Night as a Catalyst: A Horror Anthology

by Chad Lutzke

  I reached in my pocket and grabbed the extra set of padlock keys my dad kept in the junk drawer. I carefully unlocked each shackle, let them drop, and hurried to the front of Grandpa to grab the pole again. He charged at me with both hands together, but I pushed forward, keeping the pole between us as leverage. I thought the hard part would be over once I managed to unlock him, but I felt dangerously vulnerable with only a thin metal pole stopping me from joining Grandpa in this mattress-padded cell.

  I led the way to the ladder steps. I hadn’t thought this part through. I didn’t know if Grandpa was actually coordinated enough to walk down the attic steps. I stepped down onto the ladder and made it about four steps before Grandpa carelessly stepped forward, diving head first down the steps. It happened so fast, I could never explain to you exactly what happened, except that I somehow managed to jump down and out of the way before he was able to land on top of me. In the process, I had let go of the pole. Fortunately, the fall had caused some slight disorientation for Grandpa, and I was able to grab the pole faster than he could stand back up. The fall had also caused an eruption of a new pungent odor stronger than before. As Grandpa stood up, the source was revealed. A few of his ribs now jutted out from his side and through his shirt, causing direct visualization for the reason behind his bloated gut. I choked back vomit and tried to breathe out my mouth so I couldn’t smell the stench.

  Continuing to push against Grandpa with the pole, I slowly backed up through the hallway, living room, and to the front door. It was just minutes before the sun would completely set but dark enough to where I felt nobody could see me outside. I opened the front door with one hand and continued to guide Grandpa. Once outside, his focus was no longer on me but that of the sky, the distance. I carefully looked around to find no one. Everyone was safely tucked in for the night.

  I led Grandpa out into the street and stopped. I let my open backpack slide off me and reached down with one hand and grabbed the large steak from inside. Grandpa looked at it and broke free from the ties. His arms reached outward desperately in an attempt to reach the meat. I let the steak fall on the street and released the rope, letting it slide back through the pole. Grandpa was now free from any restraint. He looked at me and then at the steak. I backed away and watched. The look in his eyes wasn't so much remembrance but cognition. As though he knew which meat was off limits.

  With some reservation, he approached the steak, picked it up, and began to gnaw on it. I watched as he so primitively devoured it; his gums somehow breaking through the meat. I could see his esophagus move as he added each bite to the collection of rot he had within him. I walked swiftly to my house as he neared the end of his meal. Once inside, I shut the door and turned off the light. I watched him alone in the street, ravaging the raw meat with his toothless face.

  Once done with his last meal from me, my grandpa turned toward the house and stared. Was he looking for me? He looked at a few of the other houses as though he was indeed searching. My heart raced, and for what seemed like hours he stood searching intently until finally he turned and headed slowly down the street away from my house.

  I turned and walked to my bedroom. The hallway mirror caught my attention, but I couldn’t bear to entertain it with even a glance. I hated myself for what I was doing. Had it been the right thing to do? I knew it would be a shock to my parents, but I was convinced they would experience a bittersweet relief. I headed to my room and began picking my clothes up off the floor. Every movement took more effort than it should have.

  Before long, in the distance, I could hear the wailing of the city's emergency alarm. The town had started to grow accustomed to it, but it had been a record month since it alerted the living. I walked over to my window. The view overlooked the road I sent my grandpa on. Blocks ahead, I could see Grandpa's silhouette in the middle of the road, his shadow stretching behind him as he approached the glow of a streetlight. I watched as several vehicles entered my view and quickly formed a crooked wall in front of him. Red lights bounced off the surrounding houses. I turned away and slid my back down the wall until I collapsed into a slouch on the floor. I covered my ears but could still hear the first shot, then the next, until I lost count.

  Notes on One for the Road:

  This was my "what-if-Anne-Frank-were-a-zombie-instead" story. It was the first story I'd written after about a 17-year hiatus from writing fiction. It was also the first piece that would see publication. It was published in Shadows & Light #3 in the summer of 2014. And as I retained the rights to the story, I released it as a single short story months later on Amazon in the form of an ebook, which brought great reviews from those who read it. But originally, the last thing I wanted to do was write a zombie story. It's very against my character to be part of any type of bandwagon, but I couldn't get the idea to go away, so I wrote what I thought would be a unique take on something that's been done to death (no pun intended). Ironically, the type of attic that is in the story is fairly uncommon and I had only seen one once before. It happened to be at my grandfather's house. Less than one year later I would move into a house that had the same type of attic.

  Peepshow

  “This one is waking, commander.”

  I’m floating. In some form of liquid. Or maybe a thick gas. Is that a tube running from my nose? I can’t move my eyes down far enough to see. My legs.. I can’t move them. My arms feel like they aren’t there, yet I can see them in my periphery. My eyes. They seem to be the only thing I can move.

