“Later that night when I killed my parents, I could feel their souls rise from their decapitated bodies as they lay atop those blood-stained sheets. Their essence filled the air all around me, swirling in the stench of their own rot. Theirs were the first of the many that I would reap, my part of the redemption of my life.”
“You’re a monster,” Scott gasped.
Jeremy’s body suddenly floated back into the air in the center of the grove, the arms and legs floundering. The body jerked back to life, the shadowed form of the creature that had once been his friend Matt slipping back into the darkened refuge that the trees provided.
“You call me a monster!” the voice boomed from all around him, tearing a hole in the night. “I had come to offer you help, but you reject me in such a way!”
The body spun in circles in the air, the lifeless arms flopping in the air as they whirled like helicopter blades. There was a gut-wrenching tearing sound as the body ripped straight down the center, droplets of blood flying in all directions. The body was rendered in two, the innards filling the air as they sloshed to the snow-covered earth. Emptied, the flapping shell was flung into the night, the flesh draping from the branches of the trees. What little fluid still clung to the lifeless sheath drained in small drops atop the whitened ground.
“See you real soon,” the voice boomed from the darkness as the outline of the form faded into the shadows.
Scott fell to his knees, burying his face in his hands. He fought to keep the stench of his friend’s insides from overwhelming his senses. Small splatters of the rapidly cooling blood that was not his own ran down his bare, chapped face as the last of the rustling sounds of the monster slipping through the tightly wrought forest faded into the hum of the wind, the rattling of the needles.
Slowly, Scott opened his eyes, rolling onto all four. His stinging, bright red knuckles burned in the ice-cold snow as he crawled forward, staring down at the red patterns that decorated the even white surface. Churning, his stomach turned over in his sour belly, the vomit rising to the back of his throat before being choked back down with an audible thump. Tears crept from the corners of his eyes, arching over his cheeks as they mixed with the crimson droplets, hanging like icicles from the stubbled line of his chin.
Harry burst from the line of trees behind him, his thin shadow casting a long line across the center of the grove. Scott bolted upright, the noise startling him to the point that he was unsure if he would ever be able to slow the hammering in his chest.
“My God,” Harry whispered, surveying the blood-stained ground, his eyes recoiling in horror as they caught a brief glimpse of the lines of intestines that dangled from the branches of the pines like a Christmas garland.
Scott turned, looking over at Harry as his shoulders began to shake, the tears streaming from his eyes. He began to sob uncontrollably. Harry crossed the snow, kneeling beside him and resting his hand on Scott’s back, comforting him as he brought his other hand to his face to cover his mouth and nose.
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THE BLOODSPAWN
Michael McBride
© 2004 Michael McBride. All rights reserved.
PART ELEVEN
Part 11
Chapters 14 & 15
XIV
Tuesday, November 15th
10 a.m.
Harry peeled back the thick, hard- bound cover of the old yearbook, thumbing through the pages that were all nearly stuck together. Rifling past the freshmen, sophomores, and juniors, he settled into the senior section. All of the pictures were large and in color, unlike all of the other sections where the pictures had all been so small and in black and white. He looked over the faces one by one, until he came to page 267. There were twelve pictures to a page, three rows of four. Bringing the book closer to his face, he stared at the right hand page.
Matt Parker was the top, left picture, and the first on that particular row of four. His long hair hung over the collar of his gray and black flecked sport coat. He had an off white shirt with a blue and black marbled-looking tie. His arms were crossed across his chest, his chin tilted upwards so he appeared to be looking down at the viewer. A thin smile traced his lips, his right eye hidden behind his long bangs. He stared into the one visible eye. The page seemed to melt away behind it as a certain blackness rose from within that lone eye, resonating throughout the living room as the faint sun crept through the clouds outside, arching a thin line of light through the bay window and onto the plush carpeting. The hackles rose along his spine as he grew suddenly quite aware of how cold he was, his breath coming in short bursts.
Breaking his stare from Matt’s picture, he easily identified the one just beneath it. It was Scott Ramsey, dressed smartly in his late eighties splendor. He wore a dark suit, from the lighting it was unclear whether it was black or a navy, with a thin black tie, his chin resting on his right hand. He wore a pleasantly sincere smile that barely showed his bright white teeth, his eyes warm and charming. And compared to most of the faces he had seen so far just flipping through the book, these two should have done quite all right as far as the social scenario went.
The pipes in the walls hummed as Scott started the shower upstairs. Harry had insisted that he try to sleep, or at least lay down for a couple of hours to try to get a little shut eye, but he knew that there was no way that he was going to sleep. His face appeared to have aged close to a decade since he had met him, barely more than a day ago. His eyes, which from the start had been so filled with life that they positively sparkled, had faded to a duller hue, more akin with his own.
He knew how difficult all of this was for him to suddenly not only have to comprehend, but to have to accept on nothing more than blind faith. After all, he himself had been forced to do the same thing so very long ago, but at least he was there for Scott. Back when he had first been forced to reckon with the evil that walked the earth, he had been completely and exhaustingly alone. Not that his plight had been any more difficult than the one that Scott now fought through, but at least there was someone to talk to, someone to sympathize with him as his world turned upside down over and over again.
Turning his attention back to the book spread out across his lap, he scanned the color pictures with his eyes, watching the names for any that he might recognize. He started at the beginning of the section with the two- page spread that featured a class photo on what appeared to be bleachers outside at the stadium. Above it was a large heading in bright blue letters, outlined in white: “Class of 1990.” His eyes wandered across the tiny faces lined up along the bleachers, but he couldn’t make out either Scott or Matt.
