by C. T. Phipps
Obviously, I wasn’t dead, but this was something he’d conjured on order to live out the fantasy of murdering me. This was a dream, after all, so he could conjure just about anything in order to satisfy whatever urges he might have. Another reason he might create this was to taunt me and Nancy with the fates that might await us.
“What the hell?” Nancy asked, disgusted by the sight.
“It’s just an illusion,” I said, frowning. “A warning from my father.”
Or a trap.
Ah crap.
The corpse’s left eye opened and he charged at me, his bonds falling away like water. He didn’t move fast enough, though, to avoid being slammed in the face with the briefcase I’d brought with me. The briefcase shattered against the fake me even as he was sent spiraling against the side of the garage wall.
The fake version of me shifted and twisted before morphing back into my father. He was injured with a bloody gash in his chest and burns across his face. His right hand was deformed with a lengthy set of claws and I wondered if he realized he was ripping off one of the slashers he’d disdained as sell-outs.
“Son of a witch!” Nancy said, lifting her polearm.
“Word substitution still counts as swearing!” I said.
“It does not!” Nancy said.
My father proceeded to get up off the ground and reached up to one of his Santa suits, it slid off the rack and slithering on him like an ooze. He then reached over and grabbed the ax, ignoring the claws on his hand (as well as a potential lawsuit).
“Just when I think you can’t get any lower, Junior, you proceed to hide under some whore’s skirt.”
“Skort,” Nancy corrected.
“What?” Billy asked.
“It’s a skirt over a pair of shorts,” Nancy said. “As for the rest, it’s honest work, which I suspect you’ve never done a day of in your life.”
“I was a landscaper!” Billy shouted, grabbing his ax and charging straight at her. Nancy proceeded to impale him with the tip of her polearm, taking full advantage of its reach advantage and knocking his feet out from under him.
That was when Billy changed into a beautiful but severely injured red-headed woman with her hair in a braid. I didn’t recognize her, but she was dressed in a white tennis outfit, splattered with blood. She raised her hand over her face and cried out. “Please, no, Nancy! Don’t hurt me anymore!”
Apparently, the woman was someone that Nancy recognized as it provided her a moment’s hesitation, only for the woman to revert to my father and swing his ax into her polearm. The weapon broke in two and left Nancy off-balance.
“Sucker!” Billy shouted, swinging around his ax to strike her in the head. The evil Santa letting loose a mocking ho-ho-ho.
That was when I smacked him in the head with my baseball bat, struck him in the stomach, and then swung a third time. Billy grabbed the bat in mid-air with one hand and crushed it into splinters in his fist.
“A bat? Really?” Billy hissed. “Where’s the theme, boy? You’re an accountant. You should be killing people with spreadsheets stuffed down their throat.”
I punched Billy across the face and kicked him in the stomach. It was like kicking a brick wall, except I probably had a better chance of smashing through that. This wasn’t a real place and the strongest wills shaped the reality of it. I didn’t have any special belief my father was an Übermensch, but he’d had plenty of time to master his control over this mindscape.
“I am in control,” I said, grabbing my father’s ax before he brought it down on my head.
“Control is an illusion!” Billy said, spitting in my face with the same acidic vomit from earlier and burning the side of my face. “See how the ladies like you now! Haha!”
I fell to the ground on my knees, the pain agonizing, only to wipe away the acid and burn my hand in the process.
Nancy responded by jamming the broken end of her polearm into his chest. It pierced him and went out the other side. “Get the hell away from him, you asshole!”
Billy stared down at the stake through his heart, dropping his ax on the ground. Then he smiled. “I guess you do have the mouth of a whore after all. It matches the rest of you. Too bad this is for vampires.”
“Duck,” I said, grabbing the ax.
Nancy did so.
I swung the ax around and cut Billy’s head clean off, sending the monster’s grinning visage flying. I was hoping that would be the end of my father but, instead, my father’s head grew batwings and started flying around the garage.
