by A. R. Braun
A hovercraft loomed above him, along with the full moon’s cyclopean eye. Mem-Dog ran for his life. A number of vehicles lurked in back of the VFW next-door, and he punched in the window of a white truck. No alarm went off; it was an old pickup. Mem-Dog unlocked the door and hotwired the engine. As he did so, dinosaur-like screams rang out from behind him. They were close and he had to hurry. Mem-Dog fumbled with the wires, sweating profusely. Another loud screech bore into him from right outside his window. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught an alien peering in at him.
Panicking, Mem-Dog finally got the truck started.
The hand with black claws reached into the broken window, breaking the skin on Mem-Dog’s forearm. Pain like stick pins assaulted him. He slipped the gearshift out of park, put it in drive, and stomped on the gas pedal quickly enough to knock the hand away, but the vehicle jerked, the wheels spinning. In the rear-view mirror, another alien held onto the back of the truck bed, so Mem-Dog put it in reverse and ran over the creature. Another insane shriek cut off half-way through. He put the vehicle in drive and put the pedal to the metal. Speeding away, Mem-Dog looked in the rear-view and saw more aliens grieving over their brethren.
Or are they sistren? I can’t tell.
He banked it to over 100 MPH, sailing through a stop sign. Thank God no one was in the intersection, he thought. Mem-Dog glanced out the window and saw the hovercraft behind him. He maneuvered a number of sharp turns and found himself on a one-way street, wincing at all the headlights coming his way. They honked their horns, and he pulled a violent U-turn and headed the right way.
Mem-Dog turned onto a country road. When he looked out the window and in the rear-view, no hovercrafts loomed.
He spotted a motel called The Rocket Ride.
Mem-Dog parked, ran in, and paid for one night. He walked to his room on shaky legs and closed the door behind him. Breathing a sigh of relief, he sat down on the bed, and the bedsprings creaked. Mem-Dog shook as badly as a teenage girl who had accepted a dare to spend the night in a graveyard.
He had to tell someone, so he called Sienna. After seven rings, she picked up.
“How dare you call this late?” she yelled.
“Sienna, thank God!”
She sighed. “Memphis, I told you, I’ve got exams. I’ll talk to you later.”
“No, don’t hang up!”
“You don’t have to yell.”
“Just shut up and listen, it’s an emergency. There’s an alien invasion.”
Sienna laughed. “I told you to calm down or they’d get you.”
“So, what am I supposed to do? You can’t shoot ‘em.”
Sienna snickered. “Have a rap battle with ‘em.”
Mem-Dog sighed. “Goddamn it, Sienna, I don’t have time for this shit. Aliens broke into my crib and tried to waste me.”
Balefully, she laughed again. “Are they there now?”
“No.”
“How do you know? Maybe they are and you can’t see them. Perhaps they made themselves invisible.”
Terror like ice in his veins gripped him. “Damn it, Sienna, quit playin. You’re scarin the crap out of me.”
“Or maybe they’re hiding, perhaps in the closet—”
Mem-Dog hung up on her. If he hadn’t, he would’ve had a mental break. His brain felt like smoldering embers ready to erupt into a brushfire.
Sienna’s words came back to haunt him.
How do you know? Maybe they are and you can’t see them. Perhaps they made themselves invisible.
Scared to death, he knew if he didn’t stop thinking about it, he’d lose his mind.
The phone rang.
Mem-Dog sighed and yanked the receiver from the cradle. “What?!”
“It’s Sienna. Don’t be mad. I apologize for making up that alien story. I shouldn’t have done it right before you were partyin. You must be trippin.”
“I don’t know whether you’re lyin or telling the truth, girl! But I ain’t bullshittin! And I don’t have time for this jive.” He slammed the phone down.
Mem-Dog bounded up and peered out the window. There was a bar across the street called Ace in the Hole.
“Straight.”
Mem-Dog opened the door, just a crack, and peered outside. Nothing lurked there but rural sights. He exited, shut his door and locked it, then crossed the street. The cool night air caressed him.
