Insanity

by A. R. Braun

  “Good man. Want backup?”

  “You bet I do.” Ryan’s anxiety spiraled out of control. He knew if he kept seeing these grotesqueries, he’d lose his wits.

  “Where is it?”

  “Where’s what?” Ryan’s voice trembled as he circled, looking in every direction.

  “Abdul Street.”

  “That’s the thing, I’m not sure. Hey, Cap’, this is really weird.”

  “Well, there you go—the kind of case you wanted.”

  “Hardly; this is too strange. There’s not a peep on the street, then there’s people and sounds popping up out of nowhere. Plus, I saw a hag that I think is a real-life witch, a black devil, a trapezoid that moved, and a rat with a human face.” The connection began to break up.

  “Black devil? . . . What are you talking . . . you all right?”

  “Hey, Cap’, you’re cutting out.”

  The connection went dead. He looked at his phone. It said: ROAMING and then turned itself off. He tried to turn it back on to no avail, which didn’t make any sense since he’d just charged the battery. Sound reentered his ears: footsteps clicking behind him. He looked over his shoulder. It was Nyarlathotep, the witch, the trapezoid, and her familiar. Ryan picked up his steps, trying to out-walk them.

  “Nice shirt,” a man that looked just like Trey Azagthoth of Morbid Angel said as he clomped by him. But it couldn’t have been him, could it? He was adorned in a concert shirt featuring a bunch of unmarked soldier’s graves with hands at the top working puppet strings attached to the crosses. Ryan thought of the song, “The Call of Ktulu,” from the album his own shirt represented. Then he mused over the tune, “The Thing That Should Not Be,” from the album the other man’s shirt advertised. Both were songs about the same creature. Ryan shuddered, ignored the man, and kept walking.

  From behind him: “Hey, can’t you salute a brother in metal?”

  Too afraid to reply as per the recent events, Ryan kept moving.

  “Well, that’s all right,” the metalhead added. “You can’t bust anybody in this world, pig! You’re Ancient-One food!”

  Ryan picked up his pace, hoping he’d wake from the nightmare; the fiends’ loud footfalls and the rat’s pitter-pattering behind him didn’t cease. By the time he reached the warehouse, he was running. He sprinted through the door just before they closed in on him.

  Once inside, he slammed it and cursed the absence of locks. He crept along, dodging the many rats who’d claimed the building as their own. It was dark as pitch and a dank scent permeated the space. Breathing in the cool air, he thought he could cut right through it with his pocketknife, it was so thick. In the distance, he heard a group of what sounded like young men chanting. He followed the sound, and after he turned a few corners, he found the Cult of Yog-Sothoth and Shub-Niggurath’s Young.

  Green candles illuminated the brown-robed cult. They’d formed a perfect circle. One of them stood apart from the rest and banged on a green gong periodically. The scent of burning wax filled Ryan’s nose with bitterness. The hoods of their robes were pulled over their heads. Ryan strained his eyes to look at their weird, huge necklaces which hung on the outside of their robes. He recognized the design from the graffiti. It was made of metal—the Christian-looking fish, but with a mouth on it, grinning with sharp teeth.

  “Hey,” Ryan cried, showing his badge. “Tampa PD! Are you the Cult of Yog-Sothoth and Shub-Niggurath’s Young?”

  The youths looked at him, some with puffy, fish eyes; others with human eyeballs, as they pulled down their hoods. Ryan noticed two humans, a Mexican boy and a Caucasian. None had beards, and they were baby-faced. Some were skinny and some were bulky. Long black hair hung around all their faces.

  “What if we are?” a skinny, monstrous one asked.

  “What are you going to do about it?” a hefty human added.

  “Are you Hector Rodriquez and Damien Alford?” Ryan asked.

  “What of it?” Hector answered.

  “Yeah, so what?” Damien added.

  They’ve joined the cult!

  Damien brandished a sacrificial knife with precious stones in the handle. Ryan heard a baby crying. Squinting his eyes for a better look, he spied the missing infant lying on a green blanket on the floor in their midst.

  Ryan pulled the Glock. “Freeze! Down on the ground!”