  I have to be dreaming. Wake up! Wake up, John! Why can’t I move? Why is my vision blurred? The gas liquid? Wait..no. The light. I remember the light in the woods. We left camp and went to explore. We found nothing and then…And then I saw Michelle and Jerry disappear, as though the light had stolen them.

  “Sir, I believe it is entering the recall stage.”

  The light. It shot through me like a rainfall of needles. I must have passed out. Am I in a hospital? Where’s my wife? Anna! Anna, where are you? I can hear nothing. I don’t think I’m screaming. My mouth isn’t moving. Can anyone hear me?

  “Warm the gelatin and infuse the subject with the solvent at 0.70 rushes per beat. It is panicking. We need its pulse to remain stable.”

  I feel a pressure in my veins. My vision, it’s cleared. This is no hospital. A lab?

  “Raise the dissection table within his view.”

  Something is moving. I can see a platform coming up from the ground. There is a body. Jerry? He is naked! Is this a morgue? Am I dead? Jerry, can you hear me? It’s John!

  “Begin stage 1.”

  Who are these people? Their heads…what is wrong with them? These aren’t human. They can’t be. What are they doing to Jerry? Please wake up! They are cutting him….cutting his face.

  “Remove the identity.”

  They are peeling his face! My eyes…I can’t close my eyes! They’ve taken his face. Why are they doing this?

  “Begin stage 2. Remove the cranium and prepare for reflex commands.”

  You freaks! Let me close my eyes! Stop!

  “Penetrate the temporal lobe and drain the fluid into subject A’s gelatin. Let it consider its companion’s sensory memory.”

  “The subject’s panic level has raised, commander.”

  “Increase the solvent to 0.80 rushes. We need it to observe this—to understand.”

  This can’t be happening. Anna! Where’s my Anna!

  “It is still not understanding, sir. The humans lack comprehension. Its current thoughts are reflecting ignorance. I’m afraid we’ll need to dissect that one as well.”

  “That is unfortunate. Bring in the subject’s mate and prepare her eyes for mandatory witnessing. Perhaps the female will fathom our cause.”

  “Do not be discouraged, sir. There will be a day when they comprehend.”

  Notes on Peepshow

  I was brushing my teeth one day and wanted to come up with something very quick and very short. The idea just came. No real interesting trivia behind it.
Things just flowed together, and I ran to my computer and typed out some notes. I had a lot of fun making up bogus terminology for the aliens.

  Chow

  “Oh yes, boys. You’re gonna feast tonight!” Edward Slidmer said as he set the poison-filled bread on the cement floor. Halfway up the stairs, Edward reached for the string that would turn off the light. He hesitated and turned, facing back toward the large basement.

  “Bon appetite!”

  Out with the light, and with a grin emerging from his tight lips, he headed back upstairs.

  Edward Slidmer was greasy. Not dirty greasy, but lowlife greasy—greedy, selfish, arrogant greasy. He had perfected the talent of making all those around despise him. There were no friends, no women, and no pets. Edward was alone, and alone he would stay. He would have it no other way.

  His days were spent collecting rent on his properties—rodent-infested and run-down apartments throughout the city, most of which would be condemned had they been reported. But the type of residents Edward attracted were normally too wrapped up with their own demons to bother with tattling of any sort, especially if that included some form of authority getting involved; except for sweet, middle-aged Mrs. Martin, who, unfortunately for her, shared a duplex with the slumlord.

  The two apartments were adjoined by the basement, with two sets of stairs leading to either side. Most of the basement was empty, save for some old doors, storm windows, and a handful of boxes that belonged to Mrs. Martin—a few of which were filled with paperback books and some photo albums from when she was younger—from better years.

  Unlike most of Edward’s renters, Mrs. Martin was squeaky clean. The only monkey on her back was her abusive husband, whom she’d picked up and ran from—her and her son acting as their own witness protection. Being sucked into the likes of Edward Slidmer’s acquaintance wasn’t by choice. A low-paying waitress job didn’t offer a single mother in hiding much in the way of any choices, so the apartment would have to do for now.

  Edward’s apartment was a five-star motel in contrast with his tenant’s. His plumbing, heat, and electricity were new and guaranteed to function as they should. He slept soundly on cold nights with every room filled with the warm comfort that his tenants longed for. However, his building wasn’t without its own problems. Within the past few winter months, as it grew colder, city rats took up residence and left traces of their existence throughout the house. To say that Edward had become obsessed with ridding his apartment of the vermin would be understating the fact. It had changed him completely. Nights void of sleep and days spent dreaming of the various ways each one could be tortured and ultimately executed, concocting plans—rough drafts of blueprints even—of ways to free his home of them.

  Traps that promised to work, didn’t. The poison pellets had failed to do their job as well. He’d even sat patiently with an old shoebox propped up with a pencil and a string attached ready to incarcerate any unsuspecting rat that may pop in to take the cheese used as bait; the childishness of the attempt never once crossing his determined mind.

