Amongst the carnage of all that was happening, the most ferocious came from the hulking beast at the centre of the room, one that towered over everything else.
It held aloft two men, one in each hand. The one in the left was fighting for his life as the paw of the monster engulfed his head, slowly crushing it, taking its time and enjoying his suffering.
In the other, the man was close to death. He was already peeled of his skin, and the monster took periodic bites from the exposed flesh, tearing chunks away.
Mangled bodies lay scattered at its feet.
Adrian moved quicker, circling the room, desperate to escape the notice of the evil creatures.
But soon his luck ran out.
Something tall stepped in front of him, setting a heavy foot down. When Adrian looked up, he saw one of the more human-looking creatures standing above him. Perhaps one of the first to turn, it seemed stretched out, gangly, with long limbs and bumpy skin. The only other features that marked it as inhuman were the small littering of eyes about its chest and shoulders, and a mouth that split up in the centre of its stomach.
It made an excited noise, almost a laugh, and then reached down for him. Adrian tried to crawl away, but felt its hand wrap around his ankle. It dragged him back, clearly stronger than him, but not as overpowering and dominant as most of the transformed nightmares that tore their way through the remaining residents of the ward.
When it let go of him, Adrian quickly rolled onto his back and looked up at the thing as it stared down at him. Its teeth seemed far too long, and razor sharp, and it reached down again and grabbed him by the throat with both hands. Adrian felt himself heaved up, and he dangled before the demon as his legs kicked below him, trying and failing to find purchase on something.
He felt himself slowly brought in towards the face of his attacker and could feel and smell its hot, rancid breath on his face. A thin, pink tongue slithered from the open mouth and snaked its way towards Adrian. The appendage was ridiculously long, and quickly found its way to his face, licking up his skin.
Tasting him.
A ripple of pleasure seemed to surge through the creature, and it emitted a long moan. Then it opened its mouth further, and Adrian readied himself to be eaten alive.
But that was not the creature’s intent.
Long fingers pushed their way into Adrian’s mouth and forced it open, pulling his jaw down. It then moved him closer and started to make gagging motions.
Adrian soon realised what it had planned for him. Whatever criteria these things had to select who would be chosen to join their ranks, he appeared to have matched it.
He was to be turned. He would twist and change and would soon be one of them. And he would commit the same acts of evil they revelled in.
He would be a monster. Thoughts of his father leapt to the fore of Adrian’s mind. He remembered those acts of depravity his father revelled in, and the things he did to Adrian as a boy.
No.
He couldn’t allow that to happen—he would not turn into such a beast. That fate was worse than any other he had witnessed so far—hell, he would have preferred the end that came to the melted man who had been slurped up by the monstrous worm, and the pain that came with it. He would not become what he loathed so much.
So Adrian fought back.
The monster held him close to it, so Adrian used the proximity to his advantage, reaching out his hands to claw and fight. His attack was a targeted one, and he cut his fingers down the hard skin of the demon, making sure to scrape over the small eyes that covered its chest, driving his fingers into the milky bulbs. He felt some pop beneath him, and to his surprise the creature howled in pain. He continued with his attack, gouging and scratching at the small, inhuman eyes, breaking them open like fish eggs as a yellowy substance spurted free.
Adrian felt the pressure on his throat release as the creature dropped him. As inhuman as these things were, they could still feel pain. He then cast a glance at the tank-like behemoth as it crushed men beneath it.
Okay, so maybe only some of them felt pain.
He couldn’t imagine anything being able to hurt that giant enforcer.
Adrian moved quickly and made a dash for the exit. Up ahead, in the doorway, he saw Jack beckoning him on. The big man had gotten clear of the room, which Adrian was glad to see. And cowering next to him was that doctor, Reid. They had made it out, and as they were not being attacked, it seemed the hallway outside was clear.
That gave him hope, so he pushed himself, running at full sprint. However, as he neared the door, he felt something grab his wrist and stop him.
Another creature to fend off, he assumed, and he didn’t think he would be lucky enough to escape a second attack. But when he spun, he saw that it was Seymour—bloodied and battered—who grasped hold of his wrist.
‘Don’t leave me here,’ the fat man said, eyes wide in terror.
Adrian didn’t reply, he just pulled his arm away, then turned and ran. He felt Seymour behind him, and hoped his unwanted companion did not draw attention.
But that proved not to be the case.
As the two men managed to break free of the room and sprint up the corridor alongside Jack and Dr. Reid, Adrian heard something following behind, emitting an awful, hellish screech.
Chapter 43
Isaac Templeton’s mind swam back into consciousness as agony wracked his senses. He felt submerged, somehow, and tried to scream, but a suffocating, scalding liquid flooded his mouth and body, burning him up inside and out.
He kicked and flailed as he felt his flesh burning.
Desperate, he began to swim as hard as he could in a direction he assumed to be up.
Eventually, he broke free of the surface and pulled humid air into his lungs. The cold of the environment above the boiling water was a stark contrast on his searing skin. Templeton opened his eyes… and immediately wished he hadn’t.
