuous, looping depiction of grotesque biomechanical copulation.

Its violent landfall hadn’t made even the smallest scratch upon the sculpture. Carved into the mass were vaguely humanoid figures engaging in unspeakable depravity with the machine, an unthinking collection of pistons, gears and wires.

It was hard to tell where the beings ended and the machine began. Their flesh fused with the machinery, innards tangled in the gears, with their faces coiled in blissful agony as they gave themselves over to the machine.

Without thinking, I reached out to touch the sculpture. Though it appeared to be dry, my right hand glanced a slick surface, as if the thing were covered in an imperceptible layer of fluid.

Oil or sweat, I couldn’t tell which.

I could feel the substance trying to force its way into my pores. An invasion, I thought, a profane fluid seeping into my flesh, intent on binding itself to me on a cellular level.

An image forced its way into my third eye, ones and zeroes cascading down my field of vision, bioelectric mind-rape. I saw myself, flesh bound with steel, tiny vents etched into my skin hissing steam. The hulking machine loomed over me, within me, and I felt circuitry pulsing within my intestines. The machine came to life. I opened my mouth to scream. A hive rustled in the honeycombed obsidian pathways within me. Clouds of nanobots, like microscopic gnats rumbled through my esophagus, tiny metallic wings flapping as they swarmed past my lips. My painful erection tensed within the coaxial cable attached to my cock. The machine chugged, pistons glowing molten orange, pumping, pumping, until I ejaculated boiling machine oil.

I pulled my hand away and ran to the small sink in the corner of Aberdeen’s workroom. I vigorously washed the sweat/oil from my hand, purging my flesh of the revolting substance.

Aberdeen paid me no mind. He simply grinned like a convert after a baptism. “Johnny, this is important,” he said. “Nobody can know about it. Not yet. Just us.”

“I was gonna get back to work,” I said, wanting nothing more than to get away from the thing.

Aberdeen looked back at me in confusion, as if he’d momentarily forgotten our arrangement. “Yeah Johnny, you g’back to work,” he said. “I’ll be out ‘n a bit. Gonna tinker with this thing for a little while.”

And I left him there, alone in his workroom, just Aberdeen and the thing from the crater.

*~*~*

My dad had been a fan of Henry Aberdeen’s work without ever knowing the man’s name.

Every Friday night after work, my dad parked himself on the sofa with a twelve-pack of Budweiser and watched his favorite movies. He had a bottomless appetite for grindhouse horror, slasher flicks, and sci-fi creature features.

As a kid, I’d avoid the living room television at all costs on Friday night. My stomach was too weak for the nightmarish depictions of chitinous space aliens oozing acidic saliva or shambling undead with necrotic flesh sloughing from their faces.

One Friday night, my dad—several beers deep, I must note—pulled me onto the couch with him. I tried shielding my eyes from the monstrosity on the screen, some bizarre sex demon clad in leather, its translucent skin pierced and studded with sharp objects.

“No, hold on buddy, check it out,” my dad said. He paused the VHS tape and pointed to the demon. “Look, that’s just a guy.”

I peeked through my fingers, too scared to get a better view. “It doesn’t look like a guy.”

My dad explained that it was just an actor wearing layers of makeup, paint, and prosthetics. “Half the shit on that guy’s face is made with stuff you can find under the kitchen sink, buddy.”

“Yeah?”

“That’s all it is. Most of the time, the shit that scares you the most is just made up of littler shit that ain’t scary at all. C’mere, look closer.”

My dad bent down in front of the television, the snarling sex demon still frozen on the screen. Not wanting to look like a sissy in front of my dad, I followed him.

He pointed to the demon’s hideous face. “That’s just rubber and clay, bud.”

Now up close, I could see what my father had been saying. I imagined grabbing hold of that demon’s face and yanking on it, good and hard, and how the rubbery clumps of makeup would tear off.

“Just rubber and clay,” I repeated.

“That’s right,” my dad said.

I wasn’t so scared of those movies after that. I’d join my dad on the couch every Friday night, eagerly awaiting the nightmares so I could imagine pulling them apart, one tangible layer at a time.

I recalled that memory one night while I was sitting up in bed, chewing Adderall to fight off my creeping exhaustion. I tiptoed down into the living room, careful not to wake my mom or sister, and opened the bottom drawer of the mid-sized entertainment center on which our television rested.

I’d almost forgotten they were here. All of my father’s favorite VHS tapes, still sitting snug in their cardboard covers adorned with over-the-top schlock art, now faded and frayed with crisscrossing white crinkles.

I pulled out an armful and sat on the couch with them. I fetched a beer from the kitchen and lit a Marlboro just to complete the scene, then went about looking up each individual title online, reading reviews on retro horror movie blogs, laughing at just how terrible most of these films were.

Though they had different directors, I noticed a single thread linking the films. It first occurred to me when I realized that, despite the awful reviews, the films were all praised for their costume design. The lead designer on all these films had been a man named Henry Aberdeen.

Aberdeen had no social media footprints at all. His IMDB page didn’t even include a photograph. However, Aberdeen was something of a cult legend among horror movie geeks, a near-mythical master of on-screen eldritch beasts and body horror. His career had apparently been cut short by Aberdeen’s bitter attitude, exacerbated by his enthusiastic consumption of booze.

Per Aberdeen’s bio on CentralDread.com:

Henry Aberdeen (born 1958, Philadelphia, PA) never did reach the heights of Rick Baker or Tom Savini, but he very well could have if not for his personal demons. As a young man, Aberdeen traversed high-rise construction sites as a union ironworker before setting off for Hollywood as a self-taught costume designer.

I stopped there, my mouth agape. I read that paragraph again and again as a half-formed idea slowly gestated into something actionable.

I called out of work the following day but still drove to the union hall. The business agents had been good buddies with my dad and they didn’t mind if I went nosing through the member contact info. When it comes to collecting dues from their members, the union kept meticulous records.

Aberdeen hadn’t been an active ironworker for years. The royalty checks from his films must have dried up around ’95, because after a lengthy gap, Aberdeen resumed union work. Not for long, though. Aberdeen threw his last rod in ’98 and cashed out on his pension a year later.

There was no email or phone number but the mailing address had him in Monroe County, about two hours north of Philly.

Without really considering if Aberdeen would be willing to help me, or if my plan would actually work at all, I bought two pill bottles of Adderall and a gram of meth, packed my shit into my pickup, and headed north on the turnpike later that morning.

*~*~*

Aberdeen lived in a ramshackle house nestled among a thick ring of hemlocks and evergreens. A large garage lay about ten yards behind the house with a rusted Camaro sitting out front. I noted the union stickers on the rear bumper.

The porch floorboards creaked underfoot as I knocked on the dented aluminum screen door. I felt Aberdeen’s approach as much as I heard it; foreshock tremors preceding an earthquake.

He glared at me through the screen door mesh. “What?” he asked. Even four feet back, I caught the whiskey on his breath.

“Mr. Aberdeen, my name’s John. I’m sorry to approach you like this, but I got your contact info from the union.”

He pushed his considerable bulk through the screen door, rumbling toward me, rounded fists clenched. He was short. Most long-time rodsetters are; carrying steel on one’s shoulder compacts the spine after a while.

“Listen kiddo, the Designer’s Union can suck my dick, buncha princesses, all of em. Just cause you got your union card don’t mean you can come knockin on my door when I’m tryna--”

“Mr. Aberdeen, I’m from the 405. I’m here because I want to ask you for help.”

He stopped. The floorboards groaned beneath him like they might give out. “You throw rods?”

“I’ve been a journeyman for almost a year,” I said.

He grunted. “Yeah?”

I started reaching for my wallet. “I have my book, if you don’t believe me.”

He pulled up my shirt sleeve and inspected the scar on my right arm. He grinned. “Nah, I believe ya. C’mon in Johnny, we’ll have a beer and see what I can do for ya.”

Aberdeen’s house was a menagerie of the grotesque, with models and paintings and molded masks in various stages of completion. Aberdeen explained that these days, he got by mostly on commission work for horror buffs with deep pockets along with a little help from his pension from the 405.

“What about you, kiddo?” he asked as he took two beers from the fridge. “You tryna get into the industry or somethin? It’s tougher than ever with all that fuckin’ CGI bullshit.”

Over beers and cigarettes, I explained to Aberdeen what happened with my father, and what I needed from him. “I don’t want to learn your trade to get into the movie business,” I told him. “I just want to be able to sleep again.”

Aberdeen tilted his bottle to his lips, took a long drink then puffed his Marlboro as he considered my request.

“I can pay you,” I added.

He waved me off. “Fuck that. Rodsetters gotta look out for each other, Johnny. Consider yourself my apprentice.”

Aberdeen was a harsh teacher, but a fair one. Exactly what I expected from an ironworker-turned-artist. While he didn’t accept payment for his lessons, he did make me provide my own tools and supplies. His workshop in the house was a sanctuary, of sorts, a place for the man to construct the images from his nightmares. I’d have to find other lodgings to craft my own.

