The Worst Kind of Monsters

by Elias Witherow

  My heart was thundering and I tossed my iPod to the side, sitting up in bed. I had just imagined that voice, right? It had just been an audio memory replaying in my subconscious…it had to be.

  Then I heard something.

  Something down the hall in my bathroom.

  Splashing.

  I calmed the storm in my chest and got out of bed. What the fuck was happening?

  I turned on the hallway light and listened. Splashing.

  I crept toward the bathroom door, sweat popping out on my forehead. I reached the door and peeked inside.

  Bunny screamed at me as it struggled to pull the rest of its body out of the toilet, his upper half leaning over the rim, claws digging into the floor. Its empty eye sockets dripped as water poured from them and its teeth extended down and cut into the linoleum floor.

  I screamed, falling back and reeling in terror, away from the pawing grasp of this monster clawing its way out of my toilet. I turned and sprinted into my bedroom, slamming the door as I heard the heavy thunk as Bunny pulled free.

  My breath came in long burning gulps and my mind raced to make sense of what was happening. I knew I only had seconds. What the fuck was going on!? I needed to get out of here, needed to get to my car and drive away from this nightmare. What was it doing here?! HOW was it here!?

  Footsteps thudded outside my door and I closed my eyes, whimpering and praying for help. Sweat ran down my face and I licked my lips, face contorted in agonized fear. Behind me, I could feel Bunny tracing his big human hands over the wood, blind and angry. Then it kicked the door.

  I fell to the floor from the impact, sprawling in front of my bed. The wood shattered and blew inward, the hinges knocked clean off. I rolled to my side and under my bed as the door came crashing down where I had just been lying.

  The nine-foot giant ducked its head and entered the room. I lay wheezing, tears forming in my eyes, holding back a scream that was rocketing through my body. I watched his feet take two steps forward, then stop. I put a hand to my mouth, trying to shove any noise back down my throat. With both eyes gone, Bunny began to sniff the air, taking long pulls and growling. Slowly, it knelt and got down on all fours. I watched, pulling myself away, as it lowered its head to look under the bed directly at me.

  The hollow eye sockets were two patches of dark ink, its fur ruffled and messy, its long teeth glowing in the night. It took one quick sniff and then roared, a huge hand shooting out to grab me, claws whistling toward my face.

  I screamed, my pathetic hiding spot blown. I rolled out from under the bed and jumped onto the mattress. Without pausing, I dove for the door, my knee catching Bunny’s face as it looked up. It howled and pain exploded down my leg. I crashed awkwardly through the door and then I was up, sprinting toward the front door.

  I grabbed my keys and phone from the counter and practically tore the front door off its hinges, escaping out into the hall. My car sat parked just a few feet behind the building and without looking behind me, I ran for it, blasting the unlock button on my keychain with my thumb.

  Once inside my car, I turned it on, almost snapping the key in half. As I was about to back up, I looked up and saw Bunny thundering toward me on all fours, his long teeth sparking against the pavement as he ran. I shifted into gear and hit the gas, propelling my car forward with a screech.

  Bunny slammed into the side of the car with all its might, howling furiously. I felt whiplash shock my senses, and pain erupted in my arm as the driver’s-side door caved inward slightly from the impact. I never let off the gas, gritting my teeth and feeling blood leaking between them. I tore out of the parking lot, leaving the deformed monster behind.

  I pulled my phone out with a shaking hand, mind spinning in shock, and called my parents. They lived only a few miles down the road on the same street, in the house I grew up in. Please answer, I begged, I need help, please, please, please. It went to voicemail and I heard my dad instruct me to leave a message.

  I screamed into phone, “Mom, dad, call the police, there’s something chasing me! I’m hurt and I need help! Call the fucking police NOW! I’m on my way over! I’ll be there in a few minutes!” I threw my phone down on the seat next to me and glanced in the rearview mirror. I didn’t see it following me.