  A wrinkled hand came from behind him and seized his wrist. A black hand snaked out and yanked the semi-automatic pistol out of his grasp. The old witch and Nyarlathotep had snuck up on him. Her sickening warts—each one with a hair sticking out of it—made his wrist itch. The trapezoidal figure peeked at him from his left side.

  “Brown Jenkin,” the witch bellowed, “feed.”

  The huge rat bit into his right ankle. Ryan cried out and looked down, seeing the vermin chomping away, the jabs of pain white-hot as the coarse, sharp teeth chewed through his skin and severed his right foot.

  Ryan stumbled and screamed.

  The cult of teenagers was on him before he could fall onto his back. Hector put him in a headlock, and the other five bound him with green—yes, he wasn’t imagining things, green—rope. The group smelled like a garbage dumpster in the back of a seafood restaurant. The doughy skin of the non-humans intertwined with the soft skin of the humans, ripped with muscles. Ryan couldn’t breathe. He yelled expletives as they threw him onto the floor. His head knocked against the concrete, smarting and making him see stars. He knew there would be a lump.

  “Get him out to the beach!” one of the monstrous youths cried in a guttural voice.

  Am I really going to die like this?

  Ryan whimpered and begged them to let him call an ambulance before he bled to death.

  The cult laughed, ignoring his pleas. The witch grabbed his left ankle and Nyarlathotep grabbed his stub. They dragged him out to the beach, the pain slashing through him unbearable. He begged them to stop. The toothless hag and the black devil towed him faster while Ryan yelled in protest. Brown Jenkin carried Ryan’s bloody, severed foot in his mouth, watching him at eye level from his left while scurrying alongside his face. At his right, the trapezoidal being hovered. Soon the scent of salt water, algae, and fish overwhelmed him. At last, the trip was over and he lay on the sand. He groaned in pain as the blood flowed out of his stump. He grew lightheaded and saw stars. Ryan begged God to make it stop.

  “My name is Keziah Mason,” the old hag said as she looked daggers at him. “If you’d done your research, you’d know the Christians tried to put me to death during the Inquisition, but I escaped, baffling Cotton Mather. Thanks to my magickal, bloody markings on the wall.”

  This is no joke! Morbid Angel isn’t full of crap! Like her, they worship aliens, which exist, hidden from us like in Hanger 18!

  The cult surrounded him in a circle. The youth standing apart had brought the gong outside. The waves bellowed louder, crashing in furious heaps at the shoreline. The cult chanted.

  “Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn.”

  Now that he was close enough to make out the chant, Ryan begged for mercy.

  The bulkiest youth punched him in the face. His adrenaline made him only half-feel the punch. Perhaps being a tough cop was the only thing that kept him from being knocked out. He tasted his sour blood. It wasn’t metallic or coppery. It was hard to believe someone had ever sucked on a piece of metal or a penny and remembered what it tasted like.

  Hazy as if he were stoned, Ryan watched the cult move away, standing well behind him, where Nyarlathotep, the trapezoidal figure, the witch, and Brown Jenkin loomed. Although double vision hexed him, he blinked at the sea and was rewarded with a sharper view. The waters contracted, losing definite shape, but still retaining enough texture to comprise the ocean.

  The sea boiled. The hugest head he’d ever seen emerged from the waters, uttering the nastiest screech ever to assault Ryan’s ears—a cacophony of pain, despair, and desolation. He could make out a bald, green head—the body as big
as a city block, as it rose from the ocean.

  Ryan realized two things: he was the next sacrifice, and no one would save him. He wept, his warm tears caressing his face. This was his wildest wide-awake nightmare.

  He shrieked.

  The creature had a squid’s head and wings. The muscular green body flexed as the monster wriggled his fingers and then snapped his claws, making sounds like gunshots. The Great Old One’s frame was so massive Ryan couldn’t even see it all. The lord of the cult sported bat-like wings. The vilest reek he’d ever inhaled assailed him, more malodorous than a dead animal, even a skunk, even a dead human body. The creature stood as high as a skyscraper as Ryan lay on the beach, watching. Before him, infamous and insidious: Yog-Sothoth and Shub-Niggurath’s Young, Cthulhu.

  His brain a conflagration, madness began to consume him.

