Voices of the Damned

by Barbie Wilde

  Marney: “Don’t be so rude! He’s only trying to help.”

  Jim: “You’re joking, right?”

  Marney: “Mr. Zeiner says that he’s come across a lot of these cases in Germany. He thinks he can help you.”

  Jim: “You know, Marney, I think I’ll leave myself to the ministrations of science, thank you very much. Tell Mr. Zeiner that I had to leave because I had an appointment with my local exorcist, okay?”

  Jim left through the side entrance, the steam almost visibly coming out of his ears. Was Marney crazy? What was she thinking of?

  * * *

  A few hours later, Jim was lying in a bed in the Eastside Sleep Clinic. The pillow was comfy enough and the sheets clean and sweet smelling. The clinic technicians had wired him up so they could monitor his EEG, EOG, EMG and ECG. They placed a pulse oximeter on his finger and put pressure transducers in his nose to measure his nasal airflow. He stared at the ceiling, trying to relax, trying to forget Marney and stupid old Mr. Zeiner, with his tales of Germanic demons with crazy hats.

  In forty minutes, Jim had achieved the first level of NREM (Non-Rapid Eye Movement—sleep) called Stage N1. This occurred mostly in the beginning of sleep, accompanied by slow eye movements. The alpha waves disappeared and the theta wave appeared. People aroused from this stage often believe that they have been fully awake.

  Then he slipped into Stage 2, when no eye movement occurs and dreaming is very rare.

  At Stage 3, Jim reached deep, slow-wave sleep. Delta waves began to occur and then dominated. Dreaming was more common in this stage than in other stages of NREM sleep. The content of dreams during this stage tended to be disconnected, less vivid, and less memorable than those that occurred during REM sleep.

  Finally, Jim settled into REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, characterized by the rapid and random movement of the eyes. The activity of the brain’s neurons was quite similar to that during waking hours and the sleeper was more likely to remember dreams from this stage.

  The technicians, Brad Durning and Samantha Pesce (also known as Sam), were keeping an eye on Jim’s polysomnography recordings in the monitor room, which was filled with banks of computers and monitor screens. They were having a coffee break when Samantha saw something out of the corner of her eye scurrying around Jim’s small bedroom.

  “What the fuck is that?” Sam stood up and exclaimed, nearly spilling her coffee on the console—rather unprofessional behavior in Brad’s opinion.

  “What?” he replied and then she pointed at the CCTV monitor linked to Jim’s room.

  “Whoah, is that a rat?” Brad said, halfway out of his chair, as the thing, whatever it was, scampered under Jim’s bed.

  At the same time, Sam noticed that Jim was in distress, making the high-pitched whimpering noises that Marney had reported to the technicians in the initial conference stage of the diagnosis. His heart rate was also up and his EEG was spiking—showing high levels of mental activity.

  Brad jumped up and ran to Jim’s room, reluctantly followed by Sam. Arriving at the door, he turned the knob, but for some unfathomable reason, it didn’t work. He turned around to a panting Sam, who had just arrived.

  “These doors can’t lock from the inside, can they?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

  “These doors can’t be locked at all. It must be stuck,” she replied.

  Brad turned the knob again and shoved his shoulder up against the door, but no luck.

  In the clinic bedroom, Jim was lying helpless as the dream dwarf leapt on his chest. It unbuttoned his pajama top and playfully tweaked his nipples before casually leaning down and viciously biting them until blood came. It started to lap delicately at the blood with its tongue. Jim overcame his terror and screamed as loud as he could.

  Outside in the corridor, Brad took a few steps back and then hurled himself at the door. It flew open and he tumbled into the darkened room. Sam followed to give him moral support. And then the door slammed behind them.

  In the monitor room, while all the machines beeped quietly, the only sounds coming from Jim’s CCTV audio were the whistling of a tennis racket swooshing through the air, followed by the “Pock!” of balls being violently smacked. Then the screaming began.