He let me set up shop in the garage, once I cleared out the garbage, a process that took the better part of two days. Aberdeen let me sleep in his guest bedroom (only half a day to clean that one out) while I studied under his tutelage.

Over the first few weeks, Aberdeen hammered the fundamentals into me. How to work with plaster and clay, how to form molds, the proper ways to apply paint, and so on. I was an eager pupil and, despite my fatigue, soon I was crafting decent practice prosthetics.

He grinned in surprise at my latest work, a recreation of his sex demon. It was only a bust and not as expertly crafted as the original by any means, but it looked damn good. “You’re comin’ along Johnny,” Aberdeen said. “Tomorrow we’ll start on your real deal.”

But Aberdeen never got further than helping me with the blueprints, because one night later, we found the dragon’s eye, the thing from the crater.

*~*~*

Aberdeen locked himself away in his workroom. He didn’t leave except to borrow my pickup to make trips for material. He’d be gone for twelve hours or more before returning with scrap metal, copper pipes, and heavy iron gears. He didn’t want any help. “I gotta do this one myself, kiddo.”

He worked day and night. I couldn’t tell if he slept or not. I listened to him work, the growl of a grinder blade, a hissing blowtorch, the booming clank of a hammer, metal-on-metal. I had no interest in his new endeavor, nor did he want to share his progress with me. The few times I saw him, he’d be apologetic. “Lemme finish this new idea, Johnny,” he said. “Fuckin’ thing is like a pebble in my boot. Gotta get it out, ya know?”

Even with Aberdeen’s workroom door shut and locked, I felt the toxic presence of the thing permeate the house. The air tasted vile, like cum and machine oil. At night, it whispered alien profanities in my ear and I couldn’t shake visions of it, where it came from and what built it. I pictured a mad acolyte, carving the thing from molten rock or some mysterious metal, chipping it piece by piece with a trembling reptilian claw while caught in manic delirium, arousal and release and sanctity. I saw vast skylines stretching to grey horizons, towering power plants buzzing electric, a mechanized planet gnawing at its own core, one crafted from flesh, damp and squirming. No matter how often I scrubbed my hand, I couldn’t rid the oil/sweat from my skin.

The nightmares became worse. More vivid. No longer did I simply watch my father die night after night. Now I could smell the contents of his innards, the shit-stink from his lacerated colon. I’d look into the fading light within my father’s eyes and feel it all, the horror and confusion and panic as he bled out on the plywood deck.

I decided that I’d go back to work without Aberdeen. If I didn’t finish my project, I would go mad. I kept away from the house, away from the thing he'd taken from the crater, and took what I needed to the garage. Once I got back to work, I didn’t sleep at all. I upped my dosage and saw the world through a methamphetamine prism, a glass window smeared with dirt.

The invisible oil/sweat stain on my skin itched horrendously. Whenever I’d stop working, it grew so insufferable that I considered peeling the flesh off with a razor. Yet when I worked, that mad itch grew into a muse, guiding my hand as I built precision silicone molds and layered them with clay and plaster.

Before long, I worked without taking any breaks, drenched in sweat despite the vicious February winter slicing through every crack in the garage walls. I’d blackout for hours at a time, only to snap back into focus to find that I’d added meticulous touches to my project, a near-perfect recreation of the horrors that haunted my dreams.

I was just beginning to paint a new prosthesis when I heard Aberdeen pull into the driveway in my pickup. I hadn’t even known he was gone. He saw me, gave me a curt nod, and that was when I saw the woman in the truck with him.

Her face looked like leather, with blackened teeth, and I imagined that if she removed her coat I’d see that her arms were potted with injection marks. A prostitute, I thought, from one of the truck stops off Route 33. I wondered how much Aberdeen paid her, or if he was honest about the services he needed.

They disappeared into the house. I got back to work.

*~*~*

A week passed before I saw Aberdeen again.

I was on my hands and knees, just about finished with the last layer of paint. Outside, a gentle snow fell from the midnight sky. Inside the house, I heard Aberdeen working. His hammer clanging, a hydraulic impact driver whirling, tightening, and I suspected that whatever he was building in there, he was almost finished.

A yawn escaped my lips. I thought it was about time for another blast of crank. I blinked and, that quickly, sleep pounced on me.

“Just like the movies, buddy.”

I thrashed and screamed as I awoke. I’d been asleep for forty-five minutes. My heart chugged along and I snorted another line. I returned to my project. It was all but complete, save for one issue that I had yet to resolve. When we’d drawn up the blueprints, Aberdeen had suggested that I go to a butcher’s shop or, barring that, into the woods to find a dead animal. A deer, perhaps. I’d yet to do either. Ultimately, Aberdeen ended up aiding me with my project, after all.

Outside the garage, I heard footsteps crunching in the snow. Aberdeen waddled into the garage holding something in a plastic tarp, something that steamed in the frigid night air. His shirt was splattered red.

“This should do it for ya,” Aberdeen said as he lay the steaming pile of guts down on the floor in front of me.

I didn’t ask where he got it, but I’d noted that the prostitute never left the house. It didn’t matter to me. Nothing mattered, except for the project.

“Thanks,” I said.

Despite his gory appearance, Aberdeen’s eyes radiated peace. I didn’t smell any whiskey on him. He was tired, but sober. “How long before you’re finished?” he asked.

I shrugged. “Dunno. Not long.”

He smiled as he looked over my work. “Kiddo, that’s better than anything I ever did.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty good, ain’t it?

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help ya more.”

“No worries, Mr. Aberdeen.”

“It’s just…that thing we found,” he said. His smile widened. His graying stubble was specked with dried blood. “It was meant to come to me, Johnny.”

“I should probably start finishing up,” I told him. “I’m so fucking tired.”

“I hear ya, kiddo,” he said. “But if ya could do me just one lil favor?”

Of course I would. Rodsetters have to look out for each other.

“Before ya leave,” Aberdeen went on, “just pop into my workroom. There’s one bit I can’t finish on my own.”

“You got it, Mr. Aberdeen.”

“Hank. Just call me Hank.”

“You got it, Hank.”

When he left, I packed the viscera—still warm—into the gap inside the project. I arranged the guts as accurately as I could before taking a razor knife and splitting it with a diagonal slash, upper-left down to the lower-right.

I stood over my work, judging it as objectively as any artist would of their own work. Some proportions were off, most notably in the hands, though not by much. The wear-and-tear on the workboots didn’t quite ring true, and I couldn’t find a matching hardhat.

But the central core of the project was spot-on. I looked down at my recreation of my father’s death, his eyes wide with fear, his mouth smeared with blood. Down on my knees beside him, I took his hand into my own and held it tight.

I ran my fingers over his face, noticing that the oil/sweat stain on my hand no longer itched. I took hold of the painted clay and plaster, dug my fingertips into the flesh facsimile, and I pulled it apart, one tangible layer at a time.

After I tore the nightmare to pieces, I collapsed on the floor, eyelids heavy, and for the first time in months, I slept without dreams.

*~*~*

Inside Aberdeen’s house, the presence of the thing from the crater was overpowering. The air felt greasy, like walking through it would leave me covered in a thin layer of oil. I drew a breath and sulfur filled my lungs.

The door to his workroom had been left slightly ajar. Behind it, I heard fluid dripping and garbled respirations. The floor groaned under a heavy weight. I pulled the door open and beheld Aberdeen’s unspeakable creation.

It was a patchwork monstrosity cobbled together from dozens of disparate spare parts, yet it’s resemblance to the horrors sculpted on the thing from the crater was unmistakable.

Aberdeen was suspended aloft, fused with the machine. Steel and aluminum and sheet metal pierced his naked form, binding him to his creation. His skin rippled with power outlets, sewn crudely into his flesh, with power cords connected to a nearby pull-cord generator, sitting idle. A thick bouquet of rubber-skinned copper wires had been jammed into his throat. The corners of his mouth had split to accommodate the mass. Those wires ran to the thing from the crater, still sitting on Aberdeen’s workbench, encased snugly inside the flayed flesh of the prostitute, so tight I could make out the sculptures through the skin.

Aberdeen opened his eyes. I saw at once that he was in tremendous pain, but he endured the agony like a martyr caught in a lion’s jaw. He nodded toward the generator. I realized what would happen if I turned the generator on and my first instinct was to flee, to forget this awful scene, but as I watched a single tear roll down Aberdeen’s cheek, I knew that I couldn’t betray his trust.

Not now. Not after what he’d done for me.

I yanked on the pull-cord. The generator rumbled to life. The machine hissed and bellowed. Slowly, the gears started to turn.

“Thanks, Hank,” I said, though my voice was lost under the machine’s roar.

I shut off the lights and closed the door behind me.

End.

