by Jacob Rayne
He could have kissed it, he was so happy to see it.
But the mesh was too solid for him to barge down, besides if he did it would be little use as a barrier.
He poked his knife through the gap and tried to tease the latch up.
A hail of curses tumbled from his lips as the blade slipped out and carved a bloody gash in his finger.
The creature behind him seemed to breathe a little faster at the smell of blood.
It was incentive enough to hurry and he doubled his efforts to open the latch.
Finally it caught and the mesh opened out over.
Moving quicker than he thought possible, he moved inside, and pulled it shut just as the creature landed against it.
His trembling fingers somehow managed to get the latch shut first time and he breathed a sigh of relief.
There was a metal grille a few feet behind him. He wrestled with it, but lacked the strength to remove it from his path.
Cursing, he turned to face the mesh and the creature behind it.
He jolted as the mesh formed the shape of the creature’s loathsome face. There was a gap big enough for the creature’s grey tongue to rasp across his finger, savouring the blood that snaked out of the wound.
In sheer disgust he lashed out.
The creature howled – more angry than hurt, he noted with horror – and ducked back.
He prepared himself for another attack but it didn’t come.
He scanned the darkness. In spite of his terror, he approached the mesh, trying to see if the creature had gone.
The creature was looking right at him, what looked like an amused grin on its hideous maw.
Its tiny eyes sparkled in the fire light.
The teeth looked even bigger up close, resembling steak knives hewn from bone and screwed into the creature’s slavering jaws.
Its grin seemed to grow, then it threw itself at the mesh again, straining the material almost to breaking point.
He cried out what he thought – hoped – was a bloodcurdling war cry but in reality was a pathetic sound that betrayed the fear that had begun to erode his self-belief.
He stabbed the knife into the creature’s head while it was stuck in the mesh. His efforts were rewarded with a cry of frustration and a spray of blood. But it was clear he’d done nothing to put off the creature. If anything he’d made it more keen to finish him.
Gary cried out and backed away.
He was trapped in here like a rat in a cage, and he only had one measly Stanley blade between him and a violent death.
As the mesh buckled and warped enough for the creature to come through, desperation leant him the strength to remove the heavy metal grille. He let out a terrified scream and ran for all he was worth.
19
Campbell was still awake a few hours later, watching the shite that passed for TV in the twenty-first century.
The utter wanker presenting the show made him want to hurl his boot at the screen, but he was bound by his drip and couldn’t move very well.
Also, he feared the movement would set off another chain reaction of vomiting, which he couldn’t take.
His eyes were scanning the crumpled bed-sheets for the remote, when he heard the unmistakable sound of panicked screams.
He looked round the room, trying to figure out where it was coming from.
His eyes landed upon the sink in the far corner. There was a wooden board beneath it, no doubt where the plumbers had boarded in the pipes to prevent people tampering with them.
The board was hanging off, exposing a six inch patch of the darkness behind it. It was from here that the sound was coming, he knew it deep in his core.
He hauled himself out of bed, squinted into the hole and was certain he saw something run past the gap.
Seconds later, something big and pale ran past.
It was clearly the lethal race between predator and prey.
The creature’s cry sent images of the thing in the barn screeching into his mind and he had the unsettling feeling that it was back.
His shaking finger found it hard to press the panic button.
The nurse was less than kind, doing everything but accuse him of being right out of his mind.
She gave him something to sedate him, against his wishes – the last thing he wanted was to be subdued, off-guard, if the unseen creature returned – and left him to sleep.
20
The creature’s footfalls pounded in Gary’s head as he ran. It was gaining on him, he could tell that much without wasting time and energy looking.
It let out a scream that made his blood run cold.
Again, the scents of death and blood steamed around him.
Gary ran, not knowing – or caring – where, only that he got to safety.
If you’re there, God, this would be a good time to prove it.
As if in answer to his prayer, he saw a patch of light in the wall to his left. It was a grille and it led out into one of the hospital rooms.
If he could get in there he could sound the alarm, get to safety.
His face lit up in a grin as the grille lifted out easily. The only problem was that the gap was only a few feet across. He could hear the creature, it was mere feet away now, around the corner from him.
It slowly came into view, the light revealing unwelcome details of its sinister anatomy.
He tore his eyes from it, realising that every second he gawped at it in horror was a second wasted, and started pulling himself through the gap.
If I struggle to get through there’s no way it’s gonna manage it, he thought with a smile.
The smile died when he realised he was stuck fast. He pulled, the sharp edge of the hatch ripping a hole in his arm. Blood raced down his arm and pattered to the floor below.
The creature seemed to come out of a trance with the sound of the blood and darted in. His efforts to resist were futile; his arms were nearly wrenched loose of their sockets as it gripped his legs with devil-given strength and began to pull him back. He landed on his back in a trembling heap.
It grunted, sending a hail of stinking saliva into his face.
The droplets ran down his face like a hot shower.
