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by Angela Blythe

  Unknown to David, his mystery dog had moved behind him while he had toyed with his phone. It was silently stalking him and still on all fours. David carried on a bit longer, still looking to the right of him, but there was nothing there. He walked a few more steps before he heard a twig snap behind him.

  He whirled around, and the beast was just ten feet behind him. David was closer to it now. All that he could tell was it was huge, but other than that, he had never seen anything like it before. The only dog-like aspect to it was that it was furry and dark.

  One of David’s eyes was obscured, due to his hood, blowing against his face. The beast was in his way now, blocking his exit. All that David wanted was to get home. Back into the safety of his own car even. Maybe not playing by the rules wasn’t a good idea all the time.

  David decided that if he took a few pictures of it, not only would he have a record of its features, but the flash might scare the beast away.

  He put his hand in his pocket, and the beast stepped towards him. As it started to move, its front legs, came up from the floor. It was clear now that they were arms. Oh God, the beast was actually standing on its rear legs. None of the beast’s limbs seemed like animal legs any more.

  The beast was an ape monster that had just been tricking him. It was a few feet taller than him, like a furry wall of death. As it walked forward, David stayed where he was, hoping that this might still somehow turn out all right. He thought if he ran, that it would make it worse. The beast would think it was a game or realise that he was afraid of it. And he was scared now. This creature may be large, and a new species, but David held onto the possibility that it was gentle. Maybe it would just want to sniff him.

  The monster put its hand on top of David’s head and the other on David’s shoulder. It quickly twisted his head while holding the shoulder firmly. It didn’t take a moment to pull his head off. There was just that filmy thing getting in the way, which seemed to have kept his head dry. In the end, the head was off, and that was the easiest way to stop these things from getting away or shouting and making noise, attracting attention.

  The blood cascaded down the front of the coat, mixed with the rain. If there was a plus side to this, the coat would never have to be laundered, just wasted. David had wet himself, even when he still had his head. There wasn’t much of David left that wasn’t wet, one way or another.

  The beast didn’t really care for so much the blood. It just stuck to its fur, matting it together. So, it turned David so that his two wounds drained for a while, his head resting on the floor, the body being suspended by the creature. It dropped the body and examined the head. This was a good find, the perfect item for his ritual. Soon it would have all the parts.

  It picked up the two pieces of the human. As usual, when it made a kill, it howled.

  In The Grange, the tale had been told, and all the questions had been asked. A few of them were walking Tommy and Suzanne to the door when they heard the howls. Sally opened the front door to hear it better. There was another one. It didn’t sound human or like a wolf.

  Something they were going to have to hunt, something they have never heard before. A wild killer, living somewhere on Saddleworth Moor. The rest of the people who had been putting out the fire and turning the lights off joined the others in the hall.

  ‘That was it wasn’t it?’ Jackie asked.

  ‘Aye,’ Wee Renee said, ‘and it seems to be crowing about something.’

  The creature fed for a long time on David. He was very tasty, and warm food was always welcome up here. As it chewed, it thought about its missions. Actually, it only ever thought about its missions. Time was running out.

  It had smelled where the young thing went, and it would spy on him and see if it had the item with him. If it got a chance, it would take the young one, eat it and have the item as well. That was a good plan and it knew where the young thing went every day.

  It also knew that it shouldn’t be about when it was in the daylight. It knew plenty of places to hide on the Moors. Even in the Village, there were a few. It just had to make its way back in the night time.

  It had been up here for a long time, asleep and awake. Not too long ago, walking this Village, monsters were masquerading as humans. They hadn’t scared it, and they had never found where it had been.

  It hid the rest of David, especially the precious head, and began its work. Forward planning wasn’t something it did well – only out of necessity. This was as much as it could do.

  It walked down to the area where the young thing was in the daytime. It didn’t seem to be able to get it at night. There were people always about. Perhaps there was a chance it could be alone in this place, and it would catch him and retrieve the item. It just had to find the right place, and after a short time of burrowing and sniffing, it did.