  The cult continued its infernal, guttural chant. Cthulhu glowered at Ryan with glowing, light green eyeballs. The beast lowered his huge head. His eyes changed, turning sapphire. Many tentacles jutted from where a human’s mouth would be, and they parted like worms crawling away from an exterminator. Cthulhu opened his beak to reveal a rough tongue with rows of serrated teeth on the sides. The beast let out a screech like nails on a blackboard, and exhaled the most putrid breath anyone could ever be cursed with. Ryan gagged and his cheeks flapped.

  The creature’s hand came forward and snatched him up, moving him toward the gaping maw.

  “Ah . . . ha . . . ah, ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” Ryan insanely laughed.

  Blinding physical pain ensued as Cthulhu devoured him.

  Ryan’s world faded to black.

  ***

  Captain James blew up Ryan’s cell phone, but the detective never answered. No voice mail came on to take a message. He worried about the young detective, but not for obvious reasons. The phone had not cut out on his end earlier. Otherworldly sounds had terrified the captain, noises he’d never heard in this life, as if Ryan had stumbled upon a strange dimension not of this earth.

  Captain James sent out swarms of squadrons to the south side in search of him, and he thought he’d go, too, but didn’t want to for fear.

  Moreover, what would he tell Ryan’s young wife and daughter if they never found him?

  After hours of searching and asking questions, the Tampa PD found Ryan’s car, but no trace of either him or Abdul Street. They offered many of the people on the south side bribes. One would think they’d jump on that, as poor as they were. But no one talked. They’d even roughed up some of the denizens, but all insisted that Abdul Street didn’t exist, which was hard to argue with, for damned if they could find it themselves.

  And there was that presence the captain felt, so eerie, so foreboding, like one that was dead, but dreaming.

  Captain James mused over not only the two missing teens, but also the baby, wondering if the black warehouse was where they’d gone.

  A young man sped by on a bicycle, but not stealthily enough so that the captain couldn’t read his Teen Cthulhu concert shirt. When he looked over his shoulder, the punk was gone. Only a black apartment building stared back at him.

  They’d stay here combing the beach and the surrounding neighborhoods all night long and well into the morning but, as the captain thought about the eerie phone call from Ryan, he selfishly hoped they’d never find Abdul Street. Captain James also had a family—safe, warm, and well-fed.

  And he wanted to keep them that way.

  Six-Word Horror Story

  Come in, but avoid the basement.

  Beyond the Sideshow

  Beckoning twenty paces away stood the gates of hell-on-earth, and Richard loved every minute of it.

  His brother Jaden stopped, shaking his head.

  Yellow and white flashing lights cast the atmosphere in a jaundiced, eldritch light. A black building featured green occult runes that glowed with evil, looking as if they were carved in stone, and the symbols surrounded a nuclear mushroom cloud with black letters advertising SIDESHOW FREAKS. Behind the counter sat a retarded-faced man with a bald, oval head. A rat tail of scraggly hair sprouted from the top. He had lobster-claw syndrome and called to potential customers with a microphone in his deformed hand, the voice coming straight from a daemon’s mouth, not even trying to be intelligible.

  “Come wwwwuuuunnnn and alllllllll, to helllllll.”

  How excellent! It was the most fascinating thing Richard had ever seen.

  “Oh no, those things are so lame,” Jaden said.

  When the wind teased his eighteen-year-old brother’s dark, baby-fine hair, Richard grumbled with jealousy. With Jaden’s unblemished skin, the handsome jerk made all the girls wet. He was stuffed into a sleeveless Iowa State shirt and stylish jeans from the mall, ironed flawlessly.

  No looks were left for Richard, so he got the brains. Because of his acne-scarred face, circular glasses, and thick lips, his classmates had reduced him to nerd status. His skeletal frame made people wonder if he ate. Even the best shampoo and conditioner couldn’t cure his greasy hair. When Richard wore his werewolf shirt, as he did today, Jaden went into a laughing fit. He couldn’t even sport the horror motif without his brother screwing with him.

  Jaden locked eyes with him and crossed his arms, which Richard grabbed.

  “Please? It’s the coolest thing I’ve ever seen!”

  Jaden’s face told all; he stood stringent.

