Beth tugged on her shirt and said, "I don't want to go down there, I'm really scared."
"Don't be such a baby," Alyssa scolded, "This is why I hate hanging out with little kids, so scared of everything. We don't need the grown-ups just to go down and see what's wrong, plus, I am not going back inside there right now!"
Alyssa began stomping her way down the path with defiant determination. Bradley and Bethie stood there for a second, looking at each other as if one of them had the best idea on how to handle the odd situation. They both looked at Alyssa storming her way down the path and then Bradley said, "Well, I guess we should go with her, make sure she's safe and all."
Bethie said nothing, she just gripped Bradley's hand tightly and let him lead the way.
Bradley called down to his big sister, "Hey! Wait up!"
As they made their way down the path Bradley looked over and saw that Uncle C. had turned his gaze toward them. Something looked horribly wrong with his face, it was almost like he was wearing some sort of strange mask...All of the sudden he noticed that Alyssa veered course off the path and began walking through the sage brush and tall grass straight toward Uncle C. He saw her face, it was like she just looking ahead with a blank stare, and her face had turned instantly from one of frustration and tears into one of zero emotion. She reminded Bradley of the mannequins he had seen in department stores with his mom, just a blank, expressionless face.
“Alyssa!" He cried out to her, "What are...where are you going?!"
Before he knew what was happening, Bethie's grip loosened from his hand and she began following Alyssa, same blank stare on her young face. "Bethie.” he began to protest when it was as if a switch was flipped in his head. He followed the two girls off the path, three little robot-like minions blazing their way through the brush toward their good, old Uncle. C.
Clarence stood there in the meadow, arms outstretched, and his talon like claws on each hand pointing to the air.
"Children," the Clarence thing groaned out in a deep, gurgling voice, "Children...come...unto...me."
~
Dennis stood looking out of the kitchen window into the apple orchard past the backyard. As he listened to the soft bubbling of the coffee pot, he let his mind wander off into childhood memories of Charlie and him running through that very same orchard. They would chase one another through the trees and down the hill into the meadow below, lobbing apples at each other if it was the right time of year.
Ah, he thought with smile, the joy of simpler times!
He had saw Alyssa and Elizabeth running through the backyard as Bradley stood facing an apple tree, with his eyes covered as he counted to one hundred while the girls ran in search of their hiding places.
Oh, Bradley, he thought, it looks like the girls teamed up on you and made you it.
He laughed to himself when he saw Bradley turn around, well before reaching one hundred, and carefully sneak his way through trees, trying to be as covert as possible so the girls would not discover him cheating.
Taking after your dad, I see! He always cheated at hide and seek too!
Dennis was still drifting in daydreams of years gone by when something caught his attention. A large, black goat was standing in the backyard. The animal seemed to be staring directly at Dennis on the other side of the window.
"That's odd," Dennis muttered, "What the hell are you doing here?"
It was not out of the ordinary to see goats on the property, on the contrary, there had always been goats at Bear Creek Ranch. Nowadays the few goats on the ranch were basically feral, they roamed the grounds grazing off the grasses and shrubs at their leisure. In the cold winter months they would typically huddle together in the old horse stable down by Clarence's house and he would throw some hay and grains in there for them to eat, but for the most part they just took care of themselves.
As far as Dennis could remember, there were only three goats still left, maybe only too. That being said, this large, black billy goat was a stranger. Dennis knew that in all the time he'd spent here he had not once seen this animal and it was not likely that Charlotte or Clarence has gone out to buy a new goat for the ranch. The animal just stared directly at him, as if it knew something and was challenging Dennis in some way. The goat let out a defiant bleating noise and raked its front hoof in the dirt, still with his eyes locked on Dennis the whole time.
For the first time today Dennis began feeling uneasy, it’s just a random goat, he thought to himself, nothing to get all weird about. Probably just wandered onto the ranch property from some other ranch off in the distance.