“Oh you have got to be kidding me,” I said in disbelief.
“I am immortal, bitch!” Billy chuckled. “You can’t win here!”
That was when his head was stabbed in the center by Nancy with the end of her polearm. The ax buried itself into Billy’s flying head and drove him down to the ground. A glow encircled her as a terrible power started filling the garage.
“Watch me,” Nancy said, her voice taking on a sinister reverb.
The entire dreamscape shook like we were in an earthquake and I backed away from Nancy, feeling the eldritch force lash out at me. It smashed into Billy, my sister’s mind, and everything slasher related. She was our spiritual antithesis the same way sunlight was to a vampire or verbena to a werewolf. She was an Artemis and they were real.
A berserk fury came over Nancy as she started chopping into my father’s severed head repeatedly until it was nothing more than a pile of viscera on the ground. She then turned around to swing her glowing ax into his decapitated body and caused it to explode into pieces of living shadow.
The ground rumbled and cracked beneath her feet, revealing a molten colored light that screaming echoed from. A desiccated hand reached up and grabbed the shattered fragments of my father’s skull before dragging them beneath the cracks. A low chuckling accompanied it and I was left dumbstruck at the sight.
“Bloody Christmas V: Billy goes to Hell,” Nancy said, clutching her weapon tight. “The Final Chapter.”
Nancy looked up and I could see the power inside her want to destroy me. For a moment, only a moment, I thought she was going to attack me. She lifted her splintered weapon up and took a deep breath before tossing it to one side.
I let out a breath I hadn’t even realized I’d been holding. “I think he’s dead.”
“Is he?” Nancy asked, clutching her fists as she took several deep breaths. Slowly, the light around her faded and returned to normal. “I mean, really dead-dead?”
“I think so,” I said, looking over to the place where the cracks in the floor had melted the concrete. “I mean, I’ve only seen a few slashers dragged to Hell in my lifetime but that’s generally when you don’t have to ever worry about them ever again.”
Unless there’s a reboot, the Spirit of the Hunt said. I mean, it’s possible to get them back from Hell, but that’s more trouble than it’s worth. I mean, you might as well send them into space at that point. Hmm, space, I need to figure out how to get a slasher on that space station they’re building.
Are you insane or just screwing with me? I asked.
The mental patient is asking me, a goddess, whether I’m insane? The Spirit of the Hunt asked, indignant.
Yes, I replied.
Very probably, the Spirit of the Hunt replied. However, I find that a rational response to an irrational world.
She had a point there. One that I had difficulty rebutting.
“Talking to your fairy godmother?” Nancy asked.
“A little, yes,” I replied. “As usual, she’s long on snark and short on answers.”
“Sounds like my mother,” Nancy replied. “I’m sorry for killing your father.”
“Why?” I asked. “He was an awful person and I’m glad he’s gone. I should be thanking you.”
“Are you thanking me?” Nancy asked.
“Yes,” I said. “You keep being surprised by my reactions.”
“I guess I don’t know how I’m supposed to react,” Nancy replied. “I ha
te my family sometimes, but I still love them.”
“Same for me, but Billy hasn’t been my family in a long time,” I said. It felt final to say it out loud, but it had been my opinion for a long time.
Nancy looked around and frowned. “Well, good.”
“You’re full of regret for killing, aren’t you?” I asked.
“Isn’t that a good thing?” Nancy asked. “My mother, grandmother, and sister absolutely love it. They think it made them better, stronger people when they killed the bad people the law couldn’t touch. I’m still not sure.”
“You’ll get used to it,” I said, dryly. “But I’m not sure you should.”
“If I don’t do it, who will?” Nancy asked.
I nodded. “Fair enough.”
Nancy walked over and wrapped her arms around my neck. “Well, we’re still here. You want to do something to pass the time?”
I backed away, uncomfortable. “Nancy, I’m not sure I can give you what you want.”
