AFTERTASTE

by Scott, Kyle M.

  She could smell her though.

  Still, she could smell her.

  Slim clenched her eyes shut in disgust, as bile rose in her throat. The sickly sweet aroma of the cooking flesh smelt delicious.

  It was undeniable.

  She felt sickened with herself, yet the hatred she felt for what these people had done - not only to the child or to Meg, but to her own soul – fuelled her rage. These feral, evil bastards had all but brought her down to their level.

  She’d killed and maimed, slaughtered.

  And now here she was, creeping through a cannibal’s kitchen while her mouth watered at the scent of a burning little girl.

  How quickly the world could fall out from under you.

  “Don’t fucking move.”

  The voice came from directly behind her.

  It was Laura.

  “Turn around.”

  Slowly, Slim turned to face Meg’s mother.

  And found herself staring down the barrel of a rifle.

  She recognised the weapon as one that Arthur had often taken out into Weir Woods on his hunting expeditions.

  She had always hated the damn thing.

  Always hated all guns, actually.

  Almost hated the weapon as much as the sport it was used for.

  Right now, though, she hated the weapon just a little bit more.

  Seeing as it was poised to blow her head off and all.

  “Drop the knife, Slim.” Laura’s finger twitched on the trigger. She dropped the knife. It fell to floor with a clutter, and took all Slim’s hope with it.

  “Where’s my husband?”

  Slim struggled to keep the tremor of fear from her voice. She wouldn’t give this monster the satisfaction of knowing she was afraid.

  This is it.

  Please, God...if you’re up there, please let Meg survive this.

  She looked Laura directly in the eyes.

  “He’s upstairs, what’s left of the piece of shit, anyway. Think your fat fuck of a husband is feeling a little on the dead side...”

  Laura’s mad eyes burned with a mixture of hatred and pain. Despite cooking her baby girl and whipping her eldest daughter to ribbons, apparently this godless cunt still gave a damn about her dinner partner.

  Tears shivered at the edges of the crazed woman’s eyes.

  Her pain was beautiful.

  “Say good bye, bitch,” she spat.

  Slim smiled. “Fuck you.”

  Slim waited for the click of the trigger. She wondered if she’d hear the shot, or feel the bullet.

  She was pondering these matters, disjointed from reality more and more by the interminable seconds, when she heard the shot.

  And half of Laura’s face disappeared in a cloud of brain matter, skull and blasted muscle.

  Slim fell backwards, her ears ringing with the sound of the gun blast, amazed she was still breathing.

  What in God’s name...?

  In front of her, Laura seemed to judge her with her one remaining eye, before it rolled up into her head in search of pastures new, leaving only the orbs brilliant white, cast against the bloody ruin of her face.

  The remains of Laura’s pulverised cranium slopped out of her skull and slid down her mangled visage, falling to the floor with a wet splat, seconds before the rest of Laura followed.

  As her lifeless body dropped, Slim finally understood.

  She saw the figure that had been stood behind Laura.

  He was tall, broad-shouldered, with shoulder length hair and at least three days’ worth of stubble.

  He wore a grim smile on his leathery features and in his hands, he held a sawed-off shotgun.

  Slim could only stare in shock.

  “Get back on the clock, cupcake. No time for fucking around.” He reached out with his hand, and Slim pulled herself farther back.

  “Who a-are you?” She looked into his eyes, searching for any sign of the venom and malice that she’d seen in so many tonight.

  And she saw none.

  Only impatience.

  Again, she asked, “Who are you?”

  “Who can say? Maybe a friend.”

  “How do I know that?”

  “Not really my concern, little lady. But if you fancy living long enough to have a song written in your name, get up off your pretty ass, shake yourself off, and let’s go. This place is bad for both our lifespans.”

  Slim found herself reaching for the man’s hand.

  PART 2

  CHAPTER 18

  Slim sat in the back with Meg, her arm wrapped around her trembling, traumatised friend. She kissed Meg on the forehead, doing her best to comfort her, knowing that there was no comfort and no solace to be found.

  Her whole family...wiped out.

  One of them by Slim’s own hand.

  Meg stared directly in front of her, seeing nothing. Shock had rendered her all but paralytic.

  In the driver’s seat of the small, black van, the strange man with the hardened eyes and grim composure smoked a cigarette and bobbed his head to the music coming from his old-school cassette player. ‘Riders on the Storm’ by The Doors cast it’s languid, dark spell over the interior of the ramshackle vehicle.

  At least he has good taste.

  That’s got to count for something, Slim mused.

  Beside him, riding shotgun, so to speak, sat John. His eyes never left the man as he bobbed and murmured along to the soft, deep crooning of Jim Morrison.

  In other circumstances, the look of bemusement of John’s face would have been amusing.

  Slim patted the man on the shoulder.

  “What are we waiting for?” she asked.

  “Not a whole lot, honey. Not a whole lot. Just taking a breather for a moment, if that’s okay with you. Gotta let some Doors into my system or else I get cranky. You like the Doors?”

  Slim didn’t answer.

  “Okay, then...” The man rolled down his side window and tossed the half-smoked cigarette out to the kerb. “How’s your friend doing back there?”

