by Lowry, C. L.
“Who the hell are you, and what do you want?”
The Reaper laughed. “I’m getting exactly what I want. Karma.”
Dannie yelled out in pain again. He continued screaming for someone to help him. The Reaper continued watching him. He was admiring his work.
“You never answered my question. Did you make my girlfriend beg for her life?”
“Who the fuck are you?” Dannie asked.
“I’m your worst nightmare times ten.”
“What the fuck do you want, you fuckin’ creep?”
“I want you to answer my question,” The Reaper said as he stood up. He grabbed the crate from the ground and struck Dannie’s left ankle. The blades on the barbwire sunk into his skin, cutting deeper.
The scream that Dannie let out could be heard from blocks away.
“Now, can you answer my question?”
“I don’t know you, dawg. Let me go.”
The next scream that Dannie let out topped the first one as the crate was used to strike his right ankle. The barbwire was now embedded into both of his ankles. Blood poured from the new wounds. Dannie’s body went into shock and the injured man lost consciousness.
The Reaper stood up and walked out of the room. The thrill behind the event had left the building. Dannie being passed out was way too easy in The Reaper’s opinion. He wanted Dannie to be up during this encounter. He did not want one second going by that Dannie did not feel the pain that the Reaper was inflicting on his body.
As The Reaper exited the room, someone else entered. It was a woman. She walked to the foot of the bed and examined Dannie’s wounds. The barbwire cuts were deep, and the blades were still embedded. She had a pair of wire cutters in her hand. She carefully clipped the barbwire around the razor edges that were embedded in Dannie’s ankles.
Once the wire was cut, she carefully unraveled it from his ankles. Blood had soaked the wire. After the wire was removed, the woman took out a wide butcher knife. With a torch lighter, she heated up the knife. The hot blade of the knife was held to the side and pressed against the embedded razor edges, pushing them deeper into Dannie’s ankle while the actual wound was being soldered. The smell of burnt flesh filled her nostrils as she continued working diligently to stop the bleeding. By the time she was done with each wound, Dannie was regaining consciousness.
Dannie grimaced, immediately feeling the throbbing pain of the second-degree burns on his ankles and the blades that were still embedded in his skin. The first instinct was to grab his legs and to somehow get to his feet, but the pain was too excruciating to move. He felt like he had woken up from a terrible nightmare, but it was his current reality. He did his best not to squirm. Although his legs were free from the barbwire, his wrists were still locked in.
“Hey, can you help me?” Dannie asked the mysterious woman at the foot of the bed.
The woman didn’t say a word.
“Listen to me! I know the leader of The Association, and I can get you whatever you want. Food, vehicles, weapons. Whatever you need, I can get for you. Please let me go.” Tears poured from his eyes, as he begged the woman to help him.
The woman bent over and carefully moved the clipped barbwire to the side. Dannie noticed the knife that was in her hand. He glanced down at his ankles, and his heart dropped into his stomach. The pain was agonizing. He could barely move his feet. There was no telling what type of damage the embedded blades were causing.
The woman smiled at Dannie before exiting the room, with the wire.
Seconds later, The Reaper re-entered the room. Dannie’s eyes were trained on him. “Hey, you proved your point. Please, let me go. I was just telling your lady friend that I can get you whatever you want. Just let me go.”
“And I told you already that I got exactly what I want. You know how long it took me to get to you?”
“What do you mean how long it took you? What is your beef with me?”
“This is so pathetic. I need you to guess what my beef is with you.”
“Man, I don’t have time for this. Let me go.”
“It looks like you got time to me. It doesn’t seem like you’ll be going anywhere.” The Reaper laughed and pulled his crate up to the side of the bed.
Dannie’s heart still felt like it was in his stomach. Having The Reaper that close to him was extremely uncomfortable. The Reaper eyed Dannie’s wrists, then his face.
“Why are you doing this, man?”
“I’m doing to you, what you have done to someone that I loved. You are going to pay the ultimate price for what you did to her, but first, you’re going to suffer.”
The Reaper pulled out a cellphone and powered on the device. He was able to give it a little juice, after having it plugged into an old generator. He held the phone up in Dannie’s face, forcing him to look at the cracked screen. As soon as the video began playing, Dannie turned his head to look away.
“Do you remember now?” The Reaper asked after showing Dannie the video of him killing Dana. It was at that moment that all the memories came rushing back. It was the same room. They were back in the same room where Dannie had killed Jane Doe. More tears fell from Dannie’s eyes.
Dannie could not believe he was back in that house, let alone the exact room that he took a life in. He knew there was no talking his way out of this situation. His demons had finally caught up to him. He needed to find a way to escape, and he needed to find it soon. He tried moving his legs, but the pain was unbearable. His wrists still had barbwire wrapped around them, and he did not want to take the risk of cutting his wrists deeper.
“Is there anything you would like to say?”
“What can I say? Obviously, you watched the video. I’ve been sitting here begging you to spare my life, but I know you’re not going to do that.”
“Tell me why I should spare your life.”
“You’re not going to sit here and treat me like a bitch. I’m not going to let you do that to me. If you’re going to kill me, be a man and just do it already.”