“You don’t feel that way?” Nancy asked, looking embarrassed.
“No, I do, I think,” I said.
“You think?” Nancy asked, crossing her arms. “Way to make a girl feel special.”
“I’ve never felt this way about anyone.”
“It’s a bit early but that’s sweet.”
I closed my eyes. “No, I mean that literally. I’ve never been attracted to anyone else in my life.”
“What now?” Nancy asked.
I shrugged then looked away. “It’s not a thing I’ve ever had to deal with. I feel an intense connection to you, though, so I can’t put it in words.”
“Oh, wow.”
I took a deep breath. “I would like to explore this, but I think you should know. I think I’m more interested in the romance and feelings rather than the physical part. Mind you, I don’t have much experience with that either.”
According to my research, separate from the idiot doctors at H.P. Lovecraft, asexual people could engage in sexual intimacy with their partner. Sexual desire was also different from sexual attraction, as confusing as that sometimes was.
Every asexual person was different. Some might be disgusted by sex, some might feel nonchalant about it, and some might enjoy it. I wasn’t in the disgusted category, but it wasn’t a die-hard need for me either. Certainly, I didn’t feel the same way about it as my sister. I didn’t want Nancy to be disappointed either even as I wanted to continue this relationship, strange as it may be to me.
Nancy frowned. “Well, I’m not going to lie to you. The sex is a big part of any relationship. This is the first time any boyfriend has expressed more interest in the romance than it too. Then again, I tend to date jerks.”
Did she call me her boyfriend? It felt ridiculous that we’d just destroyed an evil ghost in a dreamscape and that was more important to me, but here we were. Billy was my past and I was determined to spend as little time thinking about him from now on.
“You already called my father an ass—” I started to say.
“I know,” Nancy said. “Don’t remind me!”
I laughed. “I’m just saying you can’t un-ring that bell.”
“I’ll certainly try,” Nancy said. “I was just caught up in the moment. But—”
I looked at her. “I’m certainly willing to help you with that aspect of our relationship. If you’re willing to let me try.”
Nancy smirked. “That is the strangest pass anyone has ever made at me.”
“If you don’t want to get involved with me, I understand,” I replied. “You’d be quite sane to run away screaming.”
Nancy stared. “Oh, I tell that to all of my boyfriends too. Here’s the thing, they usually do.”
“Are we boyfriend and girlfriend?” I asked.
“If you want, yeah,” Nancy said. “I mean, we’re probably going to die horribly in a suicidal attack on a bunch of slashers as well as their billionaire patrons today. I feel that adds a certain level of carpe diem.”
I smiled. “I’d like that.”
“Just, can we get your sister to stop talking about you having sex? Possibly with her?” Nancy asked.
“If you have suggestions, I’m open to them,” I said.
“Muzzles?” Nancy asked.
We kissed again. I was more confidant this time and loved how I could sense that it pleased her. I wasn’t sure we should graduate to anything further, least of all while inside my sister’s dreamscape, but I was still kind of looking forward to it.
“So, any ideas how we escape Carrie’s brain? I mean, it’s not like I can just wave my hand and cause it to happen,” Nancy said, waving her hand at the garage door.
The garage door started to open and revealed a glowing light outside. I couldn’t see anything but a brilliant whiteness that felt like home. Such things could be deceptive, especially in a dream, but I wasn’t aware of any other options we might have.
Nancy blinked. “These Artemis powers are getting a little weird.”
Either of you could have opened a gateway out, the Spirit of the Hunt said. You both have a great deal of potential.
Do you always have to sound like a supervillain? I asked.
Yes, the Spirit of the Hunt said.
“I guess this is our way out,” I said, offering her my arm.
“Unless, of course, it leads deeper into the dream or we end up in Hell,” Nancy said.
“That would be unfortunate,” I said. “But distinctly possible.”