  “How do you think she’s doing?”

  “Fair point. Listen, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry about what happened back there. That was some fucked up shit.”

  “I’ve had worse happen, tonight.”

  He lifted his hands in supplication, watching her through the rear-view mirror. “I can relate. I can also sympathise. I’m just trying to show some kindness, that’s all. No need to get nippy, kiddo.”

  “My name’s Slim.”

  “That’s great, kiddo, thanks for sharing.”

  “And who are you?” John asked.

  The man sighed, “Who I am doesn’t matter right now. Let’s just say I was passing by your fucked up neighbourhood and heard the commotion you crazy kids were causing in there...” he nodded to Meg’s house.

  “Yeah?”

  “Figured maybe I could help.” He eyed Slim again. “Looks like I did just that.”

  Slim softened just a little.

  Her instincts told her that this man was on their side.

  After all, he’d saved her life, hadn’t he?

  That had to count for something.

  Unless he simply wanted her and Meg for himself.

  Maybe John, too.

  No...it didn’t fit.

  Slim had learned to trust her gut way back when her mother had died and, in her grief, her friends had dropped like flies. The world became a cold, lonely place, just when she’d needed it to be exactly the opposite. Unable to deal with her heartache, her school-friends had soared off like birds for the winter; the promise of their returning, only to be granted should the harsh weather pass.

  She’d spent a long time alone, before Meg had come along and brought her back from the darkness, and she had learned a great deal about trust in that time.

  Some people fed on other’s loneliness like carrion crows, picking at the bones, exposing the nerves.

  Exploiting the pain.

  This man, however rough round t
he edges, felt different.

  He felt...authentic.

  “Thank you,” she said, quietly.

  He smiled, “Welcome.”

  Slim leaned forward in her seat, making sure to keep her arm around Meg, whom she feared was one step away from tumbling into madness at any moment. The man twisted his head around to meet her. The calm she saw on his face astonished her.

  “You know what’s going on here, don’t you?”

  “You could say that, yeah. Leastways, I know enough.”

  “Tell us.”

  “Please,” John added.

  The man flicked back his long, dark hair, and reached for the cassette player, turning down the music but leaving it loud enough to still permeate the atmosphere. He rubbed his stubbled chin with an audible rasp.

  “I’m guessing that you crazy kids have seen some awful shit, tonight. Besides what went down in there, I mean.” He nodded at Meg’s house, drawing Slim’s eyes to it.

  It was little more than a tomb, now. A house of horrors.

  “Your friend...Meg, is it....? She’s new to this, but you two...you look like you’ve been attending this party a little longer.”

  “Yes,” Slim answered. “You could say that.”

  “Thought so. I saw you two at the burger joint earlier, standing outside looking all conspiratorial. It’s a good thing for you two, that who we’re dealing with here has a terminal case the god-complex. He thinks he’s untouchable.”

  He looked Slim in the eye, his hard stare betraying nothing.

  “He’s not,” he said.

  He did know what was going on!

  He knew who was behind all this!

  “Who...who isn’t untouchable? What’s happening to our town?”

  “Same thing that’s happened to many towns. In a sense, what’s happening to your cosy little corner of the world is no more than a taste of good old fashioned human brutality. You watch the news, I take it?”

  “Of course,” Slim answered.

  “Not really...”John murmured.

  The man huffed, “Kids these days. At least one of you is halfway conscientious. Anyway, what’s going on here is, you could say, a little slice of heightened humanity. You know what mankind is capable of. At least you do to some degree.”

  “Do you think you could perhaps not speak in riddles? People are dying out there,” Slim answered.

  “Sure thing, and yes, they are, but there’s little you or I can do to stop that now. In fact, the more of the infected that die, the better, and safer, we’ll all be.”

  John sat up in his seat. “Infected! I knew it. There’s some sort of biological weapon being tested here, isn’t there!?”

  “You could say that. Then again, perhaps you couldn’t.”

  “Goddamit, stop with the riddles!” Slim groaned.

  “Sorry. It’s not easy for me either, you know. I don’t know how to explain this shit without sounding like a fucking maniac, and as of this precise moment, I figure you lot have had it up to your dicks in maniacs. Wouldn’t want you baddasses attacking me, now would I?”

  Slim slammed her fist into the back of the seat. “Fuck!”

  “Look, I know you’re frustrated. I get it. All I ask is that for now, you guys try your very damn best to trust me. I’m on your side.”

  “Then tell us!” Slim said, through gritted teeth.

  The man sighed, “Maybe it’s best if I just show you...”

  “Show us what?”

  “Look, there’s a house just round the corner that I’m holed up in. Been camping there for a few days. The owners - lucky bastards - are off on holiday. They dodged a fucking bullet, wouldn’t you say?”

  Slim huffed.

  “Anyway,” he went on. “I have something there that may help make all this bullshit hit home a little clearer. All I ask is five minutes of your time.”

  Slim fell back on her seat, “Fine! Go! Just make it quick!”

  “Yes ma’am.” The strange man saluted her, started the engine and pulled away from Meg’s home.