Dennis was locked in a kind of staring contest with this vagrant beast. He felt like it seemed to have a sort of predatory determination in its gaze, something quite odd for an animal that lives off of grass and shrubs.
It bleated at him again, shattering the immense silence that seemed to engulf the universe while he stared back at the goat. It was enough to actually startle Dennis to the point where he violently flinched back away from the window.
Dennis was abruptly distracted by a faint thumping sound coming from below, on the lower floors of the house.
Thud, thud, thud, thud, thud.
He looked back out the window and saw that the goat was gone. There was a trail of hoof prints in the soft dirt leading away from where the goat had been standing, but curiously, they seemed to end about halfway across the yard. It looked as this huge goat had simply walked towards the edge of the yard and decided to just fly off before reaching the end.
Quit it, Dennis thought, the ground is probably just harder there so it stopped leaving prints.
He was playing back in his head the amusing interaction with the stray farm animal when an ear-splitting, high pitched scream erupted from the floors below. It sounded like it came from the same place as the pounding thud sounds had been echoing up from. It was followed by the sound of small footsteps running through the basement, followed by the sound of the sliding glass door flying open.
Dennis got up to look back out into the yard to see the source, it turned out to be Alyssa, running as fast as she could through the yard, away from the house. Suddenly another resounding scream echoed all the way through the house. This was a much more dreadful sound. Dennis could not tell for sure by the high pitched wail, but he had to figure that this new bout of shrieks was coming from his brother. It was definitely not a masculine sound, but it did not sound like his wife by any means.
Through the window behind him he could hear some commotion. It just sounded like the kids playing, Bradley and Elizabeth running after their cousin, no doubt. He could only assume that they had been discovered by Charlie downstairs, oddly nowhere near the game room Charlie was heading towards with Paula, and he had startled Alyssa into screaming and running off. Charlie was not the most tactful person in the world, but he did seem to have fun playing with kids. Dennis figured that his brother had heard the kids playing hide and seek, and snuck down to the basement to try to scare the little ones. He also must have fallen over some old junk down there and hurt himself, probably cracked his knee or twisted his ankle.
Dennis poured himself a cup of coffee and chuckled to himself, "Oh Charlie, sounds like karma caught up with you on that one!"
He sipped his coffee, which he preferred with cream and sugar but was content to drink it black since Charlotte always had the cupboards stocked with the finest whole bean and ground coffee. The flavor was pleasant enough that he forged the routine sweetening he usually favored and let the soothing aroma of organic Peruvian dark roast fill his nostrils with its soothing aura.
He wondered what was going on with children right now, he gingerly turned around and looked back out into the yard. He could barely see the three of them through the soft cracks of light that poked through the branches of the apple orchard as the sun began to set. It appeared as though Bradley and Alyssa were arguing about something while little Elizabeth just watched them both. Dennis figured they were debating who would be it next round as
he watched the kids make their way out of sight, down the hill. With Alyssa taking the lead and the two younger children following close behind, they looked like they had seen something further down the hill and were going to investigate.
"Watch out for giant, black devil goats." Dennis said to himself jokingly as he watched them disappear from his view. While the feral goat had disturbed him, he did not feel it poised any real harm towards the children and they did not look like they were heading in the direction it left in, anyway.
Just a goat, Dennis. He reassured himself once more, it doesn't mean anything and the ground was too hard for it leave prints. We're all good here.
He began pondering all the planned activities for the weekend with a joyous smile. How great it was going to be sharing this special time with family. He was still daydreaming away and gazing out the kitchen window when he heard the commotion coming up the stairs. By the moans and pathetic cries of pain he could tell that it was his little brother, he was always this dramatic, ever since they were kids. Every time he slipped and skinned his knee or maybe thumped his head on something he acted like he was having his legs torn off.
