by Dan Dillard
Chapter 30
Hours later, Aaron and Kay entered the apartment through the unlocked front door. In seconds, what was concern escalated to panic. Ethan watched them and took comfort that they cared enough to check on him even if Emily wasn't there. The look of horror on their faces, mouths open, was comical, and he felt like saying ‘I told you so’, but couldn’t speak.
“Ethan?” Aaron called out.
No answer. He scanned the room. Kay burst into tears and left the room.
“Dear God,” she said, and then sat, crying loudly, on the front walk.
The apartment was spattered with blood and smelled of sweat, vomit, and dog feces. It was riddled with broken furniture and glass. Papers were strewn everywhere and the computer was smashed. The information Ethan had gathered—information that might have shed some light on the gruesome landscape—would be left to forensic science to recover and make sense of. Aaron dialed his cell phone, calling 911 to report the mess. His eyes darted from object to object as he waited for someone to answer.
“It ... I just don't understand,” he said.
The coffee table had scorch marks covering what was once Ethan's makeshift witchboard. Aaron stepped past the couch to find Slobber. The being had apparently grown tired of the dog as well, or had let its demon pet have Slobs as a plaything. As Ethan watched his friend, he noticed the dog's corpse in the corner of the living room, as well. His four-legged friend had been completely eviscerated.
Slobber's face was a terrible sight, eyeballs dried and sunken. His teeth were forever smiling, lips drawn into an eternal grimace. His tongue hung awkwardly to the side. Ethan wondered if perhaps he’d done that to his little buddy as part of his final task from the beastly voice, but he couldn’t remember anything after crawling into the bathroom.
He felt neither remorse nor sorrow for the animal, and knew at that moment he had lost his humanity. The boundary between reality and dreams had shattered, and he simply couldn’t differentiate what was real anymore. If anything had ever been real. He stared at the animal’s remains, colorful reds and blues, glistening in the sunlight that poured through the apartment’s front door.
Such a good friend, he thought.
In the background Aaron spoke to the 911 operator frantically. Ethan listened to one side of the conversation.
“Something happened to my friend. My God, there's blood everywhere.”
Something happened all right, Aaron, he thought. But I feel fine.
“No, my girlfriend is here. Whoever did this is gone,” Aaron said, voice quivering, and then continued, “I'm not going anywhere. When will the police be here?”
They are gone, Ethan thought.
“The dog. Someone killed his dog. There's so much blood. I don't see anyone else.”
Just outside the open front door, Kay sobbed harder at hearing about the dog.
“I can't find Ethan. He might be in the bedroom, but I can't go in there...” Aaron dropped the phone, his eyes fixed on the partially open bedroom door.
The faint voice on the cell carried through the silent room, “Sir? Sir, are you there?”
Ethan followed as Aaron stepped around the pile of debris that used to be a leather couch. They stopped at the door and Aaron sighed heavily, unsure if he was ready, before pushing the door open.
Ethan's nude body lay on the bed. His arms were fanned wide and his legs were crossed at the ankles in a very familiar pose. There was a black trail of dried blood leading from the bathroom to the bed His skin was disfigured with a multitude of carved symbols that Aaron didn't recognize, and the wounds appeared to have been cleaned. He turned away and caught Kay at the door.
“Don't,” he said, and began to cry in her arms.
Ethan stared at his former vessel with apathy, the way a person might step on an ant. On the floor next to the bed was his blood soaked Bible. In his body's hand was a bloody razor blade, obviously used to carve the symbols that covered the body from head to toe. None of that seemed to matter anymore, and for an instant, those things the voice had said made sense. He looked around the room once more, the memory of his last moments a blur. Everything was different, lighter somehow. In the horror of it all, he found relief.
He felt neither pain nor fear. He thought of his parents and wondered if they experienced something similar. He thought about his brother and what Emily had said about regret, but there was no regret. He watched Aaron cry out.
“You stupid bastard, what did you do?”
Aaron looked back into the room and stared at his dead best friend, voice cracking and tears falling. He was a rational being, but there were no rational answers for what he saw.
The Ethan-spirit followed Kay as she left the apartment in shock. She leaned against the brick wall just outside the front door. After a moment, she knelt to pray. Ethan wanted to tell her it was useless, knowing if anyone could see him, she could. He couldn't speak. He thought she might be thanking God that it was his body being discovered and not hers, and he was no longer angry with her.
Aaron walked back out of the bedroom and found his phone. He disconnected from the emergency operator and dialed Emily’s number.
“Hello?” a weak voice answered.
Aaron couldn't speak at first.
“Aaron? What is it?” she asked.
He sobbed and her anxiety increased.
“What? What is it?” she pleaded.
“You bitch! You should have been here. He wouldn't be fucking dead if you were here, you stupid bitch.” Saliva sprayed as he yelled.
“Aaron, no! He's not ... Tell me he's not!”
Aaron smashed his phone on the floor.
For Ethan there was no more pain, no more emotion. He felt the world slipping, growing hazy, and disappearing from view.
He thought of his father. He thought about the questions he suddenly had the answers to and how those answers only led to more questions. His vision swirled as it had in the dreams, and he could feel his human grip slipping, melting into the background. Maybe he was joining the collective known to him only as ‘We’. He would become part of the knowledge. He knew only that he would not wake up again as Ethan Jacobs, and then he felt nothing…saw nothing…heard nothing…smelled nothing...tasted nothing.
“Last entry: It's not what I thought, Dad. But there is something there.
Ethan”
..ooOOoo..
About the Author
Dan was born thousands of years ago, a product of the marriage of ancient sticky evil and the blowing dusts from one of the bottom layers of hell.
Ok, none of that is true. I'm just a dude who works a soul-sucking job and writes to center himself.
I have a family that loves me, including my fantastic wife, Stephanie, and two little girls who put up with my immaturity amazingly well. Together we adventure about this rock with a dog, a bird, a lizard, and some fish.
Writing, playing music, drawing, animation... any artform really gets me deep down and if it tells a story, I'm there. I hope you'll read some of my work and if you do, I hope it scares you. Or at least, I hope you get a laugh. Thanks for reading!
Dan Dillard
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