He knew where he was.
He’d seen this place before.
In his dreams after consuming the blood of The Great Being.
The endless, alien sky above dwarfed him, and flashes of red lightning illuminated the surface of the sea he bobbed up and down in. Those stars, circling together to form a great eye, were maddening to look at.
The water continued to scald him, and Templeton looked at his arms to see them ruined and stripped of skin, with only red and black flesh exposed beneath.
He should be dead—perhaps he was—but still he continued to exist. Another flash, and up ahead he saw a landscape. Agony continued to rage as the boiling water cooked him, so he began to swim again, this time towards the landmass up ahead, every stroke causing more and more white-hot pain.
How long it took him, Templeton could not say, but eventually he heaved his ruined body out onto the hard shore—a black, rock-like surface, one that exuded a red substance when pressure was applied. Small pools of it formed around his hands and knees as he crawled from the water, screaming, allowing his steaming, ravaged body to take in the cooling air. He then heaved, involuntarily purging water and chunks from his stomach. As he looked down to the mass that he had expelled, he saw red flesh and stringy intestines.
He began to scream again and, looking up, saw the same landscape from his dream.
Only this felt much more real.
Because it was real.
Whatever happened to him back in the asylum had brought some part of him here, and had spat him out in the boiling sea.
To be trapped for eternity.
Creatures and nightmarish visions roamed before him, wandering the terrifying wasteland. A being so big that its head touched the sky scrawled its way across the far distance.
The fear Templeton felt was absolute.
How long until one of these horrors found him and then had their way with him?
He began to sob.
Then a noise caught his attention—the sound of something dragging over the stone ground—and he looked up to see whatever it was appro
ach.
The thing looked human, but without skin—only scabbed, blackened flesh. It crawled on all fours, keeping low.
‘So it is,’ the thing said, in a strained, gravelly voice. ‘I was told that you would come.’
Whatever this thing was, it had a familiarity to it and, as it drew closer, Templeton recognised exactly who it was. But that was impossible.
It can’t be him.
The thing grew closer and pulled the ruined flesh around its mouth into a smile.
‘Hello, old friend,’ said Robert Wilson.
Chapter 44
The being made its way from the chamber where its creator lay and into a large area beyond. It saw rooms off of the central space, all open and empty.
On the floor was a ruined body, one that had been similar to its own, though now it was little more than a mangled husk. It also seemed to be drained of much of its meat.
The entity studied the ruined corpse and felt something twinge within it. Concentrating harder, it felt as though it could reach out with its mind and actually touch the body.
Which is exactly what it did… and the body twitched.
With increased focus, the corpse was lifted from the ground—bobbing at first as the entity controlled the link between mind and matter. With extra effort came more confidence and control, and the body hung limply, unmoving, until it was pulled forward and then hovered above the entity.
The thing with no name, or identity.
Not yet.
Then the being obliterated the hanging sack of meat, pulling its atoms apart, causing it to burst into chunks of red flesh and a shower of blood, all of which rained down over the thing. It savoured the feeling of blood and meat, which once brought life, slopping down upon it, coating it in the stink of death.
A first step: learning just what it was capable of.
The being then continued through the dark place. The whole environment seemed very familiar—but not from its creator. The memories it now accessed were, it knew, from its original host. A pathetic, weak creature, typical of the kind that inhabited this world.
This plane of existence.
But that sub-creature now existed somewhere else, its life-force thrust over to the home the creator. A home that the entity would never know, but one it yearned for. So, instead, it would have to make the best of this world.
And change it.
Now upstairs, the being felt that a transformation was underway in the environment around it; the creator was spreading its influence, reaching out with its winding, twisting roots, and in doing so was changing the surroundings. Growths had formed on the walls and ceilings, and pods of flesh pumped out small puffs of black spores into the air.
It could hear other, lesser children of the creator close by, indulging in their desires. But it felt no desire to go to them. They were lower than it was.
Beneath it.
Two of them even wandered the level on which the creature now found itself. They were aimless, but steered clear of the being. They were scared of it.
As they should be.
It considered pulling them apart, for no other reason than to further test its powers; however, it was curious to see something else first.
It walked to a doorway, and with a flick of its head, pulled the door open, breaking the primitive lock in the process. The being then wandered the corridor towards its destination, eager to see the place that the lowly human who had inhabited body before—Templeton… Isaac Templeton—was so attached to.
The Chapel.
A place, it understood, that these humans used for worship.
False gods.
The being soon reached its destination and entered the Chapel.
It looked around, taking in the details, less concerned with the overall aesthetics of the room—which even now were beginning to warp and twist thanks to the creator—but more on the smaller details.
The symbols of religion.
The effigies.
A man stuck to a cross, hanging in pain. This was a symbol of hope and virtue to these humans?
The being scoffed.
Hope and virtue were as pointless. They were not the real truths and values of this universe.