The Reaper took out the torch lighter and put it up against Dannie’s left bicep. Dannie could not even get his next words out before the torch was burning the flesh on his arm. Dannie’s screams pierced The Reaper’s ears. A slight grin spread on his face as he continued to burn Dannie’s left arm.
Dannie’s body began convulsing. The barbwire around his wrists sliced into him as his body seized. This did not stop The Reaper from burning the flesh until he reached the bone. The Reaper stood to his feet and watched his victim continue to seize. Dannie’s mouth foamed up. The odor in the room was stomach-turning and somehow it did not bother The Reaper at all.
“You’re not going to get away that easy,” he whispered into Dannie’s ear.
A large icepick was swiftly taken out of The Reapers pocket. He used the item and began viciously stabbing Dannie in the torso. He then climbed on top of Dannie and with two hands on the weapon, he drove it downward into the body of his victim. Blood splattered on his face with each strike. This killing as so much different than any other. It was almost orgasmic for The Reaper as he continued stabbing. His eyes were trained on Dannie’s face, the entire time. This was the haunted him in his sleep. He saw it every night, replaying Dana’s death in his head.
The Reaper continued his assault as a crater flesh blood and sliced flesh formed in the center of Dannie’s chest. The Reaper had pierced organs and struck bone, but that did not stop him. He kept striking. In some way, Dana’s presence was still in that room and The Reaper wanted to show her that her death would truly be avenged. Blood splattered everywhere. Not only was the attacker covered in it, but it was also on the floor, walls, and ceiling. Fatigue began setting in as the strikes became slower.
The Reaper’s arms felt heavy and could barely lift them to continue his assault. With the last of his energy, The Reaper raise his weapon and drove it down, directly between his victim’s eyes. He let out a loud shriek in the face of the corpse that he was straddling. He basked in the
moment, as the bedroom door slowly opened. The Reaper looked back at the woman standing in the doorway.
“Now that I’m done with him, bring in the next one.”
AVAILABLE NOW!!!
Book #1 of the series
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Genre: Crime Anthology
AVAILABLE NOW!!!
Genre: Street Lit - Urban Fiction
COMING SOON…
Genre: Crime Mystery
COMING SOON…
Genre: Urban Fiction
COMING SOON…
Genre: Crime Mystery
COMING SOON…
Genre: Crime Mystery
BONUS CHAPTER
Heavy rain poured on the roof of the gas station. Bolts of lightning lit up the night sky. Small beams of light shine into the abandoned business. Suddenly, the front door swung open and in walked two men, that wanted to escape the storm.
“I’m fuckin’ soaked,” one of the men announced as he shook off his soaked jacket. He was a heavy-set guy with a thick beard and a balding head. He was the typical hunting type that was draped in camo gear from head to toe. A hunting rifle was slung over his back. “Let’s see what we can find in here.”
“It probably won’t be much. This place looks a mess.”
His partner was almost as big as him, carrying around a little over 260 pounds on his six-foot frame. Their steps were heavy as they entered the store, checking their surroundings. Even though they were not in the woods on the hunt for deer or wild boar, their instincts never allowed them to put their guard down. The utilized small flashlight to illuminate the dark building. They were on a mission to find fuel and supplies.
“There has to be a way to cut on the gas out there.”
“Cut on the gas? There’s a tanker on top of the pumps. Even if we can turn the gas on, how the hell are we going to get to the pumps?”
“We’ll find a way. If that doesn’t work, we’ll just see what we can get out of the tanker. Either way, we are going to leave here with something.”
“I wish the keys were in the tanker. We could just bring the whole thing back to those idiots, and they’d be forced to give us all the food and guns they have stocked up in exchange for the fuel.”
“I can’t believe we drove all the way up here, from South Philly for this bullshit. Why the hell did they need us to come to the Northeast anyway? We could have gone over to Southwest or even downtown to get fuel.”
“Hell no. Going over to Southwest would have been a suicide mission. I heard that the people over there will kill you on the spot. They don’t let anyone go into that part of the city.”
“That’s every part of the city these days.”
“Not up here. It seems to be nice and safe up these parts. We have yet to see another soul out here.”
“Whatever. Let’s just get what we need and get out of here.”
“Go check the back for some more gas cans, and I’ll see if I can work my magic behind the counter and get the pumps turned on.”
The large man walked toward the counter as his partner headed to the back. “What the hell is this?” he asked himself, spotting the tarp that was spread across the counter. He immediately noticed what appeared to be hair and blood on the tarp. “Hey, Jimmy. There’s something weird out here,” he yelled.
“What is it?” his partner responded from a distance.
The man picked up a chunk of the hair that was covered in blood and examined it. “I think it’s blood.”
“What’s weird about that?” The voice seemed to be getting further into the back office. Loud crashes of items hitting the floor could also be heard as the man continued his search for gas cans.