*~*~*

Mack Moyer is a dark fiction writer from Philadelphia. His novella, Back to Her, is currently available on Amazon. You can find Mack at www.MackMoyerAuthor.com

Artist: Joseph Diaz

The Beastly Echoes of Necropedia

By L.P. Melling

I must make it clear from the start: my name is Kyle Warren, these words are not my own, the style belonging to one long dead, and I’m powerless to change that as I recount what happened.

The twisted story began with my finding of a sinister tale, which for the life of me I wish I had never had the misfortune of stumbling upon online.

That evening, utilizing various genealogy websites, I researched the dark history of my great-grandfather for some hours, and needed a rest from the mental and emotional exertions it entailed. Shamed by what I’d learned, I had to focus my mind elsewhere. Thus googling and consulting Necropedia to pass away the time, as many others have done themselves, I selected an entry on “Beasts,” of which there were a number of links that cross-referenced the veracity of others. Buried deep within these, after hours of locked-eyed reading, I came across an entry that I noted had been added on the same date. It was, therefore, odd that the story to which it led me was one penned by a John Clement in the year 1813. The reasons why such an entry, with its antiquarian origin, had only recently been added could only be guessed upon; but its content sucked at my heart and soul with horrors my mind had formerly not been burdened with. What was stranger still about the chain of events that followed was, upon later checking the website the following day, the entry had been taken down, expunged from the Internet but never from my mind. Although it has now been almost a year since I read that venomous tale, which seared itself into my memory, I know now it can never be exuviated and will haunt me for the rest of my days.

Indeed, using the last of the Emory University’s redundancy money I’d received, it later precipitated thousands of air miles, in order to hunt down the mystery of Clement’s tale. A learned man and an eminent natural historian, Clement recounted how things changed forever for him when he moved to the North West of England, bringing his loyal Weimaraner with him to the Lake District. He took up residence in a modest cottage in the area, and was funded by an eccentric lord by the name of Kelsey, who had given up one of his own properties to Clement so he could carry out a task that was said to be of “utmost importance.” Upon the cruel and untimely death of Clement’s wife to consumption, financial struggles started to creep into his life, and, as he admitted in his account, this was undoubtedly why he jumped at the opportunity with little forethought. Clement told how he watched his true love waste away, her skin clinging to her bones as she screamed at him to help her. The illness darkening her mood beyond that he’d thought possible. She scathingly attacked his family name for the crimes they had committed in the New World. For the secured cargo his great-grandfather transported there from Africa. Still haunted by the memory of her, he had to have a change in is life, and this was it. I could not help but pity Clement for this.

Across the deep and murky waters of the district, lakes had been said to turn as salted as seawater overnight, and cracks in the earth to have opened, maw-like, upon embankment and tributary. Yet, with Clement’s first wanderings around his new place of residence, he saw little in the way of other people, and those he did come across had tongues that grew slow and silent when asked if they experienced any strange happenings on the Lakes.

Stranger still, and mentioned only in passing by Lord Kelsey, Clement found evidence from the work of the property’s former occupant Phillip Humphrey. Kelsey confirmed that Humphrey had carried out some research, but had gone mad after a year of isolation in the place, ending in his suicide. The cottage was many miles away from any village, town, or neighbor, and the lonely feel of the place, with its creaks and abandoned rooms, gave credence to such an account. Even more so, the journal discovered by Clement shewed clearly that the hand which had written it belonged to one who had lost all reason and sanity; the lexicon used therein esoteric and incomprehensibly arranged. It included such odd coinages as “Internet,” “Multiculturalism” and “Necropedia” that no one else of that time had heard of; for the latter one could imagine it was an encyclopedia of the dead, yet after sustained efforts on Clement’s part, he was unable to find such a book. And in the shewing of some of the words to a friend and leading philologist, he could deduce neither sense nor meaning from such terms. There was talk of being “online” in Humphrey’s journal, but no mention of what type of line this was. The thought of a book tied to a line is verging on the facetious, he wrote, but the journal, regardless of such odd terminologies, filled one only with a sense of unedifying dread.

Clement had read of Humphrey’s visit to the banks of the misted Lakes in the district, a baying sound dogging at his every step and the noisome splashes close to the dark water’s edge, as if created by some large seabeast of the night. A time when he said his nightmares had become cold realities as he rushed from his pursuer, his heart froze black; the sound like a giant hound breathing down his neck but belonging to something altogether different and more horrid. The hideous parts of different beasts formed as one atrocity. Thereafter the scrawl becomes illegible, Clement explained, and it was said by Lord Kelsey that Humphrey forever heard the sounds of vicious barking.

Like myself, Clement was disturbed by what he read, but he was keen to chase this mystery to the same lake’s edge the following eve. He could not be certain he was in the same location, so he circumnavigated the lake in search of it with his jet-black dog Rufus. It was on his second cycle that he too thought he heard a splash, his oil lantern revealing a dark and twisting eddy, the boiling of black water only feet away from where he stood.

At first, he thought he had imagined such sounds, sleep-deprivation seating dark imaginations to run riot in his mind, but as he held his breath, he heard the unmistakable sound of another dog, much larger than Rufus. But rather than the usual bark and growl response that Rufus was so keen to demonstrate, his faithful companion started to whine and whimper, causing a pricking on Clement’s neck that penetrated his bones.

Racing home, he did not venture forth into the blackness the following night but waited for daylight two mornings hence to resume his investigation. Upon returning to the lapping water’s edge, his nerve deserted him, despite the cloud-muted light. Rufus, however, seemed to be back to his usual self, chasing crows and yomping over hill and wet channel. The enthusiastic barking filled the air and Clement’s heart with good cheer, but this was instantly shattered by a shaking of the ground beneath foot and paw. The embankments began to fissure and sever. A black furrow ran foul across the land for over sixty feet, and he knew not if it was his shuddering or the earth that was now making him shake. Rufus scampered to his owner, unsure of whether to stay or flee, his hackles up; but loyalty gave out as he barked an assault against the breaking world.

Clement called for him to follow as he fled away from the fractured earth. Rushing ahead of Rufus, a piercing yelp clamped onto Clement’s temples. Turning around, he saw his dog had fallen into a newly created hole. The embedded rock cloven at either side of the gaping hole, it looked like hellish teeth as the earth shook again and swallowed his friend whole.

The screams of the dog echo still, Clement wrote, but worse soon came to follow as a ferocious howling drowned out every other noise, and the sky turned black, the blood-red sun eclipsed by the moon. The lightless air prickled with cruelty as a false-night descended around him, so Clement knew no longer what was star-blotted sky and what was dark water. A charnel stench festered in his nasal cavity. He said that the lake began to boil and froth in a violent frenzy, and he saw his wife step out of the water, her face gaunt, ebon skin paled by decay, peeling, as she pointed an accusatory finger at him.

She took her skin at the jawline and ripped it from her face, revealing a tentacled head, its cranial limbs writhing en masse and glowing poisonous green. Clement ran. Birds swallowed by night began to rent the air with birdsquawk, fleeing as much as he. Limbs bleeding after scratches from bramble and fall, Clement slammed the cottage door behind him. He shuddered the entire night, no longer knowing what was but a dark dream and what was dark reality.

He saw shadowy visions of the future, or so he thought, where innumerable advancements had changed the world, more akin to alchemy than science. He saw race equality achieved but then angrily snatched back from people of all types, as hate grew and grew, the wickedness of man seeming to advance as fast as the technology. And those words from Humphrey’s journal, so strange and out of kilter with the world, began to take on meaning for Clement, to make complete sense, where everything else in the world no longer did. It made him question his own sanity. Were they the only two in an otherwise ignorant world, he wondered, and thus being the minority, would always be considered to be anything but compos mentis.

The barking was relentless. With his dreams forever blackened by the sight of his lifeless wife and giant hound and sea-fiend, Clement had to flee the property. He hastily scrawled a letter to Kelsey, stating that he resigned post hence, and paid for a horse and carriage to convey him as far away as possible from the cosmic horrors of the Lake District. That was almost a year ago, Clement explained in his account, but he made clear that he would forever be haunted by what he saw, and that in every shadow lurked twisted shapes of the foul creatures he found at the Lakes. His last journal entry told how he knew the time was near, when he would be taken by the darkness. The dark beast awoken inside of him, the guilt he felt for his wife, Rosa, eating the last of him away.

I can still see Clement’s final entry I’d read online, each word clawing at my mind, cutting into my heart, as he begged God for mercy. What struck me most, however, was not so much the final words themselves but their arrangement, which took on an increasingly twenty-first-century pattern of phrasing, akin to my own customary style, and out of place with that which came before it. As if it had been written today, in 2013. Unable to concentrate on anything else for days afterward, I delved into further research of the Lake District and started to make inquiry about flights to Manchester, England from my home city of Atlanta. I had to know more about this poisonous tale. I had to unmask the mystery.