It knew what these humans were—small, lowly, and blind. Insects scurrying around without the capacity to understand the true order of the universe.
Perhaps it was a lingering echo of the humanity that resided within it, but the being had a desire to change things here. To violate what was a false place of worship. To cleanse its message from the world and replace it with one much more fitting.
Much more pure.
The being moved to a circular, ornate mirror that was fixed to a wall close to the entrance door. It looked into the reflective surface, gazing at the fullness of its own body for the first time.
And was disgusted by what it saw.
The skin was sunken and greyed, lined with tears and cuts that showed the flesh beneath, and the eyes were milky white, but it was still a distinctly human appearance.
Distinctly weak.
The being knew that this appearance would need to be improved. It grabbed at the skin on its head and began pulling, peeling at the flesh and attached hair follicles, pulling it away to reveal the bone beneath.
It enjoyed the pain.
Then it brought its hands to its lips.
Chapter 45
Adrian ran with Jack, Seymour and Doctor Reid in tow. Behind them, something—he dared not look back to see what—scampered at their heels, screeching as it gave chase. Though danger was rapidly closing in, it seemed the way ahead was clear.
Giving everything he had, Adrian broke through the first ruined door into the small, linking corridor, and then on through to the large Main Hall.
He had hoped this space would be empty.
But he was disappointed.
Two creatures prowled the area. One was a tall, humanoid figure whose skull had split open at the head, revealing a writhing, moving brain beneath that blinked with small white eyes. Its tongue was long, wriggling down to its navel as its mouth hung open like a panting dog. It was accompanied by a small, dwarfish thing, with long arms that touched the floor. Its head had melted into its torso, and it had a wide stomach with a gaping mouth and sharp teeth cut into it. Out of the two, it looked less threatening, but no less horrifying.
Adrian had noticed the two creatures the second he burst into the Main Hall but, as they turned to face him, he saw something else too, hanging above the door to Ward B—a pulsating sack with multiple black eyes, fused to the wall at the junction between the wall and the ceiling. It had no human shape to it at all, only a mass of flesh with large, blank eyes. Tendrils hung down beneath it, ready to snare unsuspecting prey.
Adrian and his group did not break stride as the thing behind them gave chase, and with the creatures ahead of them, they were in danger of being surrounded.
But he had an idea.
Adrian remembered what had happened to Jones in this room when the man was turned, and what he had been carrying when he had been overwhelmed.
So Adrian took a sharp right and continued his sprint, well aware the abominations in the room had noticed him and would soon be upon him. He saw the weapon lying discarded on the floor and prayed it still worked. The small blue flame at the end of the nozzle still burned, and he hoped that was a good sign.
He heard the others—Jack, Seymour, and Reid—all keeping pace with him, wheezing and panting as they ran for their lives. But he also heard the approaching creatures, roaring and shrieking.
Gaining ground.
It would be close.
Adrian hurled himself forward, feet first, and slid along the tiled floor on his rear. As he moved across the ground, he grabbed the nozzle—the end still hot in his hand—adjusted the weapon, and swivelled his body, aiming the dangerous end away from him.
He had just enough time to see the others in his group run to either side of him, leaving his aim clear, and a half-man half
-spider horror leaping in for the kill.
Adrian squeezed the trigger.
A jet of scalding flame erupted from the nozzle and, as it did, he could actually feel the heat from the blast emanating back towards him. The leaping monster was engulfed in flames, and Adrian only just managed to roll to the side as its blazing body crashed to the floor.
Adrian quickly got to his feet and took aim at the other two monsters that were bearing down and pressed the trigger again. This time, however, he cast his aim lower, towards their feet, arcing the thrower left and right to make sure he caught them both in its stream.
Like the creature before them—who was now getting back to its feet as it writhed and burned—these two monsters went up as well, a burning mass of macabre flesh. He hit them again, and they collapsed to the floor, then he turned back to the first beast, which was trying to crawl away as the flames that engulfed it seared away at its skin. Adrian slowly stalked the thing, dragging the tank of the weapon along the floor behind him, and hit it one last time in a prolonged attack.
Eventually, it, too, stopped moving, and just continued to burn like its friends.
After taking a couple of panicked breaths, and feeling his knees grow weak, Adrian dropped to his rear. He felt a large hand land on his shoulder and jumped, but looking up saw the smiling face of Jack. The large man gave him a thumbs up.
Adrian laughed. ‘Thanks, Jack. Didn’t know I had it in me.’
‘I did,’ Seymour uttered quietly, but still loud enough for everyone to hear above the crackling of the burning creatures.
Adrian didn’t react to the comment. ‘It isn’t safe here,’ he said to them all.
Looking past his group, he could see the tentacles of that thing that hung to the ceiling above the door to Ward B snap and whip about, apparently aware of what had happened to its brethren.
And knew it could be next.
The thought did cross Adrian’s mind, but he had no idea how much fuel was left in this weapon, and had a feeling they would need every last drop.
The Extreme Horror Collection Page 39