He could hear Charlie's cries getting more audible as he made his way up the stairs. "Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck!" He seemed to be repeating this phrase over and over again as he burst out from the stairwell into the hallway that lead into the open kitchen. He was wearing just a white, tank top undershirt and it looked like he had his button up shirt wrapped firmly around his genitals. His had one hand on his groin and another hand trying to hold up his unbuttoned jeans as he hobbled into the kitchen. Dennis could see tears running down his face and blood running down the front of his pants.
All Dennis could say was, "Jesus, Charlie!"
"I'm hurt bad!" Dennis sobbed out.
"I noticed. How in the hell did you hurt your dick?"
"It doesn't matter how! I just need to go to the fucking hospital! I don't want to lose my fucking dick!"
"Were you taking a leak or something and fell?" Dennis asked his brother, sounding much more curious than worried, "And where's the kids, last I saw they were chasing Alyssa..."
"Don't talk to Alyssa!" Charlie screeched, then as if he noticed how strange this must sound he followed up with, "I don't want to scare the kids."
Paula entered the kitchen, holding a deck of playing cards. "I found the cards," she said flatly as she waved the deck in the air before sitting at the table. She looked up at Charlie with an amused look on her face and said, "What's wrong, Charlie?"
"He fell and hurt his manhood while he was peeing, or something." Dennis said as he momentarily averted his gaze from Charlie to his wife.
"I need to go to the fucking hospital right fucking now!" Charlie said, trying to calm his voice as much as he could as to show that he was serious, not just being hysterical like Dennis always accused him of being whenever he got hurt as a kid. "You have to drive me, Dennis. Let your wife stay and watch the kids."
"Why do I have to drive? You didn't break your legs."
"Stop fucking around!" Charlie's voice returned to panic, "Just take me to an E.R. so..."
THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!
The sound came from the front door, down the hall from the kitchen.
Charlie screamed twice, once in fear from being startled by the pounding and a second time in pain as he flinched, causing him to shift his grip on his ravaged penile wound.
"What the fuck was that!" Charlie shouted.
"Probably just the kids messing around." Dennis reassured his brother, "It's just about dark now so they're probably back and trying to..."
THUMP! THUMP! THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!
The entire door looked like it would shake right off its hinges as it was battered from the other side.
Dennis noticed Paula shifting uncomfortably in her seat, she was clearly rattled by the pounding, "That's not kids." She said with a slight trembling in her voice.
"It must be Charlotte," Dennis said calmly, "I bet she has her hands full of grocery bags and can't open the door. Hey Charlie, how about you go over and help Aunt Charlotte with the groceries." He smiled as he said this.
"Fuck...OFF!" Charlie did not smile as he said this.
THUMP! THUMP! Suddenly, the front door cracked, the sound of wood splitting caused all three of them to jump back a step.
From their vantage point in the kitchen, they could see down the hall all the way to the front door if they craned their necks around the corner of the door-less entry to the kitchen. But as a cold silence gripped the room the three of them just stared at each other. Charlie was the most visibly shaken; and Paula had turned pale as a ghost, the color on her face matched by the whitening of her knuckles as she clenched her fist and bit into her lower lip. Dennis looked nervously at the two of them and was about to try to calm the room by suggesting maybe a tree branch had fallen or something, when suddenly the window behind them shattered explosively.
Both Charlie and Paula screamed. Charlie was startled back so hard that he fell over and howled out in pain once more. Dennis could feel the glass falling down his neck and off his shoulders. He stood up and leaned back to let the glass fall to the floor instead of over his face. He saw that Paula had frozen, face toward the table, far too terrified to look in any direction but straight down.
Charlie, now on his back, was the only one facing the window. Dennis saw the expression on his face as he now tried to back away on the ground. He was aghast, scooting his way backwards while trying to speak, but only producing whimpers and choked screams, his finger pointing up at the shattered window behind Dennis. Dennis did not turn back to see what was in the window, the look on Charlie's face said enough. He did, however, notice the shadow that was creeping along the ground from overhead, cast by the yellow kitchen light on the ceiling. It looked like a shadowy swarm of anemone-like tentacles making its way across the kitchen floor. Dennis noticed the sticky slime, like that from one of the many slugs in their yard back home, dripping on his shoulder from the writhing tendrils overhead.
