“The Blood of the Goat is now your own,” The Word boomed from his throne, “for change starts on the inside, and from the inside, one can change anything he desires.”
He motioned to the man in the black hood. “Thomas, you have ingested His blood, filling your mind and heart with His warmth. Now, reflect on these miracles as you transform into His image.”
I gritted my teeth as the man in the white hood held me still again. Black Hood reached into the chest and I shut my eyes, preparing for the miracle. I felt my lips tremble and I bit down on them. I needed to be strong. My family was watching.
Black Hood grabbed my right arm and began sawing it off at the elbow.
I screamed, eyes bulging as pain exploded like thunder. My arm convulsed as the muscles were severed from bone, the hacksaw chewing through my skin and spraying blood across my face. The corners of my vision blackened as the saw screeched across bone, sending lightning bolts of pain charging across my body.
And then it was over. I fought to maintain consciousness, the agony unbearable. White Hood didn’t release his grip. I watched through bloodshot eyes as Black Hood set the bloody hacksaw down and pulled a blowtorch from the chest. A blue tongue of flame poked from the spout as he brought it to my squirting stump and began to cauterize the open skin.
I screamed even louder, the pain beyond anything I thought possible. Seconds later, I blacked out.
When I came to, head pounding and vision blurry, Black Hood was cutting off my other arm. After he sliced the last strip of skin from my new stump, my mind went dark again.
The world swam, red color and hot air. I was on my back, White Hood staring down at me. He gently slapped my face, rousing me from the nightmare darkness. I blinked at him and tried to speak, but the words died in my throat.
White Hood looked up and told Black Hood to keep going, that I was OK. I wanted to see my wife’s face, I wanted her to tell me the pain would end soon. I knew it was going to be bad, but this was excruciating, far worse than I ever imagined. I tried to block it out, telling myself that it was almost over, that this is what I wanted.
Black Hood began to saw my legs off, the blade spewing through my flesh, just above the knees.
I passed out in a torrent of misery and pain, my howls dying in the air.
I coughed up a mouthful of mucus and blood as I regained consciousness. My body was a furnace of agony. Something itchy was covering my face. My vision was limited. Heat. My limbs felt funny. Someone was talking, a voice muffled by my dreamlike state. I wanted to throw up. My head felt like it had been stuffed with burning coals.
I tried to climb to my hands and knees, blinking the darkness away, but something wasn’t right and I fell back down. I shook my head and felt hands grip me and gently pull me up. I shook my thundering head, the black pulling away from my vision like a spider web.
Metal hooves had been screwed into my elbows and knees, my body slumped and weak as I stood on all fours. The transformation was complete. I had done it. The itchy mask covering my face must be the skin of a goat, my eyes now seeing out of the empty eye sockets. I felt my head was bare and guessed they had already shaved it and implanted the horns in my skull with a hot knife.
I steadied myself on my new limbs, my hooves clacking against the cement floor. My body shook with effort, my muscles weak and exhausted. I ground my teeth and forced myself to stay upright. I could feel the goat horns digging into my skull. The skin pulled over my face smelled like rot and scraped against my cheeks like sandpaper.
The Word stood and I suddenly noticed there were more people in the room than before. Well…people was a stretch. To the right of The Word were the thirty-one who had come before me, the thirty-one who had gone through what I had and failed. They shuffled where they were, heads held low to the ground.
A herd of unworthy goats.
Their hooves shot echoes across the walls, an array of once-human-beings just like I had been. Men, women, all with goat faces pulled over their own, horns jutting from their bare heads, downcast with shame. Leashes were tied to collars around their throats, the ends of which were held by Kent and Bradly.
The Word leaned forward on his throne, assessing the state I was in. White Hood and Black Hood were planted on either side of me, arms crossed. I stared straight ahead, doing my best to stay upright.
“Well done, Thomas,” The Word said finally. A smattering of claps rounded the room, the Execs in suits nodding their approval. My wife had tears running down her cheeks and a smile that shone like the sun. My kids were slapping their palms together in awe at my resolution.