Booking my ticket in a family name that had been changed by political necessity, to purge the sins committed in generations past, I began my expedition. The flight was uneventful. Looking back, I can see without doubt that I did not feel any increased sense of dread, although I know I should have, mindful of what dark and sordid intertextual tale was to come. I had almost booked a flight with a stopover in London, and now I wished I had, because the peace I felt on that flight and from my cab ride to the Cumbrian Lakes, was one I will never know again; a time when my hands stayed still, my flesh fulsome and clinging clean to my bones. The gaunt face I see today, with deep holes for eye sockets, is nothing like that which I saw in the confined spaces of the plane’s lavatory at high altitude.

The cottage was easier to find than I know it should have been. Although I had cross-referenced the location and used every online tool at my disposal, the bones of the house had been reclaimed by nature. Overgrown ivy nested around the outer walls, the roof was moss-covered, weeds of every family beastly high around its base. Indeed, I know not how I found it there, and wonder if some tenebrous force was leading me to that place all along.

After cutting through the intense greenery, my brow sodden and night beginning to fall, I finally had access to the door and pushed hard to open its secrets. The creaking of door’s hinges cut into my ears and the milky twilight filled the void before me.

I used the torch application on my telephone device to burn away the remaining shadows that lay inside. The place seemed as if no living thing had been present in all the years that stretched between Clement and me. Indeed, how I had pictured it in my mind was almost a carbon copy of the layout, a lifeless-gray chiaroscuro of a dwelling. The dead air that had been collecting all those decades assaulted my nostrils, filling them with the decaying fetid breath of forgotten times. Bone-chilling stillness pervaded the room. I hesitated and thought of calling a cab back to Kendal, where I could sup fine ale and enjoy the warm company of the local inhabitants in a town not ten miles away. The driver had told me at length about this, making his recommendation of a New Inn he frequented and favored. The call of such warmth, to flee from the cold now gathering beneath my skin, was too much. Thus, I brought up my recent contacts and called the same cab firm. However, the dial tone rang clear for only one bell before abruptly being cut off. I retried the number, but found there was no signal. I’d expected this to some extent. For this was a place far removed from other residencies. My signal had been fine upon exiting the cab, so I walked farther away from the cottage, an endeavor to find a better spot, and tried to call the number again and again. My efforts were futile, achieving nothing but a drained battery now at an emergency-low level.

There was nothing for it. I had to either walk the dark roads alone or stay in the accursed cottage that filled me with fear. Pushing down my cowardice, I re-entered the property and used my torch to light the way. In the corner was the desk I noticed earlier, with a drawer that I’d took to be locked. Nonetheless, on wrenching the knob with some force, it opened. A journal lay inside the drawer, its tan cover marbled from watermarks, yet there seemed no further damage to it despite the long years. I carefully and gently placed it on the desk and opened it up to the first page. The uncanny familiarity of its words grew with each one read; then it struck me. The words were the exact ones I’d read online. But how? How could it be? As if the journal had been trapped here for years, how could Clement’s journal have been posted online?

Sweat poured off me as my mind ached with it all, then my battery gave a final warning signal, the light cutting out on a page stained with blood, the fingerprint burning into my eyes long after the illumination was gone.

The creak of the door, its deafening slam, froze my soul in place. I raced towards the door, struggling to breathe. Gripping hard, I pulled with all my might, but it would no longer budge. I prayed to everything merciful, to all the gods I knew, and at last the door gave way. I fell, for an eternity it seemed until I landed on solid floor. I stood, decaying floorboard groaning beneath my feet, and ran out of the cold cottage. I thought surely I would twist my ankle, unable to see anything beyond an arm’s length in front of me, but then a cloud moved away to reveal a gibbous moon. Its strong light lit the pathway ahead, and it led me deep into the woods, without any sign of a safer road back to civilization.

I rushed down this ragged-cut path until it declined steeply and there was a sudden change in the air. It was less humid somehow; then my dulled senses realized why as the lake’s water glinted with moonlight. I knew now what I had to do: follow the embankment, what seemed like a giant shore, to its end. There would be boathouses along the way, shops close by, even the odd inn. After all, the area was known for its visitors. All I had to do was find one to shelter me from this fitful state.

But I was keenly aware of the memories my current locale brought up. Not of my own. No, of Clements, of the memories I’d read that had filled me with dread. I pushed them out of my mind as much as I could, though they resurfaced like foul creatures I imagined lurking just below the murky surface of the lake despite its stillness. I yearned to find a similar calm in myself as I broadened my stride along the embankment. The jagged peaks of Scafell Pike jutted into the sky, looming monstrous in the distance, its outline appeared as cruel-cut teeth. I felt the walls of its solid rock closing in on me as I hurried on.

I was hastened by the sight in the far distance of some illuminated building, which I took to be an internet café or something of its ilk. I began to run, latching onto the hope of a warm place to retreat from the increasing cold. Despite the distance I covered over the next ten minutes, the illuminated building seemed to come no closer to me.

I struggled to breathe a moment, slowing down to a halt when I sensed something behind me. It was then that I heard the sound of a dog crying for mercy, ululating raw, one I knew could only be that of the black dog that had been Clement’s loyal companion.

I looked over my shoulder as I ran, but saw nothing. Nothing was there. It was then, eyes no longer focused on the ground in front of me, that I lost my footing, tripped over a jagged rock. I tried to stand but couldn’t. I rubbed at my eyes, seeing nothing in the moonlight, and knew it could only be my troubled mind. Now fraying at the edges, infected by others’ stories, by the surrounds that had started to bleed into my dreams since that day I clicked on the link to read a story I never should have.

The moon, which had been kind in lighting my way, was choked by cloud cover. The world turned black around me, and I could no longer see where the murky water began or ended, where the dark sky ceased to be, as if everything had been turned upside down. Dizziness took me. A godlike splash echoed into the night, and a shrieking of birds from somewhere out of sight pierced my eardrums. I called for help to the fading light of what I thought had been a building, my salvation, but now I knew it to be nothing but a trick of the light.

I had to rise, and so I did, limping and shaking like some lame colt, trying to flee the sounds that would not abate. I froze mid step when up nearby something large and black emerged from the murky water. The flicking of tentacles from its giant mouth confirmed my fears. Darkness surrounded it, but nothing could be as black as its opened giant maw, an abyss eager to take my soul. It dragged itself towards me, covered in weeds, slime-coated, silt-sullied, as if from the bottom of the lake, from the bottom of the earth itself. From the darkest depths of man’s imagination. I could not move, only watch. A scream trapped inside my throat stole my breath. Its protean face came closer, became smaller, and I saw it in all its cruelty, the shape of a hooded-mask, a pointed top, bright white when new but now algae-stained blue-green. It pulled off its spiteful disguise, clicking out three Ks with its mephitic tongue on those three hateful words, and I looked upon my long lost great-grandfather, Clifford Walker, the one that my family, the Deep South, had tried so hard to forget.

I do not know where or how I found the power to rise, but I did. My limbs were jellied eels, pain screaming from my ankle. Somehow, I scrambled away. For what felt like an eternity, the ungodly noises continued to dog my every step, but I did not turn around, the image of the squamous beast, my great-grandfather’s sins incarnate, burned into my mind’s eye. At last, I realized the cruel connection between Clement and myself, our families’ dark pasts shackled to our souls. I continued to flee the beast, but knew now it was buried inside me, like it had been for Clement all those years ago.

Only when dawn started to dispel the darkness was the building at last in reach, putting me in mind somehow of an edifice in Druid Hills where I lived. I rushed to the door, wrenched it open, and fell inside, much to the astonishment of the people within. An attendant of the café rang me a cab to the airport. I took the next flight available back home, my nerves and mind frayed. The horrific screams of stolen people branded onto my soul.

The clock is close to striking midnight, marking one year since those events took place, but the same sounds, the same ghastly sights, fill my febrile dreams, my waking hours, every labored breath. And as I write, no, as I type this now, my hands shaking, chewed-off fingernails leaving bloody prints on the keys, I’m haunted still by what I saw, writing in a style I do not recognize as my own, in a style not of my own time. No matter how many times I have tried to put down this poisonous tale, it always comes out the same way, as if I’m powerless to control it; and so these will be my final words.

Yet, there is one crucial thing I must leave you with, no matter its form, the true purpose of my account, and that is to beg you never to consult that dark section of Necropedia. For it will suck you into its dark heart. Enslave you to its malign will. All I can do now is wait to be taken by the shadows that draw closer with every breath, as the beastly echoes claw out the last part of my mind.