It somehow helped to clear his head and his fingers scrabbled in his pocket for the Stanley knife. The handle was covered in a thick coating of blood that squidged against his palm as he pulled it free.
His dinner rose up into his mouth as he fought to extend the blade.
When it was free, he jammed it into the creature’s face.
The creature gave a tiny flick of its powerful head and knocked the weapon from his hand. He lashed out with his boot, aiming for the knife wound he’d created.
The creature cried out.
His fingers scrabbled across the floor, looking for the knife.
He kicked out again, trying to give himself room enough to escape. The creature dodged the blow, its jaws slamming shut, easily piercing the thick sole of his work boot.
One of the enamel blades went all of the way through his foot and protruded from his instep by a good few inches.
While he screamed and wailed and tried to shut out the blinding agony, the creature’s jaws sunk shut, crushing his foot into a bloody pulp.
He felt himself swoon, felt certain that he was going to pass out with the pain, and considered giving into this as the merciful option, but fought it at the last second.
His trembling fingers found the knife and he began trying to pick it up again.
The creature pulled hard, dragging him away from the tunnel wall.
Though it was agony, he was glad, for the creature’s mouth was still attached to him and its head was an easy target. It pulled again, sending a tidal wave of agony and gore crashing over him.
A gleaming pool of his blood began to spread from beneath his pulped foot.
Just as he managed to pick up the weapon, the creature’s jaws pulled at him again.
He resisted the urge to pull away, knowing it would onl
y mean more pain, and also wanting it to remain attached to him and vice versa.
Pain hit him with sufficient force to make him momentarily wish for death’s cold embrace, but he pushed it out of his mind.
While he had the monster’s head trapped, he thrust the knife at its eye.
He missed, but came close enough to make the creature emit a cry that, for the first time, sounded slightly frightened. In retaliation, it threw its head up with renewed strength, making him realise he’d be very lucky to survive a close range encounter with it.
He cursed as he realised he’d unwittingly angered it.
The creature snorted and flung its head violently, slamming him headfirst into the tunnel wall with force enough to crack his skull.
It smiled at him, repeated the gesture.
His vision blurred, his brain seemed to grow too big for his head. The knife fell from his twitching fingers.
He had time to realise his mistake then it was upon him, its enraged face inches from his own as its teeth located his pounding jugular and tore holes in his throat.
The last thing he felt was the relentless pull of its mouth draining his life gulp by gulp.
21
In the tunnel, Dwayne finished the disembowelling of the latest sap to enter the lair of his family.
He tore the thick loops of intestine loose, throwing them to one side where the female twin raced in and began devouring them.
Dwayne gave the heart to the male twin, since he ruled the roost round here. He ate it in two greedy snaps of his gargantuan jaws, almost taking his father’s fingers with it in his haste to eat the steaming morsel.
Now the female had eaten, she nuzzled Dwayne, smearing his face with a thick coating of blood.
Her face contorted into what he knew was a smile.
A great big smile for daddy.
She was thankful for the meal he had provided and was giving him permission to eat.
He smiled back, cupping her cheek in a blood-smeared hand. She bared her teeth again in a sick parody of a grin.
Still smiling, he bent to the carcass, sunk his teeth into the meat and began tearing it off the bones, savouring each bite that squeezed more blood from the dead flesh.
22
Jerry Green woke in the darkness, his sleep suddenly disturbed.
He knew something was wrong but couldn’t put his finger on what it was.
The sound of breaking glass from the spare bedroom confirmed his suspicion.
He jolted awake – the sudden noise as effective a stimulant as a triple espresso – and hastily put his boxers on.
Jerry was the wrong side of forty, overweight, with a stinking hangover in the making, but he could fight.
He knew it must be some out of towner breaking in as the locals wouldn’t have dared.
His reputation as a drunken brawler was widespread round the North East. Anyone who knew the area would have left his house till the last one in town.
‘Who’s there?’ he shouted, cracking his knuckles ready for a brawl. ‘Gonna put my fist through your head.’
The curtains in the spare room were shut, but he could see them ruffling in the breeze.
He could see the outline of someone on the window sill, pressed against the curtains.
‘You’re as shit at hide and seek as you are at breaking in,’ he shouted, feeling a rush of confidence.
This joker was going to be his punching bag for the next half hour.
Maybe then he’d turn him in, give the cops the old fell down the stairs bullshit.
He suppressed a laugh at this.
The laugh waned just a little when he made out the silhouette of the sickle in the man’s hand.
The curtain pulled back and the man landed on the carpet with a thud that reverberated through the entire house.
He was nothing special, not especially big – though Jerry wasn’t dumb enough to believe that was the only measure of the fight in a man – but he looked ill.
Pale enough to make an albino look tanned, skinny to the point of emaciation.
The only thing healthy about him was his thick beard, which dripped with dark blood.
His teeth bared in a horrendous grin and Jerry started for a split-second when he saw that they were yellow and sharp.