The Word waited for the room to silence. When it calmed, his voice became deadly somber.
“The rest is up to you now. You know the words?”
I nodded, feeling the weight of my new horns pressing my chin to the floor. I worked my jaw so I could see properly out of the eyeholes of the goat skin. Almost there, I thought, I’ve almost done it.
The Word leaned back on his throne, scanning the room with unseen eyes, “This is it, my friends. Not a word will be spoken during this time. Thomas needs complete silence and total focus. I think we can afford him that, yes?” He turned his covered head to me. “When you’re ready.”
The two Hoods backed away against the far wall and the red light above us dimmed. I noticed now that the scarlet symbols beneath my hooves were glowing. Candles lined the edges to form a circle.
I took my place at the center of the pentagram.
I closed my eyes, concentrating. I pushed all thoughts from my brain, emptying my head. I focused on breathing, on the heat that swirled around me. I saw the red light filtering through my eyelids and let it dance behind my eyes. Sweat and blood dripped off my new face and fell to the floor. My limbs screamed in their new form, but I silenced the tormented flesh.
I drew in a long breath and then spoke, my voice strong and determined:
“Dear Father, Lord God of the Goat, I come before you, not as Thomas, but as one of your flock. I have cast aside my worldly form. I long to be one with you. I have consumed the holy blood, I have whittled my body to mirror your Holy Image. I am yours, my life, my love, my future, my suffering. I beg you to return to the earth and lead us into glorious paradise. We stand ready, humbled, and in awe of you. I have displayed my undying devotion to you and my desire to follow in your footsteps. I pray of you, please, return to us now and lead us into your kingdom!”
As the last of my plea left my mouth, the room shook slightly and a soft cry went up from the bystanders. Their eyes went wide and they looked around at one another, mouths agape.
My heart pounded in my chest as the pentagram flared and blood began to seep from the edges. I couldn’t believe it. This has never happened before, not a single person had conjured any kind of reaction.
The herd of human goats looked up at me with shock and awe, their eyes bulging under their masks. The Word stood, his hands gripping the armrests of his throne as the floor quivered beneath us. The light flickered above and a few of the candles went out, a sudden wind stirring the air.
I shuffled my hooves on the floor, trying to keep upright as the quake continued, blood pooling from the symbols around me. Even through the pain, I felt a smile creep across my face. I always knew I could do it. My wife had her arms around our boys, a look of utter amazement plastered to her face.
And then the commotion ceased.
The ground solidified beneath me and the red light stopped flickering, returning to its constant warm glow. The dust froze in the air and then gently wafted back to the ground, the wind leaving as quickly as it had come. I watched in horror as the pentagram sucked the blood back into its borders and the glow faded.
And we were left in silence.
“No, no we were so close!” The Word roared suddenly. “What did we do wrong!? What did we do?!”
The Execs cast their eyes to the ground, devastating disappointment leaking from every face. Kent and Bradly shook their heads at me, frowns pull
ing their mouths to the floor.
“WE WERE SO CLOSE!” The Word continued to scream. “WE THOUGHT THIS WAS THE ONE! WHAT DID WE DO WRONG!?”
Kent raised his hands defensively, “Sir, we followed the bloodline down to him. We were sure it was the right line. We’ve narrowed it down so much, it HAS to be him!”
The Word waved a hand at me from under his robe. “I’m disgusted by the sight of you. Someone get him out of my sight! Put him in the pens out back with the rest of them!”
“No!” I shouted suddenly, “No, let me try again! I can do this, I know I can! Please!”
Black Hood was grabbing me, dragging me back and away from The Word, growling at me to shut up. I felt something clasp around my throat and I was suddenly jerked forward.
I had been leashed.
No, NO!
“Please, just give me another chance! I’m the one! I know I’m the one! I CAN DO THIS!”
