Demon Harvest

by Patrick C. Greene

  Hudson cradled his shotgun and leaned to shine his flashlight under the cruiser. The beam danced madly as the little demon leaped from the dark and bit into him.

  Hudson dropped the shotgun, stunned by the stinging, sharp pain of tiny incisors sinking into his forearm. He wildly shook and swung his arm to throw it off, realizing quickly it wasn’t going anywhere.

  Hudson punched the orange goblin in the “face,” landing three solid blows before it dropped off. Hudson spun to find the shotgun. It lay steaming at the edge of his headlight beam. The bugger could be just a foot beyond, and he wouldn’t be able to see it.

  Hudson drew his handgun and pressed it side by side with the flashlight, listening for any scrabbling or scratching sounds or…

  “Hell with it.” Hudson decided to leave the shotgun. He got in the cruiser and reverse-turned hard. His heart sank along with the car’s rear end, as it slid violently into the deep ditch at the road’s edge.

  “Son of a bitch!”

  Though he knew it was pointless, Hudson pushed the gas, then tried alternately gunning and letting off to try and rock it out, cursing when he felt the rear sink deeper than before.

  He lifted the scanner radio microphone, preparing to call dispatch, when a sibilance—scrabbling, scratching, skittering—passed across the roof, barely louder than the rain.

  Hudson moved to power up the window, too late. Gnarled brownish-green tendrils jabbed through the tiny opening like fast-growing cancer, finding Hudson’s face and hand.

  “Get off!” he shouted. He tugged up the power-window button hard enough to hurt his finger, trapping the legs.

  But not the smaller vines that immediately followed.

  The first slipped around his neck. It felt like a barbed-wire noose. A soft thump on the windshield drew Hudson’s attention to the subhuman face set in squash flesh, leering and blinking at him, upside down.

  Hudson felt the rain intensify on his face and heard the window glide back down; the goddamned monster-fruit had seen how he operated it and learned.

  Hudson had to lean to his left, into the pull of the tentacle cluster, but that gave him just enough room to quickdraw his sidearm with his gloriously free hand.

  Though the windshield was bulletproof, Hudson always carried his .44 these days. Nothing would withstand its force at point-blank range.

  He covered his face, pressed his .44 against the windscreen and blasted the smirking aberration, sending it flying like a missile into the rainy dark as the glass noisily disintegrated.

  Torn away from their source, the choking tendrils went limp. Hudson yanked the scratchy cords away from his neck and tossed them out. Then he found the spotlight and beamed it into the darkness.

  “You…have got…to be…yanking my chain…” he murmured.

  The thing, though the upper quarter of its head was gone, crawled toward the cruiser on its broken limbs. The two or three thinner vines that were still intact were wrapped around the shotgun—and aiming it toward him.

  Hudson ducked as the twelve-gauge burped flame and thunder. The pellets finished off the windshield and pinged the hood.

  Hudson thought of what would come next. The little freak would come around to the door and rise up on those insectile limbs. It would grin at him, and it would blow him away.

  Hudson didn’t wait for that. He yanked his door latch, kicked it open and rolled out into the road, firing off the rest of his ammo in his sidearm. The horror was closer than he expected, which worked in Hudson’s favor. Chunks of pulpy rind erupted from it.

  The pumpkin went rolling backward, leaving behind the shotgun and a half-dozen encircling vines.

  Hudson got up and dove for the shotgun, wishing he had the breath for a cry of relief when his palms fell on its smooth, wet grip and pump stock.

  Ignoring the pain of the landing, Hudson hopped up and ran straight to the pumpkin thing.

  Little more than a third of it was still intact. Yet, just above the massive hole where its mouth had been, its remaining eye rolled toward him, bloodshot and wet. Though most of it was gone, the atrocity projected no less perversity.

  Hudson raised the shotgun and blasted it to a thousand pieces. He shot the largest chunks again, disintegrating them utterly.