The eyes were somehow the worst; white, glazed over and without pupils, seeming to pin him to the spot.
‘Gonna punch those pointed teeth down your throat, dickhead,’ Jerry shouted and raced in, swinging a wild overhand right that had put down all but two of his opponents in drunken combat.
The blow landed hard, the impact travelling all the way up to his shoulder.
‘Av that, ya thieving bastard,’ he grunted.
The intruder backhanded the bead of blood from his burst lip, his glare fixed upon Jerry. He quickly brought the sickle round, catching Jerry’s ample gut on the underside. The wound was deep, but superficial.
Jerry didn’t know this, but the intruder did.
While he floundered, the tramp drew the blade across the back of his ankles, severing both of Jerry’s Achilles tendons.
Smiling, he climbed back out of the window and left Jerry in a bleeding, panicked heap on his bedroom floor.
23
Campbell woke for what felt like the thousandth time.
This time, a dark figure was standing over his bed, a pillow in hand.
His thick beard was matted with dripping claret, which ran down his bare, bullet-riddled chest and onto Campbell’s face.
The figure’s teeth were bared and they were much larger than normal.
They reminded him of the gleaming fangs of the monster that had claimed his wife and son.
Campbell screamed aloud, waking himself out of the dream and feeling a fool when the cleaner gave him a concerned glance.
‘Just a bad dream,’ he said.
‘These things happen,’ the cleaner said, and, for a moment, Campbell felt certain he recognised the world-weary, wrinkled face before him.
His eyes sparkled with recognition, as though he recognised Campbell too. He smiled for a split second, seemingly to reveal the pointed yellowing teeth he possessed. ‘Be seeing you, Officer Campbell. You make sure you get your strength back. You’re going to need it soon.’
Campbell pressed the nurse’s alarm as the man sauntered out of the room.
‘What is it?’ a nurse said in the blink of an eye.
When he told her she looked at him as if he was insane.
He let it go, but asked her if she would call his therapist for him, though he was loathe to further line that shyster’s pockets.
His therapist arrived, clean-shaven and seemingly full of fascination.
‘It’s normal to imagine things like that, especially after everything you’ve been through,’ his therapist said. ‘Coming so close to death can have a strange effect on your mind.’
‘I know what I heard.’
His therapist nodded. ‘I think you need to rest up, Thomas. They’re going to keep you in here until you stop being a danger to yourself.’
‘You don’t need to do that, trust me.’
‘I’m afraid we do.’
He gave Campbell a smile that infuriated him then bid him goodbye.
24
Jerry found himself in a hospital bed with only the faintest recollection of how he’d gotten there.
The pain in his knuckles came to him first and he realised he’d been fighting.
He’d broken his hand before in one of his drunken brawls and the familiar feeling – his palm filled with shattered glass – brought him to his senses.
The pain in his legs came back hard enough to make him cry out.
‘What happened?’ said a stern-looking policeman who stood over him.
‘This homeless guy broke into my house,’ he said.
The cop nodded.
‘He slashed me across the belly with a scythe blade.’
‘But nothing was taken from your home?’
&n
bsp; ‘Not that I remember. And he just fucked off after he’d hurt me. He obviously didn’t want to kill me.’
‘Hmm maybe it was a threat of some kind. Have you pissed anyone off recently?’
‘Only bout half the town, but no one that would dare try it with me.’
‘We’ll find him for you.’
Jerry looked up from the magazine precariously perched on his lap and saw a man looking down at him.
He wore the blue overalls that were the uniform of the hospital cleaning crew. His lips curled in a sly smile.
‘Feeling any better?’ he said, the smile widening.
‘A little,’ Jerry said, groaning as he tried to sit up. The butterfly-clipped wounds in his belly were stiffening but still causing severe pain.
Something about the man was familiar.
At first he thought he was the bastard who’d attacked him, but he did look different.
He had the same scruffy beard and dirty teeth but that was where the similarities ended.
While Jerry went back to his magazine, the man slyly glanced out into the corridor.
Content that no one was there, he locked the door and approached the bed with a spare pillow in his hand.
Dwayne darted to the fat bastard in the bed and shoved the pillow over his face.
He shouted for help, but the cry was completely muffled by the pillow.
Dwayne held it down harder, kneeling on the fat man’s thrashing arms.
He felt the surge in energy that heralded the last gasp before unconsciousness.
Finally the man’s flabby arms went limp and he sagged back to the bed.
Dwayne took the pillow off his face – he didn’t want him to die just yet; the meat was much better when it was fresh and still warm – and quickly glanced round again.
He moved in, carefully plucking the drip from his hand before tightly gagging him with one of the dirty bed sheets.
The blood of his fallen master from the barn had given him unnatural strength, so he didn’t struggle in the slightest as he hefted the fat man over his shoulder.
He dumped the body in the bottom of his bedding cart and covered him carefully with duvets.