  Two hours later, Doug Sampson and Brenda Forge, Brad and Sam’s 4 a.m. relief, came into the ominously quiet monitor room. They looked around and spotted the images on Jim’s CCTV monitor. His room was still dimly lit, but the light from the hallway spilled into the room. They could see two figures lying on the floor, surrounded by puddles of dark liquid. Brenda didn’t hesitate and called security and the police, while Doug cautiously walked down the corridor to Jim’s room.

  Blood was creeping out of the doorway across the corridor floor. Doug stayed there and looked in, then warily put his hand around the doorframe to turn on the bedroom’s light switch. When he caught a glimpse of what was lying on the floor, his medical training deserted him. He whirled around and threw up spectacularly all over the corridor walls.

  Gobs of gore and brains were splattered Jackson Pollock-like across the bedroom walls and floor. Brad and Sam were dead: their white uniforms drenched in blood; their faces gruesomely cubed into hundreds of pieces, as if some demon from hell had prepared an obscene feast of face cubes instead of the usual cheese cubes for a satanic cocktail party. All that was missing were the toothpicks.

  Jim, on the other hand, was sleeping peacefully on the bed; the only sign of mayhem was the blood from a couple of wounds on his chest. Somehow he had escaped the slaughter.

  * * *

  Marney sat in the office of homicide detective Jason Strummer, nervously wondering how on earth this could have happened. Jim was in a holding cell—still in his pajamas—protesting his innocence. It was hard to imagine how Jim of all people could have murdered the two sleep clinic technicians.

  Detective Strummer entered the room, a DVD in his hand. He looked at Marney appreciatively: blonde hair, great tits, long athletic legs. He wondered how the lanky, nervous bozo in Holding Cell 9 could have nabbed such a beauty, but hey, there’s no accounting for taste in the world.

  “Looks like we’re going to have to let your boyfriend go,” he said as he sat down behind his desk and Marney’s face brightened.

  “I told you Jim couldn’t have done such a thing,” she scolded.

  “We looked at the CCTV recordings and Jim was in bed the whole time during the attacks. It’s very weird. Here were two people running around the room, yelling their heads off, pounding on a door that can’t be locked and there’s your boyfriend lying there dead asleep.”

  “So who murdered those poor people?” asked Marney.

  “That’s the problem. We can’t see who killed them. The victims are either blocking the camera at the wrong time, or something unidentified moves between them and the camera. We can see the damage being inflicted on both of the victims, but we can’t see the perp. It’s bizarre.

  “We also rewound the recording back to the point where we could see something scuttling around Jim’s room—the incident that must have prompted the victims to go check on Jim in the first place—but again the images are too fuzzy to make any firm deductions on what it could be.”

  “What about Jim’s wounds?”

  “Well, it certainly looks like something bit him. We just don’t know what. We’re getting the bite marks analyzed, but nothing so far. But the blood on his chest is definitely his, not the technicians’.”

  “So Jim is free to go now?”

  “Yeah, but tell him not to leave town. Whether he was conscious or not, he’s a material witness to a double homicide.”

  * * *

  It was Zeiner’s show now.

  Jim couldn’t science his way out of meeting up with the old guy, because Marney was threatening to move out if he didn’t. According to Zeiner, the
fact that the creature bit Jim’s nipples and sucked his blood was a dead giveaway that the perpetrator was an Alp and Jim was too damn exhausted to argue.

  Zeiner came over to their place a week after the disastrous incident at the clinic. His plan was to monitor Jim’s sleep, sitting in a chair in their bedroom, while Marney slept in the spare room. Zeiner had brought all sorts of traditional accruements to assist him in his exorcism of the Alp. These included favorite Alp repellents such as a broomstick to lay under Jim and Marney’s bed; iron horseshoes to hang from the bedpost; a mirror to place on Jim’s chest and a large silver cross to hang on the headboard. Then Zeiner plugged the keyhole in the bedroom door, a common method of entry for Alps. Jim also had to sleep with a nightlight, as this was another effective way to ward off an Alpdrücke.

  Marney retired for the night and Jim tried to get to sleep, but he was a bit weirded out by Zeiner’s presence in the room. Jim peeked through a nearly closed eyelid and the old guy was staring at him in a particularly unnerving fashion. Jim tried to turn over, but the mirror got in his way.