*~*~*

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*~*~*

L. P. Melling currently writes from the East of England after academia and a legal career took him around the UK. His fiction has appeared in such places as Tales to Terrify, Frozen Wavelets, Shoreline of Infinity, and the Best of Anthology: The Future Looms. When not writing, he works for a legal charity in London. You can find out more about him on his site: www.lpmelling.wordpress.com

Hand of Fate

By Colleen Anderson

Hand in hand we promenaded
strode over bloodied bodies
those we wronged, jeered at, used
ecstatic with the scent of their breath
we dodged for many years, devised
ploys, lies, ways to bury the truth

we were each other’s lovers
of life, chasing prey that so delighted
escaping those that sought us
and carried oh so gently nestled
in the hand of an indifferent giant
we thought we chose the path

weaving our lives with fate’s
we delivered victim’s destinies
plucked eyes and savored tongues
silenced screams, dealt their hands
we held the scales, weighed
each life as we decreed

until that inadvertent moment
we left a careless clue
one mistake amongst the remains
and that hand let us plummet
it flicked us like annoying gnats
fingers pinched us, cuffed together

caged like any other specimen
we had once seized and dissected
whether bestowed by gods, demons
or strangely blessed women
there is nothing so sobering
so perilously astounding
as when that hand of fate takes
needle and thread and stitches
into us our final length of day

*~*~*

Colleen Anderson has a BFA in writing and her poems have been published in such venues as Mirror Dance, Polu Texni, The Future Fire, HWA Poetry Showcase and others. She is a Canada Council and BC Arts Council grant recipient for writing and has performed her work before audiences in the US, UK and Canada. Colleen’s collection, I Dreamed a World, will be published in early 2021. Colleen has also published fiction including the collection A Body of Work, Black Shuck Books. www.colleenanderson.wordpress.com

Space Lizards

By Matthew Penwell

“Well, boys,” Captain West said, sitting at a metal table. “Think about it: in a few hours, we will be the first men to step foot on Mars.”

No one said a word, but everyone had stopped eating. It was setting in now. At least it was for me. It didn’t seem possible. Men. On Mars. And I was one of those men. Captain West had set up a small digital counter to approximate the time our rocket would land. Two hours, nineteen minutes, twenty-three seconds, and counting.

“Well?” Captain West went on.

“It’s wonderful, sir.” Whitehead forced a smile.

“Men, we’re about to make history. I would expect a more lighthearted mood to be in order.”

“Yes, sir.” Whitehead muttered. He spooned mashed potatoes into his mouth so that he wouldn’t have to speak anymore.

“What’s ‘a matter with you all?”

“It’s just,” Jenkins said. “I don’t know how to put it into words.”

“Fantasy.” I said. “We’re living a Bradbury story. The first men on Mars. This stuff was written about only a hundred years ago. Think of the progress we’ve made.”

“Yeah,” Jenkins said. “Something like that.”

Whitehead laughed.

“Men, it’s been an honor to make this trip with you.”

“Awe, Cap,” Whitehead wiped an invisible tear away from his eye. “You’re making me cry over here.”

West smiled. “I always knew you were the baby of the group, Whitehead. Momma’s boy. They laughed at you, the other Men, but I believed in you since day one. How can someone so small have such a large brain? I don’t know how to lug it around, honestly.”

“I hope you get bent over by an alien.” Whitehead said. “No lube.”

A gasp from Jenkins. “What language! There are kids present.” He winked at me.

“Men,” West pushed his chair away from the table, and stood. “Try not to get too drunk. We have a job to do in a few hours. Remember that. I’m going to try and rest before we land. Need my energy.” He turned away and left the control room. He left the door open behind him.

“Anyone up for a game of cards?” Jenkins asked.

“I’ll bet a buck or two.” said Whitehead.

They both looked at me. “Nah. Count me out. I got some things to do.”

“Jerk his meat.” Jenkins said.

“Choking the chicken,” Whitehead added.

“Flailing the tube steak.”

“Waxing the weasel.”

I rolled my eyes and stood. “...Rolling the bone…” I gave a quick glance at the computer screen. “...jumping the jack…” Mars was a growing red dot in a sea of black. “...nuzzling the nuggets…” I left the room. Who knew how long they would go at it.

In my bunker, I sat on the edge of my cot. My tongue poked against the inside of my cheek. A habit I’ve had since childhood, when I fell into deep thought. Less than three hours. Nine months. Staring out at the infinite darkness of space, towards Mars. No one knew exactly what the outcome would be. It was a risk. But we’d made it. By God, we’d made it.

I didn’t mean to fall asleep. But that’s what happened. The next thing I knew, West’s voice was booming over the intercom. We were under attack!

I hurried out of my bunker, towards the main control room. West’s voice echoed down the corridor. His requests on what actions he should take would go unheard for four and a half minutes, give or take. Their reply would return within ten, give or take.

Jenkins was already there. His mouth hung open. His eyes were wide with shock. “What is it?” I said, running up next to him. I’m sure if I could have seen myself, I would have had the same expression as Jenkins. I couldn’t believe what was there.

They resembled lizards, scaly beasts that stood ten feet tall, on their hind legs. A tail extended from their body, giving them balance. Tink. Tink. Tink.
Nearly hidden by the sound of the rocket’s engine, I heard arrows hitting the metal exterior. I saw rage in their small watery eyes. Rage and confusion.

“Sir,” Jenkins spat, “what are we to do?”

West shook his head and looked at the screens. “I guess we land.”

“You joking, boss?” asked Whitehead.

“Men, you knew there would be no going back before signing the papers. Don’t tell me you’re wimping out on me now.”

“Yeah,” Whitehead said. “I knew that I would die here. But I thought it would be of old age. Not—” He gestured towards the screen. “Whatever the hell those things are.”

“It’s clear what they are.” I blurted out. “Martians.”

“Space lizards.” Jenkins said.

“Space lizards,” I mused, dreamily.

They were scurrying away as we got closer, burying deep into the sand, to escape the heat of our thrusters.

“Men. We’re the first people to come into contact with a being from another planet.” West said with a smile. “We land, men. That’s final. We have no other option.” There were no more purple lizards in sight. He walked to the control panel, shifted down three levers, pushed a few buttons. There was a hiss, like the brakes of a bus. West looked over his shoulder at us. “We don’t even know if they meant us harm.”

“Sure. They were shooting arrows at us for fun?” I said.

“Men, consider their perspective. If a weird ship full of weird beings came to Earth, what would be our first reaction? We would fend it off, as an enemy, believing it will do harm to us. But we don’t know. They may, like us, come in peace.”

This got the rest of us thinking. The rocket vibrated. I thought for sure my teeth were going to click away in my mouth until they were all broken off. Thud. We landed in the red Mars dust.

“We…” the intercom sprang to life. “Atta’ by who?”

West picked up the receiver, pressed the button on the side. “We landed. The Martians…”

“Lizards.” Whitehead muttered under his breath.

“...have retreated under the sand. Standing by for further instructions. West out.” He turned to us. And breathed heavily. His body slumped as if a heavy weight was put on him. “Gear up. We’re going out.”

“Sir, with all the respect…” Whitehead started. West threw up a palm.

“Gear up. We’re meeting in the Chamber in thirty minutes. Failure to appear for duty will result in your rank being taken away.”

Jenkins chucked. “Sir. As you said, we knew what we were signing up for. We know death is coming. So you can take your rank and shove it to Kingdom Come. I’m not going out there.”

West’s face flushed crimson. Small beads of sweat formed on his brow. His hands curled into fists, uncurled. I poked at my inner cheek. Things were getting heavy in here.

West took Jenkins by the collar, pulled him close to his face. I waited. Whitehead waited. We made eye contact. We both knew what to do if things got bad. West shoved Jenkins backwards. Jenkins stumbled, but kept his balance.

“Do you two feel like Jenkins?” West asked. He looked at me, and then to Whitehead. Neither of us spoke. “I see how it is. I'm going out there.”

West stormed out of the control room. Jenkins, Whitehead, and I stood in silence. We turned to the screen, and waited for West to appear.

No one seemed to breathe until West’s figure became visible.

“Shit. He really did it.” Whitehead said. “We let him do it.”

“We didn’t do anything.” Jenkins confirmed. “He did it with his own free will. And if we would have let him, he would have taken us, too.”

“He’s walking to his grave.”

On the screen West walked slowly, his arms slack at his side. The large bulb-shaped helmet bobbed with each step. If you keep poking your cheek, it’s going to get raw. Jenkins shifted the camera to follow West on his progression across Mars.

It happened suddenly. I knew it was going to happen, and still let out a yelp of surprise when West fell to the ground, and then sank into it, like a man getting pulled down to Hell. But I knew West. West wouldn’t go down without a fight. Come on, West. Get out of there. The patch of sand West had disappeared into exploded. West’s arms stretched out, his fingers dug into the ground uselessly. Jenkins made a low mewing sound as the lizard brought a fist down onto the glass helmet. West’s hands stopped digging at the ground. The lizard wrapped its claws around West’s head and jerked him back into the sand.

Whitehead turned away from the screen, gagging.