The bar showcased a brick exterior and sported neon signs of his favorite beers. He swung open the heavy wooden door. Country-twang music rushed at him from a jukebox, and he spotted a large number of huge white rednecks with beards. He grew nervous again and wished he had a Charlie Pride costume right about now. His father had loved Charlie. Mem-Dog crept toward the bar, eyeing them surreptitiously.
“This ain’t no gangster bar,” one of the men blurted.
Mem-Dog ignored it. He walked up to the bartender. “Can I have a quart of beer, please?”
“What?” The middle-aged lady wore a plaid shirt and blue jeans. Her stringy brown and gray hair hung down her shoulders in straggles.
“Can I have a quart of beer, please?” Mem-Dog yelled.
Someone pushed him from behind. Mem-Dog turned around and saw a Toby Keith look-alike giving him the evil eye.
“You better learn how to talk to a lady, boy,” he cried.
A few more “gentlemen” stood up and joined him.
This just ain’t my night.
“I’m sorry, sir,” Mem-Dog answered in a trembling voice. “I only did it because she couldn’t hear me.”
“Apologize to the lady,” the man continued.
“I’m sorry, ma’am.” Mem-Dog now faced her. He turned back around.
Sneering, the cowpoke looked at him hard.
“You guys like Charlie Pride?” Mem-Dog asked.
The redneck eyeballed him a little longer, then his mouth formed a wicked smile showcasing yellow teeth. He laughed. The rest followed suit.
“Charlie? Of course I like Charlie! Hell, we all do, right boys?”
Mercifully, all of them agreed.
The redneck gestured toward the bar. “Get your quart. It’s on me.” He patted Mem-Dog on the back too hard, but the latter smiled and laughed with them.
The country boys made themselves scarce, swaggering over to the pool table. Mem-Dog hadn’t been as relieved since his last acquittal on battery charges. He turned around to face the lady who held a quart of Blatz out to him. He was going to ask for something else—Blatz being the most God-awful beer there was—then thought better of it.
“Don’t you want your beer?” she asked.
Smiling, he took it. The bottle chilled his hands. “Thank you.” Mem-Dog looked over the crowd by the pool table. “Thanks, homeys.”
Many rednecks smiled at him, but only one raised his mug of beer, sitting in the back, in the gloom, behind everyone else. As Mem-Dog’s eyes adjusted, the black eyeballs within an alien’s green face stared back, and his mouth split open in a wide grin to reveal sharp teeth.
The walls rushed in on him. Mem-Dog ran out of the bar, dropping his quart, which fizzed on the gravel parking lot. A couple of the huge green men loomed across the street. A bright light searched for him from a hovercraft above, and he leapt away before it could encircle him, running pell-mell into the woods. Sticks and branches hit him in the face and cut him, but didn’t break his stride. Mem-Dog scrambled for what seemed like forever, the clouded-over moon making visibility low.
He stopped to look toward a clearing where chants rang out. A cult in green robes held their hands to the sky. Mem-Dog shook his head and rubbed his eyes, but still saw his neighbor leading the ritual.
That wasn’t a cape on a Count Dracula costume. That was an alien-worshiping uniform!
“Oh great lords of the sky,” the old man summoned, “abduct us and make us your pets.” He snapped his head Mem-Dog’s way, catching him watching.
“And capture and torture my neighbor that torments me,” his neighbor added.
>
Mem-Dog whimpered and ran like hell. He wished he hadn’t seen that. When would this nightmare end?
He crashed into a tree and everything faded to black.
When Mem-Dog came to, it was morning. He lay in the grass, the sun blinding him through the trees. Mem-Dog looked around to see if any of his green “buddies” were near, a negative. He rose, holding his throbbing head that hurt like a son of a bitch, and made his way out of the forest. He thought about the creatures, tried to make sense of them, was unable to. It couldn’t be real.
No one else in the bar saw the alien. I need to quit doin drugs and cut down on my drinkin. Maybe the dope made me mentally ill, and I’m hallucinatin. I’ll make an appointment with a psychiatrist. Then I can get better and become responsible like Sienna. I’ll even go to my trial today, then work my way to a manager’s position at the restaurant.
