The FREE Digital Gift Box - Short Stories

by J. Thorn

  Before he could do that, the fire erupted and both Lilith and Beatrice stepped back. It blinded Ruford for a moment, and when he looked again, Prudence stood next to her sisters, finished with the god-forsaken self-fornication. Benson sighed, removing his hand from the limp member inside of his pants. He turned and picked up his gun, his head cloudy and distraught. Ruford hoped he could remember how to get back to the orchard and how to forget everything he just saw.

  ***

  “Did he leave?” Beatrice asked.

  “Yes,” replied Prudence. “He will have trouble finding his way home. Would serve him right to meet a coyote on the way.”

  “You didn’t stop,” said Lilith.

  “Once the ritual begins, you cannot stop. That man was not worth forsaking what had to be done.”

  “For you? For John?” Beatrice asked.

  “For all of us, dear sister. It is John, for me, tonight. It shall be another for you two when the time comes.”

  “Is it done?” Lilith asked her oldest sister.

  “It is,” she replied. “The daughter of John Jackson will be dead before the rooster crows. And then he will be in my snare.”

  ***

  “Floyd Williams,” said Constable Allen Jackson. “This be the law. Constable Jackson. Open the door.”

  “Go away,” said a man’s voice from inside the house.

  Jackson stepped back from the door and looked in both directions. The wind stirred the tall growth on the property, and it massaged the side of the Williams’ place like thin tentacles. The air teased him with the lure of autumn although the late summer humidity was not gone completely. Jackson put a hand on his revolver and another on his hat.

  “Ain’t gonna ask again, Floyd. Gotta serve papers to your wife. She’s under investigation for the death of Sarah Jackson. That’s my cousin’s baby girl, Floyd, case you didn’t make the connection.”

  The house remained silent until thumping came from behind the left window. Jackson caught a glance of shapes moving within but could not make out the identity of the people behind the filthy glass.

  “We ain’t got nothing to do with that,” came the voice from inside. “Step off my property, Allen.”

  “Got to serve these papers to your wife, Floyd. Meredith needs to answer some questions.”

  The house fell silent again, and Allen drew the gun from his holster. The clouds thickened and he could feel a thunderstorm forming over the Blue Mountains. Jackson turned to face Pine Valley and immediately regretted it. The bullets burst through the door as the armed defenders within the house fired into it. Allen leapt off the side of the porch and crashed into the unkempt hedges bordering the east side of the house. A jolt of pain shot through his collarbone and the sound of gunfire masked his scream. Gun smoke drifted across the porch and with it came another call from inside the house, this one sounding clear and determined, as if Floyd was standing in the doorway.

  “You step on my property again, I’ll shoot ya, Johnny Law or not. You ain’t got no right coming here on a witch hunt.”

  Constable Jackson crawled from the brush. He slid his gun into the holster and used his right arm to hold the left, which felt numb.

  “Gonna take it to the judge, Floyd.”

  “Take it all the way to God Almighty, Allen. Don’t make no difference to me.”

  ***

  When Constable Jackson returned that night with arrest warrants for the entire Williams family, he brought a posse with him. Judge Thornton wanted the family apprehended, and Jackson’s cousin was clamoring for justice. He brought his deputies to the house, where they came up the walk with torches lit and eyes open, ready to return Floyd’s gunfire.

  “Floyd Williams. I have an arrest warrant signed by Judge Joseph Thornton for the arrest of your entire family in conjunction with the death of Sarah Jackson. If you do not surrender peacefully, me and my deputies will be coming through your door.”

  The men stood behind Jackson, waiting for his command. Twilight brought an orange glow to the house, and the dirty windows looked like the black eyes to its soul. The wind stopped blowing, and not a single light could be seen coming from within.

  “They ain’t in there,” said one of the deputies.

  “We don’t know that,” replied Jackson.

  “They knew you was coming back, sir. They done took off.”