Jenkins scrambled to the radio. “Hello. Anyone hear me? We need help. Jeffrey Whitehead. Hank Jenkins. Andrew Collins. There are lizards outside of our rocket. They attacked us with arrows as we were landing. Our captain, Fredrick West, went out to greet them. They…” He let out a whimper, “...were hostile.”

Jenkins returned the radio transmitter to its holder. His face was ashen. A sheen of sweat covered his forehead. What did we just see? He was silent but his face bore the question. We knew what we had just seen. But it wasn’t possible. There was nothing in any aerial photos that suggested any beings lived on Mars. They didn’t. They lived in Mars.

“What now?” I asked.

Jenkins shrugged. “We wait—for help.”

The cabinets were filled with packets of food; everything from Big Macs and fries to the American classic: hot dogs with mustard and relish. There was enough to last years. As it had been planned. Food wasn’t an issue. Water wouldn’t be an issue. I got a yellow packet from the shelf: raspberry tart, and opened it. The pink paste smelled like rotten berries, but it went down easily enough. Years to go. I closed the cabinet.

“Men.” The radio squeaked to life. “Men. It ‘as been an honor to ha’ you dedi’te your life to space travel. You are ‘ood men. We’ was one of the ‘est men I ever knew. Your ‘amily has been informed of your acc’dent. The public will soon ‘e told we’ve lo’ communication with ‘ou. ‘Od Bless.”

Click. I’d heard the radio click off a thousand times, but never like that. It sent a pang of terror through my heart. It was like the closing of a coffin lid or the slamming shut of a door to a mausoleum, and we were still inside.

Jenkins swung his arm back and brought his fist down, radio in hand, onto the control panel. The radio shattered, cut deep into his palm. He howled in pain, clinching his hand in the other. He turned in my direction. Jenkins had tears in his eyes. I felt them welling in mine. There would be no help.

A sudden second possibility sprang out of my mouth: “We have enough food to last years. Remember? They’re apt to send another rocket, sooner or later. If we can just…”

Jenkins swung on me. I wasn’t expecting it. The sudden flare of pain on the left side of my face sent my head swimming. I stumbled backwards, fell onto my ass. Hard. A gasp of breath escaped my lungs from the impact. I looked up in time to see Jenkins walking towards me. I tried to get to my feet before Jenkins got to me. I didn’t. I shifted my weight and lunged for Jenkins. It took him by surprise. He lost his footing. I landed on top of him. I brought my fist down, into his mushy face. On the third strike I heard a loud snap.

I jumped off Jenkins, backed up quickly. Jenkins’ face was a mess of red. His eyes were wide white orbs in a crimson sea. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Whitehead; saw him swallow back his words. Jenkins rose. He kept his eyes on me. He smeared blood across his arm, examined it. He nodded and extended his hand towards me.

“No hard feelings. You got the best of me. I didn’t know you had it in you.”

“We’ve got to keep our cool.” I shook his hand. His grip was harder than it should have been. “For all our sakes.”

“Yeah. For all our sakes.”

I looked him in the eyes. There was nothing cool about them. They burned like hellfire.

It’s hard to keep track of time. I’m aware of when it’s day and when it’s night. But I have no clue about the date. The digital calender says it’s mid-August, but there’s no way we’ve been here two months. A week. Maybe two, at the most. Not two months. The calendar must’ve gotten a whack somewhere along the way.

I sat at the metal table, trying to keep down the ham and cheese sandwich paste. A headache throbbed behind my eyes. A gag rose in my throat. I belched.

“Gettin’ harder to keep it down. Getting harder to get it out. Damn stuff makes my ass stop up like a dam.” Jenkins said.

“Tell me about it,” I agreed. Honestly, I’d not had the same problem. I was as regular as always.

“I wonder if they’re still out there.”

“Don’t,” I commanded. “Not today.”

He turned away from the screen. There hadn’t been anything but darkness for a while. One morning I woke up and the camera had been taken out. I guess the lizards figured out what it was. Or they didn’t like how it looked. “Don’t you want to know? We’ve been stuck in this fuckin’ rocket for months.”

“You forget what happened to West.” No one had forgotten. We never would.

A long exhale issued from Jenkins. His attention turned back to the black screen. I could tell he was growing bored, and no longer wished to hear what I had to say.

I filled a paper cup with water and went to my bunker. Jenkins was a lost cause. I didn’t know how much of a lost cause he was until sometime later when I woke to a sound—the compression chamber. With only a pair of boxers and socks on, I ran the length of the rocket. I pressed the silver button, leaned in close to the speaker.

“Jenkins. Don’t.” I released the button. I knew Jenkins wouldn’t listen to me. His mind was made up. I pressed it again, and as an afterthought, added: “Regardless of the situation, West was right about one thing.” I licked my lips. “We’re going to be in the history books.” I laughed. I released the button.

“Maybe.” Jenkins said stonily. “Maybe not.”

The rocket shook as the exterior door of the chamber opened. I waited, listening for a scream that never came. And if it did, I didn’t hear it, the exterior door slid along its runners, sealing out Jenkins. The only way back in would be to enter the nine-digit code. I wondered if Jenkins would remember the code when the lizards were closing in on him. I hoped.

On the night I smashed the digital calendar, I saw fear in Whitehead’s eyes for the first time in a long time. As I stood, looking at the shattered clock, the chair laying on the tile, my head throbbed. The headaches were increasing. Daily. Nightly. A constant throb that nagged at my thoughts. It was hard to think. It felt like someone taking a hammer to my brain. When I saw that the calendar now said it was October 1st, I lost it. Completely lost it.

“Hey, man,” Whitehead’s voice broke through the dopy haze. He tugged at my shoulder. “You okay?”

Was I okay? You’re losing it, a sour voice whispered. I lost focus on my surroundings. My vision tunneled in on the shattered glass. Whitehead’s voice faded out. You’re going to die, anyhow. I shook the thought. “Yeah. I’m all right.”

“You sure?”

“Have we really been here for almost two years, Whitehead?”

The look in his eyes told me everything I wanted to know. Two years and counting. Only now, we wouldn’t know. It was for the best.

Time continued to stretch on. The rocket developed a funk about it. It hung about mostly in the main control room, where Whitehead and I spent most of our time, playing cards or eating. It was the funk of bad hygiene. Who gave a shit anymore? Who did we have to impress?

Whitehead’s death came as a total surprise. I didn’t see him around for a while. But I didn’t put much thought into it. We, myself included, spent a lot of time on our own, doing our own thing. As more time passed, I grew worried.

There’s a smell to death, a rotten, unforgiving smell. One can smell it from a mile away. As soon as I turned down the corridor to Whitehead’s bunk, I could smell the rotten smell of death. My feet wanted to stop, but my brain wouldn’t let them. I hurried down the hall, the stench penetrating my senses like a sharp needle.

I tore open the door. My breath got caught in my throat as I looked at Whitehead’s bloated body. I coughed, leaned over, and vomited. A second wave of the stench hit me hard in the face. Retching, I closed the door. I had seen enough. The sunken eyes and brown blood pooled on the floor will haunt my nightmares for the rest of my life.

My choice to exit the rocket came to me from West. We were in Florida, sitting on the beach, the waves crashing against the shore, a strong breeze off the ocean kicking up tornados of sand. We were both cross-legged, heads hanging down.

“How long have I been here?” I asked Dream-West.

Dream-West laughed. His moustache bounded up and down on his lip. “You really want to know, Collins?”

“Yes.”

“A little over twelve years.”

“Twelve?” I asked.

“Twelve,” Dream-West said.

I whistled through my teeth. “Seems longer. I’ve been alone for so long—since Whitehead.”

“You don’t have to be alone anymore. You can come join Jenkins and Me, under the sand. We got the best milk bar this side of Earth.” He snapped his fingers. “You can bet your bottom dollar on that.”

“What about food? Real food. Not this paste shit.”

“How does corn on the cob and roast beef sound?”

“Amazing.”

“Then all you gotta do is step outside. Nothing to it.”

“Step outside.” I stared out over the ocean. West was gone when I looked back. There was no impression of his body in the sand.

It took me a while, but I finally stepped into the decompression chamber. I hit the button. My ears popped. I sucked in a breath. This was it. I looked at the OPEN button for the exterior door. Just one push. Just one. That’s what I gave it.

The door shook, sputtered. I panicked. It didn’t look as if it was going to open. The dust had gotten into the gears. I gave the door a hearty kick. It shook, and began to lift. I stepped out into the dusty surface of Mars and looked about. Red, as far as the eye could see. I took a few paces and stopped. My eye caught the gleam of metal. I turned my full focus on a large rocket descending to the surface.

I’m saved, I thought.

“I’m saved!” I screamed. My breath fogged up the glass of my helmet. “Those sons of bitches! They sent help!”

I didn’t think. I started to run. The sand shifted under my feet, threatening to trip me up.

“Hey!” I screamed. “Hey! Can you see me? Hel…”

I didn’t get to finish the word. I slammed hard into the dust. A sharp pain shot through my right ankle. I rolled over onto my back. I could see the rocket. But I was no longer approaching it. I was being pulled away. Down. Into the sand.