  Then he realized the cruiser was still stuck, and it was a long way back to town. Chances are, he would need the shotgun again.

  At least the radio still worked—he hoped.

  * * * *

  “They’re coming, Dennis,” said Violina, allowing the corners of her lips to rise. “You can hear them over the rain now.”

  Dennis stood just behind her in the vestibule of Saint Saturn Unitarian, his arms aching to reach toward her, his fingers itching to squeeze her neck.

  Since he could not, he peered past the rain at his town as it, once again, fell under the siege of evil. Low electrical bursts beyond the town’s industrial border told him Violina’s conjured army had come in past the fields and were now wreaking havoc, severing power lines.

  “Call ’em off,” he ordered.

  Her laughter punctuated his helplessness, her control over him. “It’s the fault of your gender, you know.”

  Dennis grunted with intention. His arms remained at his sides, the muscles not even tensing any longer.

  “Men suppressed magic because it made women not only equal, but superior to you.”

  “Bitch,” Dennis began. “I’m a suicidal loser alcoholic with a mom who’s a widow and a girlfriend who saved this town. You ain’t gotta sell me on girl power. But you couldn’t carry water for either one of ’em.”

  Violina laughed again, almost a cackle, then leaned in to kiss him. “You don’t know how aroused that makes me, Dennis.” She returned to the doorway. “Maybe I won’t feed you to them, if you can keep up this interesting banter.”

  Dennis wanted to get under the rain, to let it run down his face so he could swallow as much of it as possible to dilute the potion she had forced on him. That wasn’t going to happen as long as they both stood in the shelter of the church vestibule.

  “Feed me to ’em?” Dennis laughed. “I’m betting that Conal douche is gonna double-cross you bigger than hell.”

  Violina remained uncharacteristically silent as she peered down at the town.

  “No telling what’s really going on down there,” Dennis said cryptically.

  “Don’t make me have you bite off your own tongue, lover boy.”

  “Hey, I’m worried too,” Dennis continued. “He’s probably gonna be a lot worse than you.”

  Violina contemplated for a long time before she spoke again. “Be a good worker bee and go get the car.”

  As Dennis felt himself walk through the building, he shouted a litany of curses that would shock a drill instructor.

  “Oh, my goodness, what a mouth!” Violina mocked. “For that, you can take the long way.”

  Dennis felt a modicum of triumph as his body about-faced and went to exit through the front door, into the rain.

  “And take your time,” Violina purred. “Half speed, let’s say.”

  Dennis felt the shock of cold water bashing into his face. He began to sing The Chalk Outlines’ club hit “Rumble at Castle Frankenstein,” reasoning that its fast pace would allow him to swallow more water.

  Chapter 24

  Return to the Living

  The healing ceremony for Ysabella, ranging from rocking whispers to childish, off-key singing to focused stillness, never wavered as the storm grew more and more violent.

  Only Jill, accustomed to watching out for trouble at the band’s gigs, kept her eyes open. Catching sight of the lightning flashes, she knew instantly that this was far from natural. Stella intuitively opened her eyes to meet Jill’s gaze.

  Jill nodded toward the window.

  The next flash sent a chill through Stell
a. She felt Ysabella’s pulse and despaired that it was weaker than ever.

  * * * *

  As the rain-slickened orange goblins approached the Audi, Kerwin tried screaming “Go!” but forgot he needed his amplifier. Brinke said the same. Doris was already flooring it before she finished the single syllable.

  The Audi’s bumper banged into the closest pumpkin thing’s sapling-thick leg and fishtailed on the wet road. Doris never stopped, regaining control with admirable dexterity.

  The thing had toppled forward on its broken limb. But it still had three legs to keep it moving—and fast.

  “Hang on!” Doris called, as she maneuvered around the biggest one yet, a Volkswagen-sized specimen. It skittered toward them with unnatural speed. When it got within a few yards, they all saw its “face”—a wicked countenance with all the nuance of a human being, including a sinister smile and blue eyes alight with an eagerness to shed blood.