Then, with a thunderous cacophony of splintering wood and busting hinges, the frame door broke to pieces. Now Paula screamed. The sound of footsteps, somehow audible over the screams, made its way down the hall. It was the sound of someone with extremely muddy feet stomping on the floor. Something turned into the kitchen's door less entry and snarled down at them, it was Clarence Wilkerson.
His bloated, grey skin covered with bluish-black veins like the topography of a city road map and his overalls were seemingly grown into his skin, yellow crust caked all around his pale, milky eyes. He opened his mouth and hissed at them, he sounded as fierce as an attacking mountain lion and his mouth was filled with rows of sharp, pointed teeth. A foul, thick black sludge was dripping from the corners of his mouth. The sight of him, coupled with the swarming mass of slimy tentacles that had by now engulfed the entire room, was enough to shatter one's sanity beyond repair.
Between Charlie and Paula's screams, it was impossible to tell which screams came from whom. Dennis could see that the tentacles that had twisted their way in through the shattered kitchen window now covered the entire ceiling. They crawled down the walls of the far side of the kitchen, with a type of sadistic determination.
Charlie yelled out, "WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON! I'M SCARED!" His words became screams of terror as one of the tentacles coiled around his leg.
Clarence was shambling his way, hissing down at him as the tentacle wormed its way up toward his wounded groin.
Paula made a mad dash for the kitchen entry, hoping it seemed to bypass the inhuman thing formerly known as Clarence Henderson and bolt for the front the door. Clarence, who's current, crusty, bloated state made him look incapable of speed, lurched out at her with the speed of a striking viper and snatched her by the hair with one talon clawed hand. It then twisted her around and forced her to her knees, where she thrashed and screamed like a trapped coyote, trying to scratch and hit at her assailant to absolutely no avail.
Charlie screamed in pain once more as the tentacle that had coiled like a python around his leg lifted him off the ground, dangling him in the air while he cried for mercy and reached his hand out to his brother.
"Dennis! Please help me!" He whimpered.
Dennis did not take his brother's hand. He simply brushed the remaining broken glass off his left shoulder as two wriggling tentacles wound their way up his legs, around his torso and then up each side of his face where they seemed to just slide around, stroking Dennis' cheeks.
Dennis just smiled at Charlie as he dangled helplessly in the air, his arm stretched out for help that was not coming, and said, "You should really try to save your energy, little brother, you have so much more screaming to do."
Charlie's bewilderment was pierced by a sting of grief as he swung upside-down, the blood from his groin was now dripping down his face in what was once the kitchen but had now turned into a vision of hell.
"My children." He said as he reached for Dennis.
Dennis looked down at him and calmly said, "They're not your children anymore. Now, it's time to begin."
PART TWO: Deepest Blackness
Chapter One
Charlene Harris, formerly Charlene Henderson, was finally done working her double shift at the Kirkland Olive Garden Friday evening at 8:45pm. She had endured nearly twelve hours of picking up the slack that had been left for her when two servers called in sick and one other had quit the night before. For Charlene, being the newly promoted location manager, this meant the work they would have done fell in her lap when no other employees would answer her calls or return her voicemails asking if they wouldn't mind filling the shifts.
Being the Friday before Labor Day Weekend, most of the staff had already put in their time off requests and had absolutely zero intentions of changing their plans. Not that Charlene blamed them, if she had the choice she would much rather be spending her Friday getting ready for the weekend she had planned with her best friend, Abby. She had the vacation hours approved for four months now and had already made sure that the assistant manager, Kelly, was fully up to speed on everything that needed to be attended to in her absence. It wasn't more than once or twice a year that she actually had time off from work at the same time her ex, Charlie, had the kids, and Charlene was planning on taking full advantage of every second.
Becoming the Gateway Page 10