End.

*~*~*

Matthew lives in Tennessee. He has been published elsewhere.

His Unconquerable Enemy

By W.C. Morrow

Originally Published in 1889

I was summoned from Calcutta to the heart of India to perform a difficult surgical operation on one of the women of a great rajah's household. I found the rajah a man of a noble character, but possessed, as I afterwards discovered, of a sense of cruelty purely Oriental and in contrast to the indolence of his disposition. He was so grateful for the success that attended my mission that he urged me to remain a guest at the palace as long as it might please me to stay, and I thankfully accepted the invitation.

One of the male servants early attracted my notice for his marvellous capacity of malice. His name was Neranya, and I am certain that there must have been a large proportion of Malay blood in his veins, for, unlike the Indians (from whom he differed also in complexion), he was extremely alert, active, nervous, and sensitive. A redeeming circumstance was his love for his master. Once his violent temper led him to the commission of an atrocious crime,--the fatal stabbing of a dwarf. In punishment for this the rajah ordered that Neranya's right arm (the offending one) be severed from his body. The sentence was executed in a bungling fashion by a stupid fellow armed with an axe, and I, being a surgeon, was compelled, in order to save Neranya's life, to perform an amputation of the stump, leaving not a vestige of the limb remaining.

After this he developed an augmented fiendishness. His love for the rajah was changed to hate, and in his mad anger he flung discretion to the winds. Driven once to frenzy by the rajah's scornful treatment, he sprang upon the rajah with a knife, but, fortunately, was seized and disarmed. To his unspeakable dismay the rajah sentenced him for this offence to suffer amputation of the remaining arm. It was done as in the former instance. This had the effect of putting a temporary curb on Neranya's spirit, or, rather, of changing the outward manifestations of his diabolism. Being armless, he was at first largely at the mercy of those who ministered to his needs,--a duty which I undertook to see was properly discharged, for I felt an interest in this strangely distorted nature. His sense of helplessness, combined with a damnable scheme for revenge which he had secretly formed, caused Neranya to change his fierce, impetuous, and unruly conduct into a smooth, quiet, insinuating bearing, which he carried so artfully as to deceive those with whom he was brought in contact, including the rajah himself.

Neranya, being exceedingly quick, intelligent, and dexterous, and having an unconquerable will, turned his attention to the cultivating of an enlarged usefulness of his legs, feet, and toes, with so excellent effect that in time he was able to perform wonderful feats with those members. Thus his capability, especially for destructive mischief, was considerably restored.

One morning the rajah's only son, a young man of an uncommonly amiable and noble disposition, was found dead in bed. His murder was a most atrocious one, his body being mutilated in a shocking manner, but in my eyes the most significant of all the mutilations was the entire removal and disappearance of the young prince's arms.

The death of the young man nearly brought the rajah to the grave. It was not, therefore, until I had nursed him back to health that I began a systematic inquiry into the murder. I said nothing of my own discoveries and conclusions until after the rajah and his officers had failed and my work had been done; then I submitted to him a written report, making a close analysis of all the circumstances and closing by charging the crime to Neranya. The rajah, convinced by my proof and argument, at once ordered Neranya to be put to death, this to be accomplished slowly and with frightful tortures. The sentence was so cruel and revolting that it filled me with horror, and I implored that the wretch be shot. Finally, through a sense of gratitude to me, the rajah relaxed. When Neranya was charged with the crime he denied it, of course, but, seeing that the rajah was convinced, he threw aside all restraint, and, dancing, laughing, and shrieking in the most horrible manner, confessed his guilt, gloated over it, and reviled the rajah to his teeth,--this, knowing that some fearful death awaited him.

The rajah decided upon the details of the matter that night, and in the morning he informed me of his decision. It was that Neranya's life should be spared, but that both of his legs should be broken with hammers, and that then I should amputate the limbs at the trunk! Appended to this horrible sentence was a provision that the maimed wretch should be kept and tortured at regular intervals by such means as afterwards might be devised.

Sickened to the heart by the awful duty set out for me, I nevertheless performed it with success, and I care to say nothing more about that part of the tragedy. Neranya escaped death very narrowly and was a long time in recovering his wonted vitality. During all these weeks the rajah neither saw him nor made inquiries concerning him, but when, as in duty bound, I made official report that the man had recovered his strength, the rajah's eyes brightened, and he emerged with deadly activity from the stupor into which he so long had been plunged.

The rajah's palace was a noble structure, but it is necessary here to describe only the grand hall. It was an immense chamber, with a floor of polished, inlaid stone and a lofty, arched ceiling. A soft light stole into it through stained glass set in the roof and in high windows on one side. In the middle of the room was a rich fountain, which threw up a tall, slender column of water, with smaller and shorter jets grouped around it. Across one end of the hall, half-way to the ceiling, was a balcony, which communicated with the upper story of a wing, and from which a flight of stone stairs descended to the floor of the hall. During the hot summers this room was delightfully cool; it was the rajah's favorite lounging-place, and when the nights were hot he had his cot taken thither, and there he slept.

This hall was chosen for Neranya's permanent prison; here was he to stay so long as he might live, with never a glimpse of the shining world or the glorious heavens. To one of his nervous, discontented nature such confinement was worse than death. At the rajah's order there was constructed for him a small pen of open iron-work, circular, and about four feet in diameter, elevated on four slender iron posts, ten feet above the floor, and placed between the balcony and the fountain. Such was Neranya's prison. The pen was about four feet in depth, and the pen-top was left open for the convenience of the servants whose duty it should be to care for him. These precautions for his safe confinement were taken at my suggestion, for, although the man was now deprived of all four of his limbs, I still feared that he might develop some extraordinary, unheard-of power for mischief. It was provided that the attendants should reach his cage by means of a movable ladder.

All these arrangements having been made and Neranya hoisted into his cage, the rajah emerged upon the balcony to see him for the first time since the last amputation. Neranya had been lying panting and helpless on the floor of his cage, but when his quick ear caught the sound of the rajah's footfall he squirmed about until he had brought the back of his head against the railing, elevating his eyes above his chest, and enabling him to peer through the open-work of the cage. Thus the two deadly enemies faced each other. The rajah's stern face paled at sight of the hideous, shapeless thing which met his gaze; but he soon recovered, and the old hard, cruel, sinister look returned. Neranya's black hair and beard had grown long, and they added to the natural ferocity of his aspect. His eyes blazed upon the rajah with a terrible light, his lips parted, and he gasped for breath; his face was ashen with rage and despair, and his thin, distended nostrils quivered.

The rajah folded his arms and gazed down from the balcony upon the frightful wreck that he had made. Oh, the dreadful pathos of that picture; the inhumanity of it; the deep and dismal tragedy of it! Who might look into the wild, despairing heart of the prisoner and see and understand the frightful turmoil there; the surging, choking passion; unbridled but impotent ferocity; frantic thirst for a vengeance that should be deeper than hell! Neranya gazed, his shapeless body heaving, his eyes aflame; and then, in a strong, clear voice, which rang throughout the great hall, with rapid speech he hurled at the rajah the most insulting defiance, the most awful curses. He cursed the womb that had conceived him, the food that should nourish him, the wealth that had brought him power; cursed him in the name of Buddha and all the wise men; cursed by the sun, the moon, and the stars; by the continents, mountains, oceans, and rivers; by all things living; cursed his head, his heart, his entrails; cursed in a whirlwind of unmentionable words; heaped unimaginable insults and contumely upon him; called him a knave, a beast, a fool, a liar, an infamous and unspeakable coward.

The rajah heard it all calmly, without the movement of a muscle, without the slightest change of countenance; and when the poor wretch had exhausted his strength and fallen helpless and silent to the floor, the rajah, with a grim, cold smile, turned and strode away.

The days passed. The rajah, not deterred by Neranya's curses often heaped upon him, spent even more time than formerly in the great hall, and slept there oftener at night; and finally Neranya wearied of cursing and defying him, and fell into a sullen silence. The man was a study for me, and I observed every change in his fleeting moods. Generally his condition was that of miserable despair, which he attempted bravely to conceal. Even the boon of suicide had been denied him, for when he would wriggle into an erect position the rail of his pen was a foot above his head, so that he could not clamber over and break his skull on the stone floor beneath; and when he had tried to starve himself the attendants forced food down his throat; so that he abandoned such attempts. At times his eyes would blaze and his breath would come in gasps, for imaginary vengeance was working within him; but steadily he became quieter and more tractable, and was pleasant and responsive when I would converse with him. Whatever might have been the tortures which the rajah had decided on, none as yet had been ordered; and although Neranya knew that they were in contemplation, he never referred to them or complained of his lot.

The awful climax of this situation was reached one night, and even after this lapse of years I cannot approach its description without a shudder.