  Edward shut the basement door and walked through the dish-riddled kitchen. He proceeded to take care of the ingredients that had made up the formula of his own special rat poison. Drano, Ajax, window cleaner, and ammonia cluttered the counter with the caps off and lying next to them like unworn helmets from an army of assassins. Edward’s comprehension of what would and would not work was clouded from lack of sleep. He and his sanity were no longer well acquainted.

  He capped the bottles and put them away, as daydreams of the rats eating the day-old bread filled his mind—their bodies writhing on the basement floor with bulging eyes as though something inside forced them out. In Edward’s mind, the rats spewed blood and bile as a result of his ridiculous poison. His daydreams were always filled with blood. Rat blood.

  The ringing phone pulled him from his fantasy.

  “Hello?!”

  “Hello Mr. Slidmer. This is Mrs. Martin. I was wondering if you could please come take a look

  at our toilet. It doesn’t seem to be working correctly. It doesn’t want to flush. I…I realize that you’re a busy man, Mr. Slidmer, but I…”

  “Mrs. Who?”

  “Mrs. Martin, from next door. I was just wonder…”

  “Mrs. Martin, who uses that toilet?”

  “Why, my son and I, Mr. Slidmer.”

  “That’s right, Mrs. Martin. Your son and you. Now, Mrs. Martin, have you ever seen me come over and use your toilet?”

  “No, I…”

  “No, Mrs. Martin. You have not. Now do you think it would be possible for me to plug up your toilet if I’d never used it?”

  “Mr. Sli…”

  “No! It would not be possible for me to do so, and I can tell you another thing, Mrs. Martin. That toilet did not lose its ability to flush by itself. Either you or your delinquent son in some way misused the thing. Who knows what you or that kid crammed down it.”

  An uncomfortable silence filled the space between his sentences.

  “A bit of advice, Mrs. Martin. Get yourself a plunger and learn to use it!”

  And with that, he slammed the old phone on the receiver. He didn’t care if she’d finished. He was finished. There were more important things to attend to. She needed to understand that he was hard at work ridding their building of the hairy little demons.

  Only ten minutes had passed since he’d placed the reeking bread on the basement floor, but he’d grown anxious and couldn’t resist taking a peek. He told himself it just had to work, that his plan was clever and innovative. With every step toward the basement door came a flashed vision of dead rat covered in blood. He added foam around their gaping maws for even more satisfaction.

  He opened the door and headed down the stairs, pausing momentarily to pull the light’s string. He turned left after taking the last step down and walked toward the bread, which laid untouched back between the furnace and a row of old storm windows.

  Edward’s fist clenched tightly as he thought of all his hard work these past several weeks, desperately trying to rid his home of the vile beasts. The grip of sanity loosened all the more as he thought of the scuffling feet at 3:00 a.m., the large brown pellets left in the kitchen cupboards where he kept his food.

  He stood there in the basement with his eyes closed and took deep breaths, exhaling slowly. He talked to himself about patience and the eventual reward of sweet revenge. His tensed muscles eased into a state of relaxation, as he thought more of their spilled blood.

  He stood staring at the bread when the phone rang. He walked up the stairs slowly and pulled the light on his way. He was in no hurry to answer the phone, and after seven rings it stopped.

  He shut the basement door and noted the kitchen cupboards. Gnaw marks decorated the edges of them. They hadn’t been there the day before. The marks were new. The sight fueled Edward’s rage and threatened to kill the calmness he had achieved in the basement. Edward needed an escape, a distraction. Perhaps a walk would help clear his head. He looked to the window. Seeing the white lawn reminded him how bitter cold it was outside. Going out in this weather would only feed his agitation. He would have to find other ways to escape.

  He went to the living room and grabbed the TV remote before sitting on the couch. Five minutes went by with Edward flipping through the channels. He was limited to four of them, all of which seemed to be airing either soap operas or talk shows—all hosted by women. Women and their gossip and infidelities. They were a special kind of rat, he thought.

  Edward turned off the television. A nap would pass some hours and help him to relax. He lay down on the couch and propped a pillow under his head. Only minutes went by before he lifted his head, swearing he’d heard them already—heard their dirty little feet scurrying around his house. He couldn’t tell where, but he heard them. He thought of the bread in the basement and fought the urge to go check on it. He must be patient. It wouldn’t pay now to head down and scare them off.

  The phone ra
ng again. Edward cussed, pounded his fist into the couch, and stormed toward the phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Hello, Mr. Slidmer. This is Mrs. Martin. I’m very sorry to bother you again, but I wanted to tell you that I left the…”

  “Mrs. Martin, listen to me. I am a very busy man at the moment and would appreciate it very much if you would take your problems or your gossip or whatever it is you feel is so important, and either save it for another time or simply call someone else!”