  Nothing excited Richard more than occult runes or anything to do with the devil, thanks to his parents’ brainwashing. He and his brother were immune to it somehow. Silly, unbelievable gospel stories—a man couldn’t survive in a whale’s belly for three days, the acids would consume him—didn’t help a failed attempt at mind control. He resented his boring existence and being told “thou shalt not” to everything worth doing.

  His brother’s resistance was maddening.

  “I’ll give you my allowance for a week!” Richard pressed.

  Jaden sighed. “Whatever, but don’t complain about not gettin’ your way anymore.”

  They headed toward the hellish experience waiting to claim them behind those doors which, to Richard, would be a wicked heaven.

  Jaden and Richard handed the man their money.

  “Thwankkk wwwoooouuu,” he said.

  “No sweat,” Richard answered. “Hey, you part of the show?”

  Jaden snickered. “The geek probably is.”

  He fixed one slanted eye on Jaden and pointed him out. “Nooooo, but you could apppppppllllllllyyyyyyyyzzzzzzz.”

  Jaden laughed. “You wish, pervert.”

  With that, they entered complete and utter darkness.

  “Where’s the light?” Jaden’s voice carried a hint of annoyance.

  “Just keep walking,” Richard answered.

  Eventually, the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel winked through. Folding chairs on top of a straw floor came into view, as well as a black curtain that hung like a giant wraith over the stage, decked out with those same runes. In the seats, teenagers laughed, middle-school children cried out, old men picked booger treasures. The scents of popcorn, sweat, mildew, and damp soil wafted up to him. Richard was fit to burst with joy.

  Jaden held his nose. “This is worse than the typical carnival stink.”

  Richard pointed toward the curtain. “Hey, bro’, two seats up front! Unbelievable!”

  And there they were, moving toward the best seats in the house.

  ***

  The curtain opened.

  Red spotlights showcased black smoke, and the sideshow’s host crept forward with a microphone in hand. When a white spotlight isolated the grotesque figure from the smoke-filled stage, Richard made out a gleaming, shaven head. The paleness of his flesh amplified his wide eyes that fixed on Richard. Crooked yellow teeth filed down to serrated fangs filled the host’s cavernous mouth. The smoke curled away as the huge electrical fans blew the fog hither, thither, and yon, and the smell of sulfur hung in the air.

  The host flashed a rictus grin
a monster would’ve been jealous of. “Allow me to introduce myself,” his voice bellowed. “I am Merlin the Annihilator.”

  Richard elbowed his brother. “Great, huh?”

  Jaden shook his head. “These things are all fake.”

  The host’s glare seared them as he scowled. “Apparently, I don’t have everyone’s attention. Would freaks straight from Gehenna grab it back?” Merlin stuck a long, bony finger out and moved it over the small crowd. “Youuuuu! All of you should appreciate the gift of health, for this blessing was taken from the abominations I’m about to show you.”

  Richard’s breath caught in his throat. Oh, wow! This is going to be righteous!

  “I’ve scoured the four corners of the earth, searching for the most bizarre deformities ever unleashed on mankind.” Merlin let loose a laugh that not only echoed through the P.A. system, but also speared Richard’s belly with icy needles, and was it ever divine. “God would not allow these creatures to wander the world. Only my dark master would dare unleash them.”

  The silence was so prevalent Richard could hear the screams of children who’d ventured onto the more frightening rides outside.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you . . .

  . . . the survivors of Chernobyl.”

  “Oh, fucked up,” Richard whispered.

  “How boring, a disaster that happened when Dad was young,” Jaden whispered as the host held his hand out to the back of the stage. “I bet I’ll be able to make out the zippers.”

  “Shh!” Richard said. His eyes were focused on Merlin.

  “Behold, Dino Man!” the host continued.

  Richard gaped as the monstrosity in short pants clomped onto the stage. His legs had indeed been enlarged like tree trunks, and his toenails were long claws. Dino Man had a hard time keeping his eyes on the crowd, as if ashamed. Hair on the sides of his crown dwarfed the large cranium from where it grew. Dino Man’s varicose veins flexed like grotesque snakes as he took his stance, the horror before them eyeballing the crowd as he chomped on the vegetation Merlin handed him. Leaf after leaf of a corn stalk, he put it all away.