It was a hot night, and the rajah had gone to sleep in the great hall, lying on a high cot placed on the main floor just underneath the edge of the balcony. I had been unable to sleep in my own apartment, and so I had stolen into the great hall through the heavily curtained entrance at the end farthest from the balcony. As I entered I heard a peculiar, soft sound above the patter of the fountain. Neranya's cage was partly concealed from my view by the spraying water, but I suspected that the unusual sound came from him. Stealing a little to one side, and crouching against the dark hangings of the wall, I could see him in the faint light which dimly illuminated the hall, and then I discovered that my surmise was correct--Neranya was quietly at work. Curious to learn more, and knowing that only mischief could have been inspiring him, I sank into a thick robe on the floor and watched him.

To my great astonishment Neranya was tearing off with his teeth the bag which served as his outer garment. He did it cautiously, casting sharp glances frequently at the rajah, who, sleeping soundly on his cot below, breathed heavily. After starting a strip with his teeth, Neranya, by the same means, would attach it to the railing of his cage and then wriggle away, much after the manner of a caterpillar's crawling, and this would cause the strip to be torn out the full length of his garment. He repeated this operation with incredible patience and skill until his entire garment had been torn into strips. Two or three of these he tied end to end with his teeth, lips, and tongue, tightening the knots by placing one end of the strip under his body and drawing the other taut with his teeth. In this way he made a line several feet long, one end of which he made fast to the rail with his mouth. It then began to dawn upon me that he was going to make an insane attempt--impossible of achievement without hands, feet, arms, or legs--to escape from his cage! For what purpose? The rajah was asleep in the hall--ah! I caught my breath. Oh, the desperate, insane thirst for revenge which could have unhinged so clear and firm a mind! Even though he should accomplish the impossible feat of climbing over the railing of his cage that he might fall to the floor below (for how could he slide down the rope?), he would be in all probability killed or stunned; and even if he should escape these dangers it would be impossible for him to clamber upon the cot without rousing the rajah, and impossible even though the rajah were dead! Amazed at the man's daring, and convinced that his sufferings and brooding had destroyed his reason, nevertheless I watched him with breathless interest.

With other strips tied together he made a short swing across one side of his cage. He caught the long line in his teeth at a point not far from the rail; then, wriggling with great effort to an upright position, his back braced against the rail, he put his chin over the swing and worked toward one end. He tightened the grasp of his chin on the swing, and with tremendous exertion, working the lower end of his spine against the railing, he began gradually to ascend the side of his cage. The labor was so great that he was compelled to pause at intervals, and his breathing was hard and painful; and even while thus resting he was in a position of terrible strain, and his pushing against the swing caused it to press hard against his windpipe and nearly strangle him.

After amazing effort he had elevated the lower end of his body until it protruded above the railing, the top of which was now across the lower end of his abdomen. Gradually he worked his body over, going backward, until there was sufficient excess of weight on the outer side of the rail; and then, with a quick lurch, he raised his head and shoulders and swung into a horizontal position on top of the rail. Of course, he would have fallen to the floor below had it not been for the line which he held in his teeth. With so great nicety had he estimated the distance between his mouth and the point where the rope was fastened to the rail, that the line tightened and checked him just as he reached the horizontal position on the rail. If one had told me beforehand that such a feat as I had just seen this man accomplish was possible, I should have thought him a fool.

Neranya was now balanced on his stomach across the top of the rail, and he eased his position by bending his spine and hanging down on either side as much as possible. Having rested thus for some minutes, he began cautiously to slide off backward, slowly paying out the line through his teeth, finding almost a fatal difficulty in passing the knots. Now, it is quite possible that the line would have escaped altogether from his teeth laterally when he would slightly relax his hold to let it slip, had it not been for a very ingenious plan to which he had resorted. This consisted in his having made a turn of the line around his neck before he attacked the swing, thus securing a threefold control of the line,--one by his teeth, another by friction against his neck, and a third by his ability to compress it between his cheek and shoulder. It was quite evident now that the minutest details of a most elaborate plan had been carefully worked out by him before beginning the task, and that possibly weeks of difficult theoretical study had been consumed in the mental preparation. As I observed him I was reminded of certain hitherto unaccountable things which he had been doing for some weeks past--going through certain hitherto inexplicable motions, undoubtedly for the purpose of training his muscles for the immeasurably arduous labor which he was now performing.

A stupendous and seemingly impossible part of his task had been accomplished. Could he reach the floor in safety? Gradually he worked himself backward over the rail, in imminent danger of falling; but his nerve never wavered, and I could see a wonderful light in his eyes. With something of a lurch, his body fell against the outer side of the railing, to which he was hanging by his chin, the line still held firmly in his teeth. Slowly he slipped his chin from the rail, and then hung suspended by the line in his teeth. By almost imperceptible degrees, with infinite caution, he descended the line, and, finally, his unwieldy body rolled upon the floor, safe and unhurt!

What miracle would this superhuman monster next accomplish? I was quick and strong, and was ready and able to intercept any dangerous act; but not until danger appeared would I interfere with this extraordinary scene.

I must confess to astonishment upon having observed that Neranya, instead of proceeding directly toward the sleeping rajah, took quite another direction. Then it was only escape, after all, that the wretch contemplated, and not the murder of the rajah. But how could he escape? The only possible way to reach the outer air without great risk was by ascending the stairs to the balcony and leaving by the corridor which opened upon it, and thus fall into the hands of some British soldiers quartered thereabout, who might conceive the idea of hiding him; but surely it was impossible for Neranya to ascend that long flight of stairs! Nevertheless, he made directly for them, his method of progression this: He lay upon his back, with the lower end of his body toward the stairs; then bowed his spine upward, thus drawing his head and shoulders a little forward; straightened, and then pushed the lower end of his body forward a space equal to that through which he had drawn his head; repeating this again and again, each time, while bending his spine, preventing his head from slipping by pressing it against the floor. His progress was laborious and slow, but sensible; and, finally, he arrived at the foot of the stairs.

It was manifest that his insane purpose was to ascend them. The desire for freedom must have been strong within him! Wriggling to an upright position against the newel-post, he looked up at the great height which he had to climb and sighed; but there was no dimming of the light in his eyes. How could he accomplish the impossible task?

His solution of the problem was very simple, though daring and perilous as all the rest. While leaning against the newel-post he let himself fall diagonally upon the bottom step, where he lay partly hanging over, but safe, on his side. Turning upon his back, he wriggled forward along the step to the rail and raised himself to an upright position against it as he had against the newel-post, fell as before, and landed on the second step. In this manner, with inconceivable labor, he accomplished the ascent of the entire flight of stairs.

It being apparent to me that the rajah was not the object of Neranya's movements, the anxiety which I had felt on that account was now entirely dissipated. The things which already he had accomplished were entirely beyond the nimblest imagination. The sympathy which I had always felt for the wretched man was now greatly quickened; and as infinitesimally small as I knew his chances for escape to be, I nevertheless hoped that he would succeed. Any assistance from me, however, was out of the question; and it never should be known that I had witnessed the escape.

Neranya was now upon the balcony, and I could dimly see him wriggling along toward the door which led out upon the balcony. Finally he stopped and wriggled to an upright position against the rail, which had wide openings between the balusters. His back was toward me, but he slowly turned and faced me and the hall. At that great distance I could not distinguish his features, but the slowness with which he had worked, even before he had fully accomplished the ascent of the stairs, was evidence all too eloquent of his extreme exhaustion. Nothing but a most desperate resolution could have sustained him thus far, but he had drawn upon the last remnant of his strength. He looked around the hall with a sweeping glance, and then down upon the rajah, who was sleeping immediately beneath him, over twenty feet below. He looked long and earnestly, sinking lower, and lower, and lower upon the rail. Suddenly, to my inconceivable astonishment and dismay, he toppled through and shot downward from his lofty height! I held my breath, expecting to see him crushed upon the stone floor beneath; but instead of that he fell full upon the rajah's breast, driving him through the cot to the floor. I sprang forward with a loud cry for help, and was instantly at the scene of the catastrophe. With indescribable horror I saw that Neranya's teeth were buried in the rajah's throat! I tore the wretch away, but the blood was pouring from the rajah's arteries, his chest was crushed in, and he was gasping in the agony of death. People came running in, terrified. I turned to Neranya. He lay upon his back, his face hideously smeared with blood. Murder, and not escape, had been his intentions from the beginning; and he had employed the only method by which there was ever a possibility of accomplishing it. I knelt beside him, and saw that he too was dying; his back had been broken by the fall. He smiled sweetly into my face, and a triumphant look of accomplished revenge sat upon his face even in death.

End.

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Table of Contents

- Greetings dear reader,
- The Ticket Taker
- The Apprentice’s Nightmare
- The Beastly Echoes of Necropedia
- Hand of Fate
- Space Lizards
- His Unconquerable Enemy
- Dear beloved reader,