  5. The School Railings

  Thursday was a good day for Bob. Not only was it next to the last day of the School week, but it was also the day when he had the best lessons - double art to round off with. To Bob, he always felt that he finished School at lunch on Thursdays. Fridays were easy, he spent most of that day planning the weekend. Art was his favourite subject. To make it even better, this year they had Mr Pugh, who was arguably the best teacher in the School.

  Mr Pugh was a cool art teacher. He had long hair, which he wore in a ponytail and when he reached up to the whiteboard you could see that he had tattoos on his arm, small black crosses, when his sleeves rode up.

  The other two art teachers in Friarmere Secondary School were old. An old man and woman. Bob had been taught by both of them in previous years, and they were good but pretty boring. Both of them made you draw bowls of fruit.

  Mr Pugh though was down with the kids. He got them drawing comic books and talked about pop art. Just recently he had seemed a little bit depressed. During lessons, he was always quite happy when he was talking about Art. When Bob had seen him walking around the School, he seemed a little sad. Bob wondered if he had lost someone during the vampire invasion of Friarmere in the winter, but he didn’t like to ask.

  Bob thought that there was a good chance of it. Nearly everyone had. Apart from them.

  Another good thing about this year’s Art class was the girls, well two girls in particular. Now Bob and Adam had been in classes with these girls before, but just lately, all girls had seemed different, and these two were very different.

  Rumours had gone the around school that Bob and Adam were a couple of heroes. Some people had even found out bits about what had happened to Adam, and of course, now he lived with Bob and had no mother. That seemed to make all rumours true in Friarmere Secondary. Some of these rumours were true, and some were wildly inaccurate. True or not, this made the pair all very dark and interesting to girls. Plus, they had grown up an awful lot over this winter and had suddenly become more attractive to the opposite sex.

  These two girls, in particular, had taken their eye, and these were both in Art. As long as people got their work done, Mr Pugh wasn’t bothered if they talked to each other, so they did.

  Adam and Bob had been worried about something for a while – trying to pluck up the courage. Bob had drawn the short straw in the end. He had to say the actual words.

  ’So, what about having a date with us? Both of us?’ Bob asked Zoe and Emily. The girl’s giggled.

  ’We’ll have to talk about that,’ Zoe said.

  ’As a foursome - as a double date?’ Emily asked Adam.

  This flummoxed Adam for a second. But the more they both thought about this, the more they thought that this was actually a good idea. Neither of them had been on a date with a girl before, and if they got nervous and didn’t know what to say, they could talk to one another.

  ’Yeah of course,’ Bob said.

  ’We’ve been on double dates before,’ Adam said. He was convincing no-one.

  ‘Oh yeah, who with?’ Zoe asked.

  ‘We don’t tell tales,’ Bob said. ‘We were taught to be gentlemen, so what do
you say?’

  ’We’ll think about it then,’ Emily said.

  ’What about tomorrow night, what are you doing?’ Adam asked.

  ’Nothing,’ Emily replied, coyly.

  ’Will you then?’ Bob asked.

  ’Yes!’ The two girls shrieked shrilly, then went off giggling and chatting to each other, while looking over at Bob and Adam.

  ’You lot, if you want to be away on time you’d better get all your paintbrushes, and stuff washed and put your work on the bench over there to dry,’ Mr Pugh shouted. Bob and Adam walked over to the sinks overlooking the all-weather pitch.

  ’I can’t I believe they said yes,’ Adam said to Bob. ‘I’m shitting it now.’

  ’I know. To be honest, I didn’t think Zoe would ever go out with me, but that didn’t take much persuading, did it? What a result,’ Bob said.

  ’I know it’s great isn’t it, and we’ll have each other to bounce off. We won’t have to make conversation with them all the time and talk about clothes or makeup, or whatever girls talk about.’