When he came out of the woodland, the hick bar lurked, looking innocuous in daylight. Mem-Dog walked toward the road. He put his head down. Mem-Dog realized he’d stolen a truck, and that didn’t bode well. He decided to drive it back to the VFW and leave it there.
The sounds of destruction commenced.
Mem-Dog turned his head and looked upward. Hovercrafts were everywhere, shooting red death rays that blipped through the sky. Nashville’s buildings exploded into orange flames in the distance.
Mem-Dog ran to the truck. “I’m not really seeing this! I need a shrink!”
People ran from the motel as they screamed in terror.
Hell nah, that’s a hallucination, too.
Then why did they bump into him while making a mad scramble to get away?
Terror in the Bell Tower
You will think me mad. It is not true. How can I be mad when I strive to stop the evil that threatens my town? Is this not Salem? Nonsense. You will see my reasoning, my strength, my persistence to ensure the evil doesn’t pervade us.
I couldn’t have been closer to the wretchedness, living in a modest house next to a church made of stone, with grand steeples, a bell tower, and turrets. When the bells sounded the sacred hymns I grew up with, my heart rejoiced, and I was at peace. Then how was I to feel when the infernal song came to my ears at the witching hour? You may understand my consternation at hearing such an abomination. For the tune rang of an eerie chime, the tempo too quick, the tones diabolic. Infernal noise! I had to put a stop to it.
I went to visit my friend Carlton, a misanthrope obsessed with music. My company, however, was acceptable, as he had been familiar to me since childhood. He owned a viola and played it proficiently. I knocked on his door the morning after I first heard the insidious tune from the belfry, and he bid me entry, his viola in hand. When sweat glistened on his forehead, I knew he’d been feverishly playing a melody.
He set down the instrument and struck up the fire, for it was a chilly day indeed. Misanthropy, a double-edged sword, bit back at the soul after too many hours isolated. His ear-to-ear smile let me know his eagerness for company had consumed him.
He picked up the viola and sat across from me. “Andrew, my good man, would you like to hear my new composition? It is the most heart-stirring one yet.”
I frowned inside at his obsession. If I had an obsession, it was the taverns, where I’d given any fool that dared to speak out of place a sound thrashing. Sports were always my main interest, and in school I excelled at all of them. I didn’t think his ditty would rival any of the great composers, but I wanted to appease his mind before indulging in his temperament. “Yes, let us hear this haunting composition, and then I bid you a little chat.”
“Haunting? You are mistaken, sir. This is a tune sure to soothe even a devil.”
“Did I say haunting? Forgive my presumption and play on.”
He roared into a rather sappy ditty that did nothing to soothe me; I acted riveted, lest I should stir up any malevolence that lurked in his crooked heart, however. When he finished, I applauded as if it had been Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 in C minor. He smiled and took a bow.
Carlton lived two doors down from me, so if anyone else had heard that accursed tune from the bell tower, it was him.
He rose, set the instrument in its case, and tucked it away for the night. Then he came back over to sit across from me at the table where a single, flickering candle struggled to maintain its life. “So, old friend, what is in your heart to-day?”
“I feel I shouldn’t have to say it. Does it not keep you up at night, conflicting with the beautiful (Good God!) melodies you put forth on your viola?”
At this, he looked confused, and his face hinted at suspicion of my flawed character. “Does what keep me up, sir?”
“Why, the infernal tune! It rings forth from the belfry every night at midnight. If it keeps me awake, then it must keep you awake.”
Carlton looked at me queerly. “Infernal tune? Whatever do you mean? I’ve heard no such thing. From the bell tower, no less?”
“Oh, come now, old friend. It’s louder than hell itself!”
“I’ve heard no such ditty.”
My emotions consumed my kind spirit. Did this man, my dearest of friends, dare mock me so? It took all my strength to calm myself. “Then you must retire at eleven and sleep through it.”
“Are you mad? For I am often up until one o’clock at the least, and I’ve heard no such song.”
My anger could suppress itself no longer. “Mad then! Is that what you presume? Shall I stay the night here and point the song out to you myself?”