  It was the middle of the night so the streets were empty. I silently flew down the road, the street lamps casting rapid shadows across my vision, making me jump at every one. My eyes darted from the road to my mirrors at a rapid pace, fully expecting to see Bunny right behind me. How was it here? Why was this happening?!

  As I approached my parents’ house, I saw the street bathed in blue light. The cops were already there waiting for me. There must have been ten cop cars lining the street, surrounded by fire trucks and ambulances. Officers swarmed my parents’ lawn and I spotted my dad sitting on the curb.

  He looked up as I came screeching to a halt in front of him. I kicked my door open and got out, immediately embraced by my father. He hugged me tight and pulled me close, burying his face in my neck.

  “I’m so glad to see you,” he said, his voice weak and cracking. He pulled away and I saw his eyes were red and bloodshot.

  “Dad, something weird is going on, you’re not going to believe what I’m about to tell you,” I said, the words fumbling out of my mouth in a rushed frenzy.

  “Listen to me,” he said softly, sorrowfully.

  He took me by the shoulders, his eyes swollen and brimming with tears.

  “Your mother is dead,” he croaked, mouth trembling. “She was…” he gritted his teeth and shook his head, now weeping. “She was murdered and—” …tears poured from his eyes… “—and they raped her…goddamn it they raped my wife, my angel.”

  I felt the blood leave my face. My stomach rotted in on itself. The breath was punched from my lungs. I staggered, looking at my father, and felt myself stumble into my car behind me as my knees disintegrated. I gasped for air.

  “W-w….what did you say?” I mumbled, barely aware of my surroundings, the world growing dark corners.

  “I’m so sorry, son,” my dad said, his whole body shaking as more tears fell. “There’s more.”

  No. No, please God.

  He wiped his eyes, “Your little brother, Lyle…Jesus Christ…they fucking killed him, they killed my boy!” My father collapsed to the ground, sitting down hard on the pavement, covering his hands with his face. “I was sleeping on the couch…I…I didn’t hear anything.” He looked up at me pleading, “I could have saved them…”

  I sucked in air, the world spinning. Lyle…my brother…dead. It couldn’t be true. There’s just no way. Please.

  I suddenly bent over, pulverized by the shock and grief, and screamed. I shrunk to the pavement as mucus bubbled out of my nose and drool dripped from my chin. I screamed hard, my whole body convulsing as the crushing reality of my father’s words hit me. I sobbed and rocked on the pavement, eyes squeezed closed so tightly I saw stars. I don’t know how long I lay there weeping and screaming, but as my energy drained I felt a hand on my shoulder.

  I opened my eyes, the face looking down on me blurry and I cleared my vision with the back of my hand. It was the chief of police.

  “I can’t tell you how sorry I am,” he said gently. “If there’s anything I can do, please ask and I’ll do it.”

  “W-why?” I cried, looking up at him.

  “I don’t know,” he said, sighing heavily. “I wish I had an answer for you. Sometimes people just do bad things.”

  I sat up and pushed myself so my back was resting against my car. “Who did this? Who did this to my mother and brother?!”

  The chief shook his head. “We don’t know. But we’ll catch them. I promise you. We will get the bastards who did this.”

  I paused, “Them?”

  He sat down next to me, glancing at my father across from us on the curb who had stopped crying and was listening.

  “There’s been a pattern of these incidents,” he said. “Two people: One
watches, the other acts. We don’t know why they do it. But it’s always the same, a mother and a son. They even kill the fucking dog.”

  And that’s when the horrible, sick realization dawned on me with the force of a thousand suns. That game. That fucking game had done this. Somehow, someway, my actions had controlled the hands of fate in this waking night terror.

  I leaned over and threw up on the ground. And then I threw up again. I felt dizzy and numb, my consciousness fading in and out, threatening to abandon me.

  What have I done?

  The police chief put a hand on my shoulder, a look of deep sympathy on his face. He remained silent and we all sat there for what seemed like forever. The police streamed in and out of my parents’ house, pushing past paramedics and detectives, all talking and looking grim.