“The blood isn’t red, it's black.” He continued examining the hair, trying to piece it all together in his head. In all of his years of hunting, he had not seen an animal that had black blood. On top of that, the hair seemed to be human hair. “Ain’t that a little weird, Jimmy?” he yelled out. He put the hair back on the tarp and walked behind the counter, looking for the control panel to activate the gas pumps. The gas station's interior had a rancid odor coming from it, which made the man frown his face. The odor fell somewhere in between rotten food and a decaying corpse. Behind the counter, the smell seemed to become more pungent. The register screens behind the counter were all deactivated. There was no power to the building, so another obstacle was placed in front of the men, making it more challenging to complete their mission.
Besides the inability to power to control modules, the smell was still getting to him. He looked down and found the source of the horrible odor. A puddle of black blood had pooled behind the counter, from the tarp. Black blood was still on his fingers, which he raised to his nose. The man took one whiff and stepped back. He quickly wiped his fingers on his pants after confirming the horrid smell was coming from the blood. “Jimmy, this blood smells like shit.” He continued wiping off his fingers. “Jimmy?!” He yelled out his partner’s name again after no response. “Jimmy, you okay?”
The man slowly walked over toward the door to the back office. There was still silence coming from the area. It was odd. A few minutes prior, Jimmy was just back there making all the noise in the world, and now there was nothing.
“Jimmy, you back there?”
Still, with no response, he became concerned. The rain picked up and viciously beat on the roof of the gas station. The strong winds blew off the broken signs that dangled in the front parking lot. He grabbed his rifle from the sling and aimed it into the darkness. “Jimmy, you got five seconds to let me know that you’re okay or I’m going to start shooting.” He took another step forward and rested his finger on the trigger. “Five..four…three…two…o – “
Just as he began pressing on the trigger, an empty can rolled toward him. More movement came from the darkness, followed up a low groan. “Jimmy, is that you?”
The man spotted the feet first as Jimmy emerged from the back room. He continued groaning and had his right hand pressed against the side of his neck. “What the hell is wrong with you?” the man asked as he watched Jimmy stumble into one of the shelves.
“Help me,” Jimmy whispered, barely able to get the words out. His head bounced off the hard surface as he passed out and struck the floor.
“Jimmy, get up.” His partner kneeled and rolled Jimmy over. His mouth dropped when he spotted a deep bite mark on the side of Jimmy’s neck. The wound was deep, but it was something else that shocked the man. It was the blood that dripped from the wound. The blood was black. He raised his rifle and aimed it into the back room. Whatever attacked Jimmy is still back there, he thought. The growl that came from the room confirmed his thought.
A face slowly emerged from the darkness of the back room. The hefty man turned pale and began shaking. He fired a shot from his hunting rifle, but the creature swiftly dipped back into the darkness. The man blindly fired a flurry of shots, not knowing if his first shot had struck the creature. “I gotta get the fuck out of here,” he mumbled under his breath before grabbing Jimmy by the collar and pulling him toward the door.
Another growl came from the back room. The man let go of his grip on Jimmy’s collar and lifted his rifle. Another shot exited the long gun. “Come on out, motherfucker. I’m going to blow your brains out,” he yelled, sending another shot into the dark abyss.
A deep growl caught the man’s attention. However, the growl came from behind him and not from the back room. The man slowly turned around. His eyes locked onto Jimmy, who was now standing and blocking the front doorway. Black blood still dripped from the bite wound. Jimmy’s eyes began turning colors. The whites of his eyes had now turned black. “Jimmy, you okay?”
Jimmy continued growling. The man looked at his friend, who was mutating right before his eyes. He never saw anything like this. He hunted the original beasts when the mutations first occurred, but this was a completely different experience. “Jimmy, don’t let this shit take over your mind. If you’re still in there, fight it
.”
The man’s pleas fell on deaf ears. Jimmy growled at him and began advancing. The man raised his hunting rifle and took a shot, quickly dropping the mutation. Just as quickly as the fear set in, it was gone. Once again, his instincts took over, allowing him to pull the trigger on the only man he ever trusted. “Rest well, my friend,” he whispered before stepping over the body and making a run for the older model Dodge 2500 that was parked in front of the gas station.
The rain seemed to be coming down even harder. He jumped into the truck and placed the rifle on the passenger seat. “Fuck,” he blurted out, remembering that Jimmy was the one that drove to the gas station. Pulling down the sun visor and opening the center console, the man searched for the keys to the truck. He looked over at the gas station, but the beating rain made it difficult to see. The keys are probably in his fuckin pockets. “Damn you, Jimmy.”
The driver’s door of the truck opened, and the occupant stepped out into a puddle. He darted back into the store and headed straight to Jimmy. These keys have to be in here, he thought, as he dug through each of Jimmy’s pants pockets. As he was looking through the pockets, the pungent odor returned. This time, the odor was more robust than before.
A growl traveled in his ears. It was a familiar sound. It was the same growl that came from the creature in the darkness. A thick, black liquid began to drip onto Jimmy’s pants. He still could not locate the keys but looked up once he spotted the thick liquid running down Jimmy’s pants. He gradually lifted his head as the warm and smelly air hit his face. He was now staring into the eyes of the creature from the darkness. Once a disabled young man named Tyler was now a hideous creature that was thirsty for blood.