Carlton shook his head. “You may stay, but you cannot persuade me to hear something that is not there.”
He began to inquire about my health, pontificating about how pale and thin I looked. He asked about my diet, and if I’d been exercising. Can you believe it? A misanthrope! More than insulted, I made my exit before I flogged my friend with that very viola he harped over.
The cold air pulled at me, wrapping around me, enveloping me in its breath as I walked to my house, then slammed the door. Back in my home, his ill words filled me with a somber bitterness as I sat in front of my roaring fire and dined on porridge. If necessary, I’d pull that fool out of his home at the witching hour and pull the wax out of his ears!
At bedtime, I didn’t bother putting on my nightclothes and preparing for bed. What was the use? Soon, the twisted melodies would ring out.
Sure enough, as the clock struck twelve, the horrid noise clanged. Someone played too many bells and they echoed eerily, on top of one another, as if summoning Baal-Zebub. Filled with wrath, I burst out of my house and banged on Carlton’s door.
I craned my neck and looked over at the massive stone structure. A full moon hung over the church, spotlighting the grotesquerie. I covered my ears against the devilish song interloping on my soul.
My friend opened the door, once again with the viola in hand. “Good God, man, what is it that makes you enquire at such an hour?”
I pointed toward the church. “Do you not hear that? The diabolic noise I told you about!”
Again, he looked confused. “I hear nothing but the crickets, sir.”
In a fury, I grabbed his arm and yanked him out. “Do not make sport with me anymore! That song, that unholy tune, if you can call it a tune, ringing out from the bell tower! Do not lie to me that you don’t hear it.”
His eyes grew wide, and he yanked his arm away. “Look here, sir, you are mad! There is no tune coming from the bell tower! Who on earth would be in the belfry at this time of night pulling forth an abomination? The priests are shut in asleep, the nuns slumbering. Have you been indulging in absinthe? Opium?”
At this comment, I balled up my fists and assumed a fighting position. A good thrashing was what this scoundrel needed, and posthaste. Yet when I did, the blood draining from his face forced me to relent. The man looked as if his weak heart would give out. Alas! I did not have the heart.
I stomped back to my home, entered, and slammed the door. I put my hands over my ears to shut out the demonic disturbanc
e.
The next evening, after my work at the stables concluded, I visited the police station. It was time to talk to someone with a sound mind about the evil noise that robbed me of sleep each night. I walked in with an air of sophistication, not wanting to be presumed insane as I’d been with the madman Carlton. I perambulated with a smile up to the desk.
Officer Williams looked up and smiled, not a little laconic, playing with his moustache. He looked me over a full ten seconds before becoming voluble. “How can I be of assistance, sir?”
I drew a deep breath. “I am here about the vandal creeping into the bell tower, playing a blasphemous tune at midnight. It keeps me awake, and the scoundrel must be apprehended.”
“A bat in the belfry, you say?” He looked not a little amused.
His sarcasm was not lost on me, and it took all my self-control to keep from screaming at the man. “You jest, but perhaps you cannot hear it from this part of town. I troubled Sir Carlton about it, and he thought me mad, making sport of me.”
“Is that so, sir?”
“Yes, and I steeled myself to give him a thrashing he’d not soon forget. But, alas, I did not have the heart.”
“It is good that you did not the act. He is infirmed. The first blast to his head may have killed him outright.”
“Yes, I know, sir.”
“However,” he said whilst sighing and shuffling some papers, “the bell tower sounds loudly enough for the whole town to hear, including anyone in the woods surrounding the town. If this were so, would I not hear it? Especially at midnight, of all times. It is not a good thing for you to make sport with me, for I am an officer of the law and have the power to detain you for the evening. I suggest if it’s sport you seek, that you look for it in the pub.”
I could not believe my ears. Was the whole town in on the conspiracy? Had they all gone mad? I saw no help was to be had here and left with a heavy heart, knowing I’d have to handle this situation myself.
I returned home for a hearty supper, needing to keep up my strength, for if breaking into the church was needful, I’d not heed the laws of a constable out to jail me for speaking the truth.