  And that’s when my phone rang.

  It was still in my car on the passenger’s seat and I didn’t hear it at first until my father nodded his head at me and said in a delirious voice, “That’s your phone going off.”

  I staggered up, the police officer leaving us in privacy, and reached through the shattered window of my car. I looked at the screen and saw the incoming call was blocked.

  I numbly answered it, “What?”

  “Get back to your computer and finish what you started.”

  I blinked, feeling like I was floating above myself. That voice.

  “Only a few have made it so far, please, the entirety of existence depends on it, you must go back!”

  “Old Man?” I said incredulously.

  “Yes!” he said, his voice rising. “Please, I know your loss is great tonight, but the Tahlo has almost completely turned his vengeful gaze upon us. You need to go back and finish! The door is down one last hallway! That’s it! Then we are safe, then we all survive!”

  As he talked, I felt a burning inferno rising in my chest. “You know what, go FUCK yourself, you sick, twisted bastard! I’m done with your fucking game, I’m done with this whole nightmare! It’s a fucking GAME!”

  My father and a few officers looked my way, hearing me yell. I turned away from them, walking behind my car.

  “This isn’t real, none of this can be real, my fucking family is DEAD!” I screamed. I looked over at my father and saw him covering up his dead dog on the lawn. I hadn’t even noticed it. I lowered the phone from my ear. I saw its face just before my dad covered it with a blanket. It looked like it had been pulverized.

  “Jesus Christ,” I whispered, pain sprouting from my chest. I raised the phone back to my ear. “What is this?” I asked. “What is fucking happening?”

  The Old Man answered in a hushed tone, “Without meaningful sacrifice, the sealing of the door will not hold. The blood of an animal, a child, and a broken mother is required. That’s just the way it is. That’s just the rules. I’m sorry, I really am, but you have to believe that the Tahlo is coming, this hurricane of violence is approaching!”

  “And why the FUCK should I believe anything you say?” I snarled. “Because of you my family is shattered. Because of you, my family is dead!”

  “Bunny has entered your world, hasn’t he?” The Old Man said softly. “He’s trying desperately to kill you, isn’t he?” He paused, the silence stretching between us. “I thought so. I know this is madness to you, but you are the only person who has made it as long as you have after the third room. Please. All you need to do is go back to your computer and walk down the last hallway. Please. I n—” he suddenly stopped, the line going quiet.

  Then, “Oh, heaven help me, Bunny is here. He’s found me. Just go! Not for me but for what family you have left! GO!” The line went dead.

  I stood there in the night, seeing nothing. What had happened? When was I going to wake up? I looked at the somber buzz of people before me and then I cast my eyes to the stars. Tears dripped down my face silently and I breathed.

  “Fuck you,” I whispered.

  I quietly climbed into my car and drove away, seeing my father walk into the road behind me and stare, his face red in my tail lights.

  I didn’t think about anything, my body shutting down and going into autopilot. My mouth was closed, jawbones creaking as my teeth ground together. This was my nightmare.

  I pulled into my apartment building and marched straight back inside to my apartment. I slammed the door behind me and locked it, flipping on the lights as I went back to my computer. Silently I sat back down in front of my screen. The game was still paused.

  I put on my headphones and gripped the mouse. I resumed.

  “Where were you?” my character asked, his voice shaking.

  “Go to hell,” I growled. I moved him forward toward the door in the back of the room I was in. The dead woman’s body still lay motionless on the table. My mother.

  My character pushed the door open, the familiar gloom of the hallway meeting us.

  The Old Man lay dead on the ground before me.

  It looked like he had been ripped to shreds in a torrent of fury.

  My character and I remained silent. At the end of the hallway I saw light. We moved toward it, the echo of my character’s footsteps vibrating off the walls. My heart was a sinking ship, my mind a melted sculpture. Just. Finish. The. Game.