Nancy glared at me. “You’re not very good at this reassuring thing.”
“I find that the best attitude to life is to assume the next day will be worse than your last,” I said.
“How’s that worked out for you?” Nancy asked.
“Pretty well until yesterday,” I said. “You’ve broken a long-running streak.”
Nancy smiled. “Nice save.”
The two of us then walked off into the light. It would have been a beautiful ethereal moment if not for the fact that I then landed square on my face in the Demeter’s Garden parking lot.
Chapter Seventeen
“Shouldn’t that thing have healed by now?” Nancy asked, looking at me. We were both in the first passenger seat of a church van we’d stolen. Carrie was at the wheel and doing well despite the fact she’d had a grand total of two or three driving lessons beforehand.
I was presently holding an icepack to my face, which was covered in a nasty bruise from where I’d landed on my face. Gerald was asleep, or dead depending on how you wanted to view vampires during the day, in a body bag underneath our seat. It was wrapped in a blanket to cover him up as we’d agreed. The sun was shining overhead, and it was now close to one o’clock.
We were running behind schedule due to the unexpected assassination attempt by my late father, but had spent much of today running from store to store getting what supplies we could. The materials to make our bomb, gloves, climbing equipment, rope, smoke bombs, a cellphone jammer, binoculars, and a couple of rifles that the gun shop owner really shouldn’t have sold to us under any reasonable state law. Assembling the bomb would have to wait, though I’d done most of the grunt work in the middle of a cornfield despite my injury. A child could put the remaining parts together, not that I would advise it.
“Facial injuries are the least likely to heal for slashers,” I said, grimacing. “Sometimes they do, but most often they don’t. Don’t ask me why.”
“Because who would be afraid of pretty people!” Carrie said, jokingly. I hoped. “The Romans taught that beauty was a sign of good moral character. So, slashers being ugly is a sign of their inner corruption.”
“That explains a lot about the Romans,” I replied.
“They also believed murder shows were a way of educating the public as well as instilling strong moral character,” Carrie replied. “Think how well we would have done in the coliseum.”
“I’d rather not,” I said, dryly. “They made you fight animals after all.”
“B
ark?” Cujo asked, sitting in the front seat.
Carrie paused. “I hadn’t thought about that. Well, there go my gladiator fantasies. You are a professional killjoy, you know that, bro?”
“I’ve heard,” I said, removing the ice pack from my face. “In any case, we’re running out of prep time.”
“No kidding,” Carrie said. “I mean, I’d say we still have a few days until they’re all dead but I doubt Nancy feels that way.”
“A little bit,” Nancy said. “I don’t trust these people not to murder the whole lot of them or worse, magic ritual be damned. They’re slashers.”
“Worse, they’re super-rich,” Carrie said, not contradicting her. “The Cassidy brothers can always afford to buy new ones. Plucky female heroines can’t be that hard to find. The armed forces are integrated in many countries. Maybe there’s some old Soviet fighter pilots that still technically count. Is there an age limit on being a sacrifice? I mean, you’ve already said the virginity thing isn’t a problem, so age shouldn’t be a problem either.”
Nancy stared at her. “You know, we were in your brain and it was less weird than this conversation.”
“How was it, anyway?” Carrie asked. “I mean, you didn’t come across my porn stash, did you?”
“We most certainly did not,” I replied.
“Because I’m pretty sure that occupied an entire room,” Carrie said. “In any case, you now owe me.”
“Wait, what?” Nancy asked.
“Bark?” Cujo asked.
“You killed my father,” Carrie said, focusing on the road in front of us. “So, not only did you deprive me and William of the opportunity of killing him—”
“I chopped off his head,” I said.
“But the head flew away,” Carrie said. “Doesn’t count. Not even as halfsies.”
I frowned.
“But you have popped your slasher murdering cherry!” Carrie said to Nancy. “You have slain one of the eternal monsters who stalk mankind! Therefore, you owe us.”