  “I can’t sleep with this thing on my chest,” Jim complained.

  “Would you rather have an Alp sitting on your chest, with his infernal tennis racket?” asked Zeiner.

  “Hey, that’s right. You were going to tell me about the tennis racket,” said Jim.

  “It’s too late now. I will in the morning,” Zeiner said.

  “I want to know now,” Jim demanded.

  “All right, my impatient friend. It is an unusual implement, to be sure, but Alps are mischievous creatures. This one obviously admires the game of tennis, so in his twisted way, he finds it amusing to “slice and dice” (as you Americans say) his victims using a tennis racket strung with cheese wire. And the balls he uses are interesting. It makes you wonder what they are made of—to be so resistant against cheese wire.”

  “Teflon, maybe?” Jim asked sarcastically.

  Zeiner ignored him and continued, “Normally, Alps are not so vicious, so this is a very unusual occurrence. It is possible that this Alp is not necessarily a demon, but a particularly unpleasant human. After death, his unquiet spirit metamorphosed into an Alp. So perhaps this Alp in his previous human existence was a tennis player? Who knows?” Zeiner pontificated.

  “What a load of bilge,” Jim mumbled and closed his eyes.

  * * *

  4 a.m., the darkest hour. The time when humans have their most tenuous hold on life—their most fragile grip on the planet. Jim knew in his heart that all the precautions Zeiner had taken were inadequate. The Alp was coming to get him.

  Jim’s feelings of anxiety were at their height and not only for his own sake. He wondered if Zeiner was going to get butchered by the Alp. Having already been a suspect from the previous clinic carnage, albeit briefly, the police would definitely try to pin Zeiner’s murder on him for sure.

  Jim opened his eyes and he was surprised to see that he was in his own bedroom, not the vast blue room. He looked around and Zeiner was gone. What the fuck? He was supposed to be watching over him.

  Jim removed the mirror from his chest and cautiously got up. He looked around: in the closet, even under the bed, and he was relieved that he couldn’t find any cubed remains of Zeiner. Maybe the old bastard just needed a bathroom break.

  Then Jim heard something. A moaning sound. The hairs stiffened at the back of his neck. Instead of exasperation, he felt sudden nauseous fear in the pit of his belly.

  He quietly walked across the room, opened the door and peered into the hallway. It was dark, lit only by a small wall socket nightlight under the table at the end of the corridor by the bathroom. The bathroom door was open and the room beyond it dark, so Jim’s theory about the old geezer taking a leak flew out the window.

  Then he heard the sound again. It was coming from the spare bedroom. Where Marney was.

  * * *

  Now it was Marney who was trapped in the vast, blue, high-ceilinged room—moonlight splashing across her bed like a spotlight. Although she instinctively knew where she was, she had her eyes tightly shut. It was almost an out-of-body experience. In her mind’s eye, she could see everything that was happening in the room from above. Marney was dreaming, but not dreaming—hovering somewhere between wakefulness and nightmare. She was helpless, unable to move, totally incapable of defending herself. She tried to call out to Jim, but every time she managed to vocalize, a hairy palm clamped itself over her nose and mouth, cutting off her air supply. She stopped and the hand was removed.

  Marney was terrified, but aroused at the same time. Her nightdress was open to the waist and something was lying on top of her—biting and sucking her nipples.

  Marney was too petrified to open her eyes to find out what was lying on top of her. It couldn’t be the Alp, as the creature’s noises of passion were not accompanied by any tennis racket sound effects. It was at her neck now, breathing heavily, then a tongue forced itself into her ear. The creature pushed her quivering legs apart. A pause while it adjusted itself, and then something hard thrust inside her.

  Marney tried to scream, but the hairy hand covered her nose and mouth again. She struggled and attempted to push the thing off, but she was slowly descending into unconsciousness. She decided to take a quick peak at her attacker and was confronted by piercing blue eyes and a very recognizable black monobrow. That’s when Marney knew that Jim had never been part of the plan. She had always been the target.

  Marney mercifully blacked out. The Alp completed its task in record demon time and then hopped down from the bed, fully resuming its Zeiner human shape. He felt her pulse. It was still strong, even after her ordeal. He had chosen his bride well.