  ’You can’t double date forever though,’ Bob said, absentmindedly washing his brushes, while looking out of the window.

  ’Yeah, but by then we’ll be far more experienced. What shall we do? We haven’t got much cash. We need to do something awesome. Absolutely outstanding. Impress them,’ Adam said, trying frantically to think of the perfect date.

  Bob didn’t answer. He was staring at a rustling bush on the other side of the dry stonewall just outside of School’s property. Above the wall was a barbed wire fence. Behind that lay the donkey path. A donkey path that he had walked down many times when he had been hunting vampires.

  This path was continuously used by dog walkers and horse riders. Lined both sides with trees and bushes, there were many places where you could actually see all the way to the School. One of the thickest areas of shrubs and trees was against the wall, with a bare wall on either side of the patch. It stretched for quite an extended length of wall, however, maybe seventy or eighty feet. This patch in its centre, at its thickest part, seemed to be rustling. Just the other side he could see a woman trying to pull her dog away from the bush. It must have been a pretty small dog because he couldn’t see it behind the angle of the wall. The dog had not got in there, but he was barking.

  Bob could hear him even from here through the closed School windows. She managed to pull him away and off they walked. No sooner had she left with her dog, another person came walking up with a Dalmatian. He too went mad at the clump of bushes against the School grounds. The Dalmatian tried to get in but couldn’t. Eventually its owner dragged the barking dog back to path. The bushes still rustled.

  ‘There’s something in those bushes,’ Bob said quietly. Nodding to the scene outside.

  ’What?’ Adam asked.

  ‘There is something in the bushes. The dogs are barking at it,’ Bob confirmed. Adam looked towards where Bob’s gaze was, to try and see what he was on about.

  ’It’s probably a fox, or a rat, or a squirrel or something. You know what dogs are like,’ Adam said.

  ‘Yeah, I do. They bark like that if they are upset,’ Bob said.

  ’If you’re thinking what I think you’re thinking, this is not the Moors, and it’s not dark. Why would anything like that be down here?’ Adam asked.

  ’I don’t know, but we know it’s about. And we don’t know what it’s up to yet. I’m going to tell Wee Renee about it. It’s up to her if she does anything about it. I tell you this, I’m not going in there myself!’ Bob said.

  It was very well concealed in these bushes. There was no way that anyone could see a thing from the path. It was happy to be well hidden.

  History had shown that humans, and dogs, did not like their kind. That was a one-way road to extinction. It got against a wall and could just see over the top of it, to the School windows. The wind could not get in here to blow away any dead leaves, so there were years of half rotted and fresh, soft leaves to sit on.

  Looking out towards the path it was quite dark, fully enclosed by trees. It had been a bit of the job getting in here, especially considering its size. Looking over the wall, it was very light. The whole place opened up over the wall. It could see old buildings, yet the spiky fence was above the wall so it would not be able to get in there. Not tonight anyway.

  There were a lot of spiky fences around everywhere. It would get through if it worked on places systematically with its ritual tools over a few days. It could make holes. Many times, holes had been formed, out of necessity. It may have to do that again if things got desperate.

  It could smell the small one was in there, but it had not come anywhere near this part of the wall all day. There were lots of small ones that had, but they were no use to the beast. This had been useless. It realised that it would have to chance going back to the other place or perhaps it would get lucky and catch the small one somewhere on its own. The problem was, it was always with the other small one.

  One thing that it knew for sure was that it never should attack two together. It should only take one at a time. It was not a fast creature. It knew that it was strong but couldn’t run. If it attacked number one and number two ran, then it would tell someone. Lots would come later, with their superior weapons.

  It hadn’t survived this long without following the rules. The small one had to be alone, but it wasn’t going to happen here. It would be dark in a few hours, but then it would still have to wait a few more hours after that until the streets of Friarmere were empty. This had been a complete of waste of time. Luckily it still had food. After such a long watch, at least it didn’t have to hunt with David’s carcass tucked away in its nest.