  Kerwin stared at Brinke. He didn’t even try to say it, but she knew; he expected her to do some “magic.”

  Brinke tried to gather her pinballing thoughts to find a general protection charm that might apply. But all those she knew were to be done well in advance.

  For now, Doris’s driving prowess would have to do the job. “We’ll get to town,” she exclaimed, as she rocketed right between the spidery legs of a fresh-risen pumpkin demon. “Find Hudson.”

  “What can he do?” Kerwin asked, strangely calm through the monotone of the vocal enhancer.

  Doris couldn’t answer. She was busy veering hard away from a pair of the things, as they stalked toward the car in perfect unison, like the Martian killing machines of H. G. Wells.

  Brinke saw the nearest of the demonic duo open its mouth, viewed the stringy innards hanging before the black cave inside, and saw the tiny, yet deadly incisors.

  The pumpkin beasts were evolving—taking on more and more human attributes—by the second.

  “We can at least warn the town,” Doris said without optimism, “if we can beat these things there.”

  * * * *

  Yoshida was usually lulled by thunderstorms. Exhausted as he was from all that had already happened this night, he was sure he would fall into a deep sleep within minutes. Yet the terror remained that he would transform again.

  There was no precedent for that. Yet every night’s change had been more intense, making him wilder and more unpredictable. The fear that he would become a wolf, and remain that way, left him in a constant state of alarm. He had already considered ending it all, via a delicious mouthful of gun barrel. But he didn’t have any silver bullets, and if he was anything like his “wolf mother,” Aura, it would be a useless gesture, serving only to drive home the extent of his dilemma.

  There was a grenade launcher in the evidence annex. That would surely do it.

  He both envied and enjoyed the sound of Pedro snoring on the recliner across from him. His friend deserved a good rest, after all he had done. He, Dennis, McGlazer, Hudson, the boys too—all had gone the extra mile as friends. If it was to be the end, the best consolation he could think of was that he would be well-mourned.

  Someone, a woman or child, cried out in panic from the apartment next door.

  “God, what n…?” Yoshida went to the window.

  No detective work was required.

  Under a flash that briefly painted the parking lot a foggy crimson, he saw three van-sized creatures moving toward the apartment complex.

  They moved on uneven limbs, some jointed, like locust legs, others more flexible, like the tentacles of a squid.

  Another scream—a man’s voice this time.

  Pedro stood up, dropping the trank rifle. “Whut the blue hades…?”

  Yoshida shushed Pedro, then waved him over, as more terrified exclamations rose all around the building.

  Pedro almost cried out when he saw one of the pumpkin-spiders clamber over a car.

  “Wake me up outta this sick dream, Yoshi.” Pedro gripped his shoulders. “Right the hell now.”

  Through the window, the rain and darkness smeared the pumpkins to moving blobs of orange, but it was clear they were coming closer to the building, drawn by the screams.

  “Where’s your sawed-off ten-gauge!?” Yoshida asked.

  “You guys made me turn it in!”

  Nearby, a window crashed. Then another. Through the rain-pelted window, they saw that one of the things was just a few feet away, moving toward Pedro’s screaming neighbors.

  “What about your revolver?” Pedro whispered.

  “I locked it up when my super puberty hit.”

  “All I got is a spiked bracelet and some butter knives.”

  Lightning flashed again, engraving a savage photograph on their minds, of two spider-pumpkin-demons carrying flailing, pajama-clad apartment dwellers, one suspended in a viney tendril, the other quickly disappearing into a grinning mouth.

  They physically recoiled from the window, falling over each other and the recliner. The crashing thump of the falling chair came just before the thunder. Pedro and Yoshida lay awkwardly frozen, waiting to see if the shapes would come to their window.

  Other noises caught the beasts’ attention, though. Someone had a gun. It popped like either a cap pistol or a .22. Hardly heavy artillery.