  Zeiner tiptoed over to the door and opened it, totally unprepared to find a furious Jim standing in the hallway holding a baseball bat.

  “What the fuck are you doing in Marney’s room, you fucking pervert!” Jim shouted and he swung the bat at Zeiner’s head. Zeiner ducked dexterously and then feinted to the left. As Jim moved in to take another swing, Zeiner shot to his right and dashed into the hallway. Jim turned to chase after him, but Zeiner had disappeared down the stairs.

  Jim followed, turning on all the lights. Even though the front door was still closed and locked, and although he searched every room, including the basement, he couldn’t find Zeiner.

  His rage abated and Jim realized that he had no idea how long Zeiner had been in Marney’s room. He ran up the stairs to find her standing in the doorway, trembling and crying. He tried to get an explanation, but she was incoherent and in shock. He bundled her into bed and called the police.

  * * *

  Marney never told anyone what really happened that night. She wouldn’t allow a physical exam. She said that Zeiner had tried to attack her while she was sleeping and she had fought him off. She knew in her heart that it was completely illogical not to report the actual assault, but she was unable to verbalize what had happened to her. It was as if some otherworldly force had sealed her lips on the subject. Or maybe it was just a dream after all?

  Zeiner didn’t show up at work the next day. His address was found to be an old warehouse downtown that hadn’t been used in years. He had simply disappeared. Along with Jim’s sleep paralysis.

  Nine months later, Jim and Marney had a baby boy they called Jim Junior. The baby looked and acted normal (no sign of twinkling blue eyes, a German accent, or a monobrow) and Marney was mightily relieved.

  But one day, when Jim Junior was still learning to speak, he turned to her with a wide, gummy, baby smile and, with spine-chilling clarity, spoke his first complete sentence:

  “Anyone for tennis?”

  Valeska

  Chinese proverb: 一滴精，十滴血

  pinyin: yì dī jīng, shí dī xuè

  “A drop of semen is equal to ten drops of blood”

  Val
eska’s cold blue eyes opened at precisely nine o’clock in the evening. She always knew what time it was, clock or no clock. The room was dark, but she could see every detail, night vision one of the more helpful traits of being a Seminal. She rose from her bed, went into the bathroom and performed her ablutions in the same way that she did every night: sensually, taking her time, enjoying the feeling of the water on her skin, her hands massaging her body. She put on her makeup carefully, for maximum effect. Afterwards, she examined herself in the mirror and was satisfied that she looked as appetizing to the male human animal as she ever could.

  She dressed provocatively in a skintight, crimson cocktail dress, with stockings, garter belt and no bra or panties. She put her black hair up in a wild, punk-style ponytail on the top of her head. She looked like a party girl on the make, ready for fun—not a predator looking for sustenance. The last thing she slipped on were her black, unborn calf’s leather gloves—no grain, so they felt like human skin.

  Valeska was ready to leave at eleven o’clock. Before she opened her front door, she looked through the peephole and then listened intently, to make sure that no one else was in the hallway. She hated people knowing her comings and goings. She was sure that she caused enough comment by avoiding going out during the day, but she’d be damned if she gave her nosy neighbors anything more to gossip about.

  She exited her apartment and took the stairs down three floors. She left by the back service entrance, entering an alleyway that most sensible people would avoid like the plague. Valeska didn’t care. She had dealt with street people and muggers before, easy prey. Too weak, or stupid, or unprepared to deal with her strength and purpose. But Valeska had standards and she avoided seeking out these kinds of targets. Her sense of smell was very acute and most of those losers stank of booze, BO, excrement or cigarettes.

  Also, because she didn’t want to have any personal contact with such trash, she would have to kill them first and she didn’t like taking the fluid from the dead. It didn’t have the same buzz of energy to it and extracting it was more trouble than it was worth. Although disease wasn’t a problem for her, she was still fussy in a catlike way about her victims. She had enough problems dealing with the normal, run-of-the-mill specimens, but preying on the weak, ugly and nasty ones just added to her feelings of revulsion about the whole species.