Black Hood kicked me into line along with the rest of the goats. They were streaming out the side door, pulled along by their own leashes as White Hood led them out of the Goat Room.
Just as I was about to be pushed through the door, The Word turned to me, an arm raised.
“Wait a moment. We weren’t wrong…we had the right bloodline…”
He turned to my eldest son, “Just the wrong person.”
I thrashed against my leash, screaming, “No, he’s not ready for this! HE’S NOT READY FOR THIS! GET YOUR FUCKING HANDS OFF MY SON!”
5
There's Something Wrong With Dad
Fifteen years ago, something terrible happened to my family. It’s taken a lot of therapy and drugs to help me cope with it. I still think about those days a lot. I can’t seem to get some of the images out of my mind. They scare me, they keep me up at night. I want to forget, but I can’t seem to.
My therapist told me I should write it all out. She said that it would help purge some of these memories. I’m not sure if I believe her, but I’m going to try. I have to. I need peace of mind. I can’t keep living like this.
A couple things you need to know before I begin: 1) My family didn’t believe in technology. We didn’t have a TV, a computer, a phone, anything. My dad believed those things would rot your brain out and he was always happy to tell people just that. 2) My family didn’t like to be bothered. Our house was out in the hills down a dirt road. We didn’t have neighbors. We didn’t have company. It was just us. My mom, my dad, and my brother Jay. My mom homeschooled us and my dad would take his truck into town to work at the bank.
I wouldn’t say we were an unhappy family. My mom, Ann, was caring, kind, and had a passive way of dealing with things. She was a soft-spoken, submissive woman. My brother, Jay, was two years younger than me. I loved my brother. He was a troublemaker and I constantly had to cover for him, hiding some of his more mischievous actions from our parents.
And then there was my father, Henry. He was an old-fashioned kind of man. Strict, but honest. He believed in a moral code, believed in being an upstanding example, and was a hard-working provider for our small family.
That was before everything went bad.
That was before my father changed.
I was sitting at the breakfast table happily munching my toast. My six-year-old brother sat across from me, slurping down his milk. My father walked into the kitchen and asked Jay to stop being so rude before going to my mother and pecking her on the cheek, bidding her good morning.
My mother smiled and helped him with his tie, telling him his lunch was packed for the day and to come home safe. My dad threw on his sports jacket and grabbed his briefcase from the kitchen counter. He ruffled my hair and leaned down next to me.
“Are you going to be good for your mom today, champ?” He asked. This close, I could smell his cologne, his face freshly shaven. He was a good-looking man, tall and dark with broad shoulders. I had always looked up to him and admired his physicality.
“Yeah, dad, I’ll be good,” I answered.
Smiling, my dad went to my brother and asked him the same. My brother shrugged his shoulders, a goofy grin on his face. One of his front teeth was loose and it stuck out at an angle, the object of much fruitless wiggling.
“Maybe today that’ll come out,” my dad said, examining it.
He kissed Jay on the forehead and said a goodbye to my mother, blowing her a kiss, and was out the door. As I finished my toast, I heard him fire up the truck and back it down the gravel driveway.
My mother began cleaning up the breakfast dishes, telling Jay and I to finish up and fetch our schoolbooks. I hated school, as all children do. I thought it was boring and a waste of time. The woods and hills were more interesting to me than words and pencils.
Groaning, I brushed the crumbs from my shirt and motioned for Jay to come with me to our room to collect our school supplies.
The day passed like so many before it. Jay and I sat at the kitchen table, doing our schoolwork, listening to our mother, and trying not to die of boredom. At lunch my mother made us peanut-butter sandwiches and we were allowed to go outside for an hour. This was always my favorite part of the school day.
Jay and I bounded from our house and went to the woods. We climbed trees, threw rocks at each other, and then finally took turns rolling down the grassy hill we lived on. I remember how warm it was that day, the June heat foreshadowing an even hotter July.