  “We gotta do something,” Pedro said, pointing at the ceiling. “Ophelia’s up there.”

  * * * *

  As “The Cat Came Back” played over the speaker, McGlazer made the rounds, passing out candy that was meant for later to the kids trapped inside by the raging storm. He was met with mostly troubled faces and pleas for their parents.

  As for the adults, the thunder might as well have been pulses of direct current, with each clap jolting everyone deeper into a collective state of unease.

  McGlazer heard the door latch echo and frowned. It didn’t help that the boys were at the exit, holding it open.

  “Sure is weird!” said DeShaun, shouting over the roar of the rain.

  “There’s no explanation for lightning to be red like that,” added Stuart. The boys gave each other the look that had long ago become shorthand between them for “just another Ember Hollow Halloween nightmare.”

  Bernard wandered toward them. “What are you boys doing over here? Letting all the excitement out?”

  “This storm’s more interesting. Red lightning.”

  Bernard watched, silently counting between flash and thunder. “And it’s coming closer.” He stepped out under the aluminum eaves and put his hand over his glasses, as if shielding them from the sun, squinting toward the fringe tree rising from a grassy island in the middle of the parking lot.

  There was a split second of total darkness in the sky. Then another angry rumble that seemed almost like the grumble of a giant.

  “Did you see that blackness?” Bernard asked, too quietly under the squall for the boys to hear. But they got the gist. “That was no power outage.”

  Headlights appeared at the far end of Main Street, moving toward them fast.

  “I think…here we go,” said DeShaun.

  “Whatever it is, whatever happens…”

  Stuart did not need to finish. DeShaun was ready to defend his friend, just as Stuart had fought for him the year before.

  “Watch out!” Bernard ran inside, past the boys, as the car slid into the lot at speed and careened straight toward them.

  Chapter 25

  Yet Not Human

  Settlement era

  “You must understand.” Standing outside the guest room, Bennington patted Chloris’s sturdy shoulder to reassure her. “He must be delirious from blood loss. He surely believed you were his assailant.”

  “Perhaps,” Chloris said. “Yet there’s…blackness rising from him. If he’s gone mad…I don’t expect that he’ll return from it.”

  Starin
g at the door, Bennington nodded. “I want to try something.”

  Minutes later, Bennington entered Everett’s room, wearing the scarecrow hood he had taken off the mop-haired man. Behind him came Chloris, clutching the matchlock pistol in a two-handed grip as steady as the settlement’s best marksman, whom, if she wished to be indiscreet, she could decisively best in any shooting contest.

  Everett stirred immediately from a stream of welcome nightmares and sat up like a corpse that had gone into rigor mortis. He regarded the man in the doorway wearing his mask, and blinked, as if he had found himself in yet another beautiful bad dream.

  Slowly he formed a grin. “Trick?”

  Bennington came to his side. “It’s a trick, yes.” He pulled the hood off. “It’s me. We want to help you heal.”

  He handed the scarecrow mask to Everett. “We are your friends.”

  Everett took the mask and quickly put it on. Bennington helped him adjust it.

  “I am Wilcott. That is Chloris.”

  Everett waved.

  “And your name?”

  Everett was confounded. He could not remember anyone ever asking him his name.

  His father had tried to take Halloween away from him. Then the church men came to his room and took everything else.

  He eyed Chloris, who had brought him treats, soup that tasted like pumpkins and sweet bread. She…smiled at him.

  Then his gaze traveled back to the big man who had put him on his horse and brought him here to rest. But Everett felt he knew him from before that.

  No. He knew his ghost.

  “Eh…Everett…”

  “Everett,” said his host.

  “Everett,” repeated Chloris.

  The two grown-ups smiled at him again. His Mamalee used to smile at him and speak kind words too, but she also let his father lock him up. She did nothing when the church men came. Mamalee did not love Halloween.