  Slim watched the property grow smaller out the back window, a happy home transformed into a two storey unmarked gravestone, as the man drove the quiet, desolate road.

  She wondered what her own home had become.

  CHAPTER 19

  By the time she was stood there, it was too late.

  There was no turning back, though Slim dearly wished she could.

  The scent as they she approached the doorway was all-pervasive. Her nostrils burned and her will seemed to drai from her body and pool in her boots.

  She knew the scent well, wished she didn’t.

  It was the smell of cooking meat.

  Just like back at Meg’s house.

  Just like little Gemma.

  Was I a fool to trust him?

  Have I just gotten us all killed?

  If he wanted to kill us, he could have done it back at Meg’s place.

  “What’s in there?” she asked the man who’d led them here.

  “Go in, and you’ll see...” the man said, quietly. Slim detected the first hint of fear in his voice.

  She moved forward and gripped the door’s brass knob.

  She turned it, wincing in expectation at what she would find.

  More horror. More atrocity. More death.

  Then walk away.

  I can’t. He knows something.

  As though reading her thoughts, the man said, “You have to see for yourself. You have to see, or you won’t believe...”

  Slim pushed the door open.

  It swung all the way ajar, and there on the bed, bound and bathed in a pool of coagulating blood, she saw a girl.

  Shock hit Slim like a sledgehammer to the senses.

  The girl was a bloodied mess, her eyes swollen almost shut, her teeth broken into jagged, shapeless rocks, and her chest area almost unrecognizable.

  Her left leg, below the knee, was gone.

  All that remained was a smoking, charred stump. Crisped skin sizzled around the blackened bone.

  The girl was clearly unconscious...probably dead.

  He’s one of them, her senses screamed.

  “You motherfucker!” She spun on the man behind her and lashed out with her knife, missing his neck by less than an inch as he dodged back from her killing blow, before immediately springing forward on his heels and pushing her hard in the chest.

  Breathless, Slim fell forward, unable to regain her balance under the man’s brute strength, she collapsed at the foot of the bed with a grunt, landing next to the poor girl’s severed leg; her hand pressing down on the cold, dead foot for support.

  Behind her, she heard John shout something, and then he too was silenced.

  He landed right beside her on the floor with a pained yelp, as behind her the bedroom door slammed shut.

  Turning from the horror, she saw the man stand over them both, the shotgun pointed at their faces.

  “Jesus fuck! You trying to kill me, kid!?” he growled at Slim.

  She frantically eyed the floor for her weapon, spotting it across the room, where it had propelled from her grip as she tumbled into the gruesome scene.

  She growled, “What have you done, you bastard?”

  The man’s hard eyes softened, “I’ve done only what I had to. I asked you for your trust, and you turn a blade on me? I should fucking end you right now, and cut my losses right here.”

  She glared at him. “You’re one of them.”

  “No, kid, I'm not. In fact, I'm the only damn thing standing between you and the end of your short, pretty fucking life, so how about you show some damn gratitude. Now get up.”

  He lowered his weapon slowly, and reached out a hand to Slim. John was already getting to his feet, a wet stain spreading from his groin.

  He thinks we’re finished.

  He’s probably right.

  The man urged her to take his hand, just as she had done before.

  “She was one of them. Is one of them. Not me. No
w please, get up. You need to see this.”

  “Even if she is, you didn’t have to do...that...to her.”

  Without taking his hand, she got slowly to her feet.

  There was little else she could do, given the circumstances. Fighting this strange, unknowable man would only result in a quicker death.

  Need time, she thought.

  Need to wait for the right moment.

  She stood before him, defiant.

  He smiled that grim smile of his, “I'm sorry you had to see this, kid, but you really did have to. I should have warned you first. To tell you the truth, I’m a bit frazzled myself by all this. And it ain’t over yet.”

  “You’re a monster,” she hissed.

  “Slim!” John warned.

  “Maybe I am, but I can assure you...there are worse monsters than me out there, tonight. How about you try using your God-given senses and take another look...” He nodded to the bed.

  Before Slim could turn to look...she heard it.

  Low, guttural, and full of terrible mirth.

  Laughter.

  The girl was laughing.

  And it sounded...

  Backing around the bed, she glanced again at the mutilated girl who lay there. The initial shock subsiding slightly, her gaze took in more.

  The girl was most definitely conscious.

  And she was smiling.

  It wasn’t the grin through broken teeth and mashed gums that caused Slim’s rational world to slide out of view. It wasn’t even the inhuman laughter than even now was rising in volume as the girl’s eyes locked on hers.

  It was the eyes themselves.

  They burned red.

  The pupils undulating and dancing with a dark flame.

  Almost imperceptible, no more than a distant fire, but undeniable, nonetheless.

  Slim’s legs almost buckled.

  “What is this?” she gasped.

  The man moved to stand beside her, and looked down on the girl-thing that now set its molten eyes on Slim, boring holes into her soul borne of sheer, unmistakable malice.

  He spoke more quietly, now, as though trying to comfort her in this moment of understanding. “This, Slim, is why I brought you here,” he turned to John momentarily, “Brought you all here...”