by Pete Kahle
Gordy tried to move his arms and legs and cried out, shattering the stillness. He tried again and slowly managed to pull himself to his knees, biting his lip to keep from screaming out. Running his hands up and down his body, he noted that he only wore tattered remnants of his pajamas. Other than that, his entire body felt as if it were throbbing in time with his heart. Every spot was tender. He must look like one giant bruise.
Gradually, as his eyes adjusted to the low light, flashes of memory came back in fractured shadowy images… the storm…the explosion… the Queen… the death of his friends… NO! The rest was lost to him in a blur of remembered pain and terror. He knew now what the mounds most likely were and he began to sob again. He cried for a number of minutes, then realized something astonishing. He was alone.
The cave was silent, except for his own voice, and he realized that the Queen and her brood must have left, returning to their lair down the shaft in the wall.
Only one thing was on his mind. He staggered over and grabbed the failing flashlight. Nearly dead, it had enough of a light to find his backpack lying in a dried pool of grub slime. In the outer pocket, amazingly, he found his car keys. Gordy did not look back. He hobbled out the entrance, forgetting everything in his fugue state. All he wanted to do was escape.
After Gordy fell sideways off the riding mower, it lurched left and the gas can toppled off. It landed upside down next to him, soaking the grass and ground around him with the last few pints of gasoline. Rolling for a few more feet, it stopped when a wheel fell into one of the burning holes and sat there with the blades spinning through the flaming worm shit stew. Sparks and burning crap sprayed through the air.
Gordy saw none of this. He was too busy screaming, blinded by the pure agony of his abdomen being torn open. He was on his way out to a much better place. There was no way he could come back from these injuries, and he only hoped it would be quick. The grubs writhed in the open wound, covered in blood, shit, and a number of other body fluids. Arcs of arterial blood spouted past them onto the ground. The reek of gasoline filled the air. Gordy tried to grab the larger of the two grubs, but it just wriggled through his fingers and started crawling out of his gut-hole. It slithered up his chest toward his mouth, aiming to burrow back into him from the opposite end. Gordy shrieked and prayed to die before it reached him.
Ten feet away, the mower’s front wheel sank lower in the fiery trench, pulling the spinning blade deeper into the blazing waste and changing the trajectory of the splatter. Left and right, burning clumps landed around Gordy from head to toe. One especially large flaming shit patty fell smack dab in the center of the gasoline-soaked grass and instantly ignited the entire area. The flames jumped to Gordy just as the grub reared back, and engulfed him and the grubs in a cleansing inferno. As he died, his screams sounded a lot like laughter.
Sergei Tumasov stood on his back porch drinking his evening tea and staring through the wall of smoke hanging in the air above the trees. A host of flashing red and blue lights lit the evening sky. He finished the last sip, grumbled, and went inside his house.
“What is it?” asked his wife Sofia. “Did you see anything?”
“That boy has finally gotten into trouble, Sofi,” he answered. “I knew he was a problem waiting to happen. There are firemen, at least five or six policemen and an ambulance.”
“Stop it,” she admonished him. “You say that about all of our neighbors. How are we to make friends if you think that all of them are criminals?”
“I was right about him. I’ll bet he blew up a meth lab”
“You have been watching that show about that science teacher too much. Not everyone makes drugs in their basement. Maybe there’s a medical emergency.”
“You are too trusting, dear. Most Americans are selfish assholes.”
Sofia laughed, “Should I remind you that we are now citizens? Do I fit that category now?” she said, giving him a warning glance.
“Of course not, my kroshka,” he said, using her pet name to hopefully mollify her. He looked around absentmindedly. “Where are the boys?”
“In the den. All of them. I think Yuri got into a fight. He has a cut on his nose and he smelled horrible when he came home. I cleaned him up a bit and put some salve on it, but we may need to take him to the vet to check it out.”
“Hmmm… I’ll check on him and see how he looks.” He left her in the kitchen and walked down to the basement. A flurry of barks greeted him when he entered. Their boys, ten dogs they had rescued over the past few years, were as happy as always to see him. Mischa, the terrier mix, greeted him by racing in circles around his feet and peeing a bit in excitement. The others, varying in size and age, were content to mill around and nuzzle his hands. All except for one.
Yuri, the largest dog by far, was lying on his chosen pile of blankets in the corner looking miserable. Immediately, Sergei was concerned. Yuri had been with them the longest – over six years - and, though he wouldn’t have admitted it out loud, the giant mutt was his favorite, even if he had the disgusting habit of eating his own week-old turds.
Sergei kneeled down next to Yuri and patted him on the flank.
“You’ve got yourself into a mess. Huh, boy?” he soothed the dog. “What was it? A skunk? A raccoon? You need to be careful, my boy.”
The big beast flopped his tail against the blanket and whimpered in distress. He gagged, shook his head and tried to blow air out of his nostrils.
“Are you okay, boy?” Sergei was becoming concerned. Nothing usually bothered Yuri. One time he had even been struck a glancing blow by a car and Yuri had just walked away with a bruise. The car’s door panel, on the other hand, had a dent the size of Yuri’s head in it.
Yuri began whining frantically. He stood up, walked a few steps and began retching in the middle of the concrete floor.
“That’s it, boy. We’re taking you to the doctor,” said Sergei. He walked to the stairwell and yelled up, “Sofi! Call the vet. I have to take Yuri in immediately!”
He turned back just in time to see his dog vomit up a softball-sized lump of pinkish pudding and collapse to the floor. Sergei ran to Yuri to gather him up in his arms, but once he saw what had come of Yuri’s throat, he stopped and stared.
The object seemed to be a shredded piece of one of Yuri’s internal organs. It smelled like death, and it was crawling with hundreds of grubs. Their pincers were the color of blood.
Pete Kahle is the author of The Specimen: A Novel of Horror, winner of The Kindle Book Review’s 2014 Kindle Book Award in Horror/Suspense. Next up is a stand-alone tale titled Blood Mother: A Novel of Terror, due out in the late spring of 2016. He is also the owner and editor of Bloodshot Books.
In 2014, he organized and edited Widowmakers: A Benefit Anthology of Dark Fiction to help out a fellow author in a time of need. Doing so gave him the editing bug and he decided to try to run a small press of his own.
Hopefully, he will continue to feed your nightmares for a long time coming.
ALSO FROM BLOODSHOT BOOKS
The Specimen (The Riders Saga, Book 1)
Available in paperback or Kindle on Amazon.com
ISBN– 1495230007
ON THE HORIZON FROM BLOODSHOT BOOKS
Spring 2016
Not Your Average Monster 2 – A Menagerie of Monstrosities
Blood Mother: A Novel of Terror – Pete Kahle
2017*
The Abomination (The Riders Saga, Book 2) – Pete Kahle
2018*
The Horsemen (The Riders Saga, Book 3) – Pete Kahle
* other titles to be added when confirmed
READ UNTIL YOU BLEED
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