  It still needed to find a match. The problem was if it got close enough to smell whether the human was a possible match, it would be discovered. He hadn’t found one yet. There weren't many blood and emotional matches around. He had to be sure it wasn’t a match before he killed it. If it cried out and drew attention, it would have to either kill it or take a chance. These things were all difficult to do. Even more so in this age of bright places and lots of people.

  It would find one. Generations of them had survived. Matches were always found. For hundreds of years – thousands, matches were found sooner or later, or else how had it survived?

  The problem was, it would be soon time to sleep. The sleep that was for a long time again. If it didn’t happen in the next few moons, it might as well wait for another year. It was lonely, it needed another of its kind. It always had to watch out for itself and always had to kill its own food. If it got injured, that would be the end for it. And it was the end, it was the last of its line, and it couldn’t do that.

  It was bred to survive.

  It would survive.

  6. Rag Pudding and Chips

  Since Ernie’s wife Lynn had died, Gary had taken him under his wing. Gary was a lifelong bachelor. Ernie had been used to the good life, otherwise known as a woman looking after him. Now Ernie had to do his own washing, ironing and cooking.

  Gary told Ernie that at least once a week, sometimes twice, he liked to go to the chip shop for his tea. He said that it cut down on thinking about shopping, the dishes and could be quite a social occasion. All in all, if he could have afforded it, he would go every night. He varied widely what he had with his chips, but generally, they were always with something moist, otherwise known as mushy peas, or gravy.

  Since Ernie had joined his way of dining out, the trips were always twice a week. Recently increasing to three times.

  Tonight, they were walking down to the chip shop. It was always a nice wander down there, but then there was quite a frantic power-walk back so that they could plate their chips up quickly.

  The two men fell into the pattern of going every Monday and every Thursday. Today, this Thursday, the plan was to come back to Ernie’s house to eat their chips. On Monday, they would go back to Gary’s. As usual, there was always plenty to talk about and even more so, after las
t night’s meeting.

  ’What do you make of all this beast stuff?’ Ernie asked.

  ’There’s no doubt that there’s something nasty about,’ Gary said. ‘It might be hard tracking it and then if we find it what are we supposed to do with it?’

  ’Same as what we did with all those other things, of course,’ Ernie said.

  ’It was different then. Let’s face it the bastards were already dead! We were cut off from the world. Everyone was living by their own rules. Now the Police are back in Friarmere. What if something, I don’t know … official gets done afterwards. What I mean by that is, what if we end up in the clink, just trying to defend our own Village?’ Gary asked.

  ’What are they going to charge us with?’ Ernie asked. ‘Assault and battery of a supernatural killer? You think we will get in trouble for killing a Bigfoot or The Beast of Saddleworth Moor?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Gary said. ‘I don’t fancy jail though Ernie.’

  ‘Wasn’t there enough brushing under the table with all that which went on before, to realise that no-one will be interested. As long as they are keeping up with their quota of parking tickets and clocking people going about 35 miles an hour in a 30 zone, they aren’t bothered. They aren’t concerned about all the serious stuff. That will be left for us to deal with, as per usual. We don’t even get the gritters up here anymore. Everyone has to salt their own roads. The Police, the Council, the Government, don’t give a monkey’s uncle, Gary,’ Ernie said, holding his three fingers up as he counted off the organisations that ignored them. Gary couldn’t disagree with anything there.

  ’I tell you what else I’ve been thinking,’ Gary said. ‘Maybe we should make some home-made notices to put at the bottom of the path, just to warn people off.’

  ’Do you really think they will take any notice of that if they could tell it was homemade? Most people would think it was a joke – I would myself. What are we going to say? Warning! Big Hairy Beast Killer Stalking the Moors – Do not stop while eating sandwiches,’ Ernie laughed.