  Allen stood holding the torch with his sore arm. He had his gun in hand and looked about the property. He saw no evidence of any of the family and thought that maybe Floyd would flee in order to save his wife and kids.

  “Gotta do our diligence,” he replied. “Got to follow the law.”

  Jackson motioned for the posse to follow him up the front steps and to the door. He looked at the bullet holes from their earlier confrontation and saw nothing but darkness inside them. His heart raced and he instinctively stepped to the side of the door. Allen put his torch up to the house and moved it around. The flames cast flickering shadows on the shutters but did not reveal a presence inside it.

  “Floyd!”

  Silence filled the void after the Constable yelled the man’s name. Jackson nodded and two burly men stepped up to the door. They handed their torches to him and faced each other with a shoulder leaning on the door.

  “One, two, three.”

  The men threw their bodies into the door, shattering the wood into dozens of pieces. They stumbled inside with the posse coming in next. Jackson stepped through the threshold and felt queasy in his stomach, which he attributed to the injury he sustained earlier in the day. He pushed his torch through the heavy, air seeing nothing but ratty furniture and dust motes. The house smelled of onions and body odor, neither stench enough to overpower the other.

  “Floyd!” Jackson screamed again.

  The posse pushed past Allen and moved through the house. He heard their boots going from room to room on the second floor while the other half spread out through the first floor. Jackson stood in the main living room alone, his skin crawling and a sweat breaking out on his forehead. He turned to look at the wall, and for a moment, felt as if eyes behind it were watching him. He laughed and shook his head at the ridiculous thought when the men reconvened behind him.

  “Gone.”

  “You searched the whole place?” Constable Jackson asked. He scratched at the badge pinned to his vest.

  “Yes, sir. Ain’t nobody in here.”

  Jackson looked around again. It appeared as though the family left to do errands. He saw no evidence of them packing up or fleeing. When he turned to face the men, the bottom fell from his stomach.

  Some men of his men were sitting on the floor, rocking back and forth while mumbling. Others stood in place as if their feet were nailed to the floor. Their eyes rolled back into their head as they stared blankly at the Constable. Jackson heard whispers and did not want to believe his ears; they were coming from inside the walls.

  Allen walked over and put his hand on the peeling wallpaper. It felt warmer than a wall should feel. Jackson waited as the whispers increased in intensity. He turned his head sideways and put his ear to the wall to try to hear what was being said. The hand came through the plaster so fast that Allen didn’t have time to flinch. It was white with long, slender fingers, and it wrapped around the back of Allen’s head and pulled him closer. Jackson wanted to cry out but his mouth was firm against the wall and he could not open his jaw far enough to yell. He took a step backward with his head fixed to the wall by the hand that came out of it. He reached up with his good arm and tried loosening the grip. The arm felt slimy, cold, and the whispering intensified into what felt like a thousand voices inside of his head. He heard confusion and chaos in the room, but could not turn to see what his posse was doing or what was being done to them.

  In a moment of lucidity, Constable Jackson used his feet to push against the wall and free his head from the phantom arm. He stumbled backwards and fell on to his rear end, still facing the wall. He blinked and shook the plaster from his
mouth, and when he looked up again, the wall appeared as it had minutes earlier, unbroken and whole. He spun around and swallowed hard. The room was empty and he did not see the flicker of torches anywhere within the house.

  Constable Jackson got to his feet and stumbled outside where four men stood in a circle at the bottom of the steps.

  “We ain’t goin’ back in there, Constable.”

  “I know,” Jackson said. “Where’s the rest?”

  “They gone. Ain’t nobody wantin’ to deal with Floyd and his devils. They went home to play cards and drink some ‘shine.”

  Jackson was almost tempted to do the same until he remembered the grief on his cousin’s face. The Constable couldn’t prove it yet, but he knew Floyd and his damned family had a hand in baby Sarah’s death.

  “Let’s check the grounds.”

  “You mean the crypt, don’t you?” the one man asked.