  As we stepped past The Old Man and walked down the hall, the passage widened again and as we reached the source of light I saw that it was a glowing white door. Above it was written in ashy black: THE END.

  As I approached the knob, the game took over and my character went into an automatic animation. His hands appeared, covered in thick dripping blood, and he slowly dragged them across the clean white surface of the door, making an X pattern. He then knelt in front of it, his hands clasped together in front of him.

  He spoke, his voice soft, “Please, oh God, hide your creations from the coming storm. Save us from the coming wrath. You have given us life, now please, we beg of you, shelter us from extinction. Cast your shadow upon the world so as to hide us from the Tahlo. This we pray, this we plead. Amen.”

  And then the screen faded to darkness.

  It’s been three days now. I sit here writing this out, the pain and sadness in my heart threatening to devour me. My father has tried to call me, visit me, but I can’t talk to anyone. The blackness in my mind is growing greater. What did this all mean? What was it that I did? I haven’t tried to contact the creators of the game, but I have a feeling that even if I did, I’d find no trace of them. And no trace of the game.

  Did I murder my family?

  Did I save the world from some cosmic apocalypse?

  And, God help me…where is Bunny?

  16

  Horse/8min

  It was an incredibly hot day when I heard the knock on my door—one of those days where you close the blinds and crank the AC, trying to find relief in darkness. It had been like that all week, each day growing more and more unbearable. I was upset at whomever was knocking at my door because that meant I was going to have to get up and open that door, letting the crushing heat in.

  I quick-saved my work on the computer as I always do before leaving my station and walked to the door, my mind still filled with thoughts of paints and borders. I have the fortune of working from home. I’m an artist and I draw backgrounds for various cartoons and animations both on television and the Internet. I had almost finished my day’s work and so it was especially irritating to be interrupted and break the flow I had been enjoying.

  I reached the front door and opened it, raising a hand to my eyes against the sudden sunlight. I felt the warmth of the day drape itself around me like a heavy blanket and I could feel myself begin to sweat.

  No one was at the door. I stared out at the empty street and could feel my irritation grow. Some kind of joke? That’s when I looked down and saw that someone had left me a small package. I quickly bent down and picked it up, bringing it inside. I walked over to my work station, turning over the small box in my hand. There was nothing written on it. No address, no name, nothing. I weighed
it slowly in my hands and it felt like there might not even be anything inside. Sitting down in my desk chair, I began opening the mysterious package. Inside, wrapped in some old newspaper, was a single DVD. I tossed the box aside and held the disc up to the light. Written sloppily on the disc were the words “horse/8min.”

  I wondered what the hell that meant and saw that the disc was really scratched up, as if it had been played over and over again. I sat there for a few moments, figured what the hell, and popped open the computer’s disc tray. I wasn’t sure if it would actually read the DVD considering what poor shape it was in, but after a few seconds, the player popped open on the screen and the video began.

  What I’m about to describe does not give justice to what was on that disc. I’ll do my best to convey what it was I was seeing as the first few seconds ticked by.

  The video was grainy and shot in a very dark room with deep maroon lighting pushing only the darkest shadows off the screen. In the middle of the frame was a person, sitting down with their back to the camera. I could only see from the shoulders up and the person’s arms were resting on the armrests, just out of sight. The person appeared to be wearing some kind of dark winter jacket. Instead of a human head, though, it was the head of a horse. Its mane was grown out and looked almost like human hair. It was black and greasy and fell down to its shoulders. Its head was turned, looking slightly behind itself toward the camera. The one eye that I could see was completely white and severely bloodshot. Its mouth was twisted and almost ripped back to form a smile that looked both painful and amused. Its lips were pulled up almost to its eyes and the gums were black and irritated.

  The initial shock of what I was looking at caused me to jump. What the hell was this? What was I looking at?

  I sat, captivated, feeling both creeped-out and curious. The thing didn’t move, it just sat there, staring, unblinking, at the camera. Its shoulders seemed to heave with almost desperate, heavy gasps, but there was no sound of breathing.