We heard our mother calling us back in and we obeyed, steeling ourselves for the final stretch of schoolwork. Hours seemed like years in that kitchen, but three o’clock always came. When the hands on the old clock made a right angle, we were allowed to close our books for the day.
That evening, Jay and I decided to make paper airplanes on the living-room floor as my mother prepared supper. I remember the delicious smells wafting though the house as we folded newspaper into planes. Jay had just finished his first one, holding it up proudly, when dad came home.
From the second he walked into the door, I knew it was going to be a bad night. We all have those memories of our fathers, probably when his temper got the better of him and everyone was on eggshells. This was different, though. There was an aura of tension around him that I had never seen before.
He didn’t say anything when he walked in, just tossed his coat over the back of a chair and put his briefcase down. My mother turned from the stove and smiled at him, welcoming him home and asking how his day was. Dad said nothing as he went to the sink and filled a glass of water. He drained it in one long gulp and set the glass down.
He turned to Jay and I, something hard and dark in his eyes.
“What are you doing?” he asked, his tone sharp.
“Look, dad, it’s a B-52 bomber!” Jay said proudly, swooping his paper plane through the air.
My father took a step forward suddenly and snatched it from his hand, examining it. He lowered the plane and stared at us. “Is this the paper I was reading this morning?”
I swallowed. Yep, dad was in a bad mood.
“I told them they could use it; I thought you were finished reading it,” my mother intervened.
My dad turned to her. “Well, maybe you should ask me next time. Do you think you can handle that?”
My mom blinked. “I’m sorry honey. I didn’t think it was a big deal.”
My dad said nothing, just pulled a kitchen chair out and sat down, watching us. I felt uncomfortable. I felt like he was looking for an excuse to be angry. He wasn’t usually like this, but there had been a time or two his anger had gotten the better of him. For the most part, though, he wasn’t a violent or even a loud person.
“Bad day at the bank, dear?” my mother asked, stirring a pot full of sauce she was preparing.
My dad turned to look at her. “I had the worst day I’ve ever had.” He shook his head, “You can’t even imagine. None of you can. The things I go through to put food on this table.”
My mother turned and frowned. “Aw, I’m sorry to hear that. Can I get you a beer?”
Dad nodded.
My mom went to the fridge and pulled one out, handing it to him and putting a hand on my dad’s shoulder reassuringly.
My dad went to twist the top off but pulled his hand away with a snarl. “Ow! Shit! Of course it’s not a twist top, why would it be?” I could see a drop of blood on my dad’s hand from where the cap had cut him. I began to look for an excuse to leave the room before dinner.
“Relax, dear, I’ll get you a bottle opener,” my mom said, trying to cool his rising temper.
My dad shook his head. “Oh, don’t bother!” Raising his arm, he smashed the neck of the beer against the table and shattered it. He poured the beer from the fragmented neck into a glass before tossing the empty bottle toward the trash can. It missed and shattered on the floor.
“Henry!” my mom said, her voice a soft hiss.
My dad took a long pull and set the glass down hard on the table, “Maybe next time you should get the twist-off caps. Maybe you should think about me every once in a while.”
Not wanting to fight, my mom quietly turned around and continued making dinner. My dad took another drink from the glass and looked at Jay and I. I quickly looked down at my half-made paper plane and mindlessly fiddled with it. I didn’t want him to even know I existed.
“Tommy,” my dad called me. My heart froze. I looked up at him, panicked.
“Were you good today?” he asked. “Was Tommy a good boy for mommy?” His voice was condescending and his eyes bore into mine.
I nodded.
He drained the rest of his beer, staring at me, before putting it down and muttering, “You better have been.”
As my brother and I tried to melt into the floor, my dad stood and went to the bedroom to get changed out of his work clothes. I let out a sigh of relief and looked at Jay. He grimaced at me and shook his head, his loose tooth jutting from his upper lip.
“Be good tonight,” I whispered urgently to him.
The Worst Kind of Monsters Page 9