  “I guess I do, deputy. Due diligence and whatnot.”

  The foggy hue cast from the Blue Ridge Mountains settled upon the ground, mist curling at the ankles of the men as they walked past the final resting place of some of the Confederacy’s bravest men. Most of the names on the grave markers were familiar, reminders of mortality from the recent past. They walked in silence through the cemetery and toward the crypt in the middle. Allen felt their pace lessen the closer they came to the stone monument.

  Jackson was the first to enter the crypt. He threw his shoulder into the bronze door until it opened enough to let the candle from inside light his face. With the members of his posse, Jackson stepped into the crypt and saw something that would have him mumbling for decades inside the Western State Lunatic Asylum.

  Constable Jackson waited for the dust to settle and the coughing fit to pass. The air inside the crypt felt as ancient as it looked in the light cast from the torches. His deputy came up on the left and the remaining men waited at the threshold, unable to fit and not incredibly upset about it.

  Floyd Williams sat upon a stone sarcophagus in the middle of the crypt. His wife, Meredith, sat completely naked in front of him. Her hair was down and loose, and she stared right through Jackson. Floyd’s son and three daughters were laid out in a row across the cold stone, unmoving and with a noose around each of their necks.

  “We got a warrant for your arrest, Floyd. You and Meredith. Gonna give you five seconds to come out of this here crypt, or I’m gonna have to use force,” said Allen.

  His deputy had stepped around and reached to examine the Williams children when Meredith shot across the open space and sunk her teeth deep into the man’s neck. Constable Jackson stood in abject horror as the woman tore through his skin and ruptured the jugular vein, sending a spray of warm, dark blood into the air and splattering onto the floor of the crypt. Jackson tried to raise his hand but it would not obey the command from his brain. He struggled and pushed and yet no amount of force would raise his arm. Floyd sat still, smiling at Jackson.

  “Stop!” the Constable shouted. “You’re killing him!”

  Meredith kneeled over the deputy, who was lying on his back. His feet kicked out twice and then fell still. She looked up at Allen, her wide grin smothered in blood that looked black as oil in the darkness. Her eyes shone and her tongue flicked at the liquid dripping from her lips.

  “You should leave here now before my wife’s appetites rear up again.”

  Jackson felt the grip on his body loosen. He was able to move again and he considered attacking Meredith and pulling her off of the deputy, but he knew he couldn’t save him.

  “What in the name of the devil are you messing with, Floyd? Did you kill your children?”

  “Take him into the graveyard and leave a message for the mob, one part on each corner of the fence.”

  Meredith stood, obeying her husband’s command and grabbing the dead deputy by his ankles. She dragged him past the other members of the posse, who gave her a wide berth. Allen stood still as Floyd slid forward on the sarcophagus.

  “You done messin’ with things of which you know nuthin’ about, partner? I suggest you take your boys and get the hell off my property.”

  Constable Jackson mumbled as his eyes looked down at the trail of blood leading out of the crypt. The children had not moved, and the pasty hue of their skin left no doubt as to whether they were alive or dead.

  “The devil got you tight, Floyd. I know you and I ain’t seen eye to eye on everything, but this is damnation and you know it.”

  Floyd stood and walked to Jackson. He sniffed the air and shook his head at the smell of perspiration, tobacco, and fear.

  “Seen the Gaki yet?” Floyd asked.

  “Who’s Gaki?” Jackson replied with a question of his own.

  “Preta. The Hungry Ghost. You seen him yet?”

  “So this is about a haunting? I believe we can get the reverend up from Pine Valley to help you, Floyd. But you gotta stop this now before more people die.”

  “He’s coming, Allen. I can feel that slimy bastard coming through the darkness from the fires of hell. When he gits here, you’re gonna wanna be gone.”

  Constable Jackson shook his head, trying to make sense of the situation. He heard screams from the graveyard that sounded masculine. He thought of the look on Meredith’s face and shivered.

  “I’m the law. I can help.”

  “No, you can’t. Take your posse and scat. I got to have the Portal ready when he comes back and if you’re here, well, he’s gonna want to use you too.”

  He saw a change coming over Floyd’s face. Allen pissed himself and the warm urine ran down his leg and mixed with the deputy’s blood. Williams cried out as his limbs extended and his skin turned bluish gray.

  “Get out!” said Floyd. The beast was stealing Floyd’s body.

  Jackson turned and ran and he felt a thundering beneath his feet as if a herd of horses were on the way. He looked out into the empty graveyard and saw no sign of Meredith or his posse. He ran toward the gate as a red light burst from the doorway of the crypt followed by a painful, thin scream. Constable Jackson passed through the fence and came face-to-face with his deputy, the decapitated head sitting atop the post and looking back with lifeless eyes.

  ***

  Gaki held his hands up in front of his face and then turned to look at the bodies of the dead children upon the floor of the crypt. He shook his head and looked back at the wall, hoping to see a crack in the stone where the Portal might be forcing its way through. The crypt was nothing but darkness and death.

  “More time wasted,” he said, shaking Floyd’s head back and forth. “The Portal will not open yet.”

  Gaki walked through the crypt and out of the door, disappearing into the orchards behind the Williams’ place and into another universe, leaving the crypt for a time when it would be ready to open and spill the hidden evil into this sick, wretched place.

  Before the Realm: Coda

  Okinawa 1945

  The soldier came through the cave with his rifle raised and crosshairs lined up. The battle for the Pacific raged in the distance as the Allied soldiers scattered across the island of Okinawa, bringing the Typhoon of Steel.

  “What the hell are you?” he asked. The end of the rifle shook in his hands.

  The thing moaned and threw the contents of one hand against the wall of the cave. The shit splattered and oozed toward the ground.

  “Gaki,” it replied.

  “What the fuck is a Gaki?” the soldier asked.

  The creature turned to face him. It sat perched on a rock and drew a long, slender finger from its mouth. It looked at the feces of the dead men and back to the soldier. The demon crouched low like a junkyard dog.

  “From Preta, the departed,” it said.

  “Yep, no doubt. Operation Downfall is gonna make quite a few ‘departed’, eh?”

  The demon remained still, staring into the man’s eyes.

  “It is in you already. I can feel it.”

  “Really?” the soldier asked, laughing. �
��You know what’s in me now? I think I should just fill ya with lead.”

  Gaki nodded, the smile spreading across his filthy face. A low, hoarse chuckle escaped from his tight mouth. Explosions shook the cave and the sound of machine-gun fire drew near.

  “Feed me,” said Gaki. “Sustain the greed.”

  Drew Green’s grandfather nodded before grabbing his weapon and walking back out into the hell of war, taking the hidden evil with him.

  ###

  Killer (A Dystopian Short Story from the World of Hugh Howey's Half Way Home)

  Second Edition

  Copyright © 2015 by J. Thorn

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, places, and dialogue are drawn from the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Edited by:

  Laurie Love

  Rebecca T. Dickson

  For more information:

  http://www.jthorn.net

  jthorn.writer@gmail.com

  Thanks to Hugh Howey for graciously allowing me to commit murder in his world.

  Click here to get Half Way Home by Hugh Howey.

  I am destruction, lord of chaos. I have slaughtered thousands of worlds, my existence proof that darkness prevails. Love is weak. Hate hardens like a cancer, consuming the host, killing it.

  I cut a man’s throat while he slept, set fire to a tray full of DNA, sent a lethal dose of electricity through a woman’s skull. I suffocated a family with toxic gas. I killed in every way you can imagine, spread my tainted seed in the natural act of human intercourse, both forced and consensual. My code has been transmitted through thousands of strands of DNA now replicating exponentially throughout the cosmos, into both the known realms and the darkest corners of the universe.