Flipping the page, he first scanned the listing of names along the left- hand column of the page, and then perused their faces. He crossed page after page, focusing on the pictures with first names similar to those that Scott had used to identify the friends who had died at the hands of the bloodspawn. After passing a handful of Brian’s, he finally came to the picture of Brian James. As he stared at the picture, a thin line appeared to pass over the picture from the top right corner down to the bottom left. It looked like a thin line of gray like that of the lead from a pencil, but it slowly widen, separating the colors of the picture with the white from the page beneath. It looked as though someone had torn the picture diagonally without removing it from the page.
Harry looked up, staring into the still living room, the yellowing Norfolk Pine drooping terribly, the needles falling in a circle around the hand crafter pot onto the carpet. A bewildered look etching his face. He stared back into the open yearbook at the picture. Not only was the tear mark still there across the picture, but another was in the process of forming, running diagonally from the other side to form a large “x” across the picture.
Slamming the book shut, he rifled his trembling fingers through his hair, t
he book falling from his lap onto the floor. Placing his quivering hand across his mouth, the air from his nostrils whistling over his knuckles, he stared down at the book on the thick carpeting.
The incessant tick- tock from the grandfather clock in the corner filled the otherwise silent room. Dust floated in swirling clouds in the stream of light from the window, but only for a moment as the next wave of the dark front rolled over the Rockies from the west, choking back the sparse rays of sun behind the black, rolling clouds. A dull whine echoed from within the walls as the water from the shower was turned off.
Harry stared down at the cover of the book. Mustering his courage, he shifted his weight, leaning over the edge of the couch with his outstretched right arm to grab the yearbook from the floor. Right before his slowly steadying hand could grab the heavy annual, the front cover peeled back, the pages flying past before finally opening wide. It stopped of its own will on one of the pages with the color pictures, the smiling faces beaming up at the vaulted ceiling of the living room. Squinting, he tried to make out the names along the line to the left. Barely able to read more than just the capital letters at the start of the first and last names, he crawled from the couch onto the floor, careful not to so much as breath on the book.
Placing a shaky hand to either side of the book on the floor, his shuddering breath blew down on the pages as a thin line began to trace across one of the pictures, just as it had the one he had been watching a moment ago. His eyes shot to the left to read the name as the line continued to scratch right through the picture from the inside of the page.
“Williams, Tim,” he read aloud.
The first diagonal line had finished its course, the second beginning on the upper right corner of the picture. Before that line was even half way across Tim’s face, another line started in the picture directly to the right. His eyes jumped to the left, landing on the line below the one he had just read: Jeremy Willis.
The tearing continued until both pictures were etched under a thick, white “x.”
Harry had only a moment to stare at the page before it changed on its own, the pages flying past until finally coming to rest between the B’s and C’s. There were only three bodies that he knew of, one corresponding to each of the three “X’s” that the phantom had had scrawled across the pictures. Staring into the smiling lines of faces, he watched for anything at all: any movement, the beginning stroke of any of the tears across the page.
But there was nothing.
There was no movement at all. Not even a single “x.”
Starting with the page on the left, Harry’s eyes stared from one face to the next, lingering just long enough to place the face with the name to the left. All of the smiling face leered back at him from beneath the gloss of the page as he inspected them one by one. But nothing jumped out at him.
Moving on to the right page, he began to scan once again, caressing each of the faces with his gentle stare. One by one they passed, the names lining up with the faces, until…
Something on the page jumped, he caught the movement from the corner of his eye. He couldn’t see it right off, but he was sure that he had seen something on the right page. Glancing towards the bottom right side of the page, he scanned the pictures, waiting for whatever had happened to do so again. Finally, his patience was rewarded.
A tiny, almost unnoticeable flash of red caught his eye as it immediately focused in on the picture of its origin. Choosing not even to steer his gaze from the picture long enough to read the name for fear whatever was happening might stop, he stared deeply into the picture, watching as the crimson flashes started appearing with more regularity.
The picture was of a young man, fairly attractive in the grand scheme of things, but nothing incredibly out of the ordinary for that age group. Whatever color his hair had been was now replaced with a deep red, the hair matted damply to the arch of the skull. The face was different from all of the others, as the expression that haunted the face was nothing even close to the smiles that ripped across all of the others. This particular boy wore would could only be described as a grimace, his tightly stretched lips peeled back from his clenched, grinding teeth. His eyes were mere slits, his brow knit tightly below the taut skin of his forehead. Thin lines of red ran vertically down his neck, diffusing into the white color of his shirt, spreading in an oblong arc like a sweat stain across his chest beneath his black tie.
Harry’s eyes darted to the left side of the page, quickly finding the name and reading it aloud.
“Corso, Shane.”
His eyes shot back to the picture before the name had even fully rolled off the tip of his tongue, but by the time his gaze had settled onto the picture, it had returned to normal. The only red in the picture now was the two small circles in the center of each eye. The grimace had been replaced by a warm smile; the light hair combed back into place, and the white shirt almost glowing beneath the dark jacket.
Reading the name one last time, Harry closed the book with a loud clap and slid it across the floor of the room beneath the love seat across the room from him.
Footsteps pounded down the hallway upstairs as Scott appeared rounding the corner just above the staircase. Harry’s head jerked to the side as Scott could see immediately the startled look on the man’s pale face as he crouched on the ground.
“What’s going on?” Scott asked as he bounded down the stairs. His damp hair bounced slightly as he descended.
Harry just stared up at him from the floor, his jaw hanging open.
The dark blue sweatshirt featuring the old Denver Broncos logo in the center brought out his eyes from behind the thick bags that encircled them as he crossed the entryway into the living room. Thrusting his right hand into the pocket of his faded jeans, he hovered over Harry, the carpet seeping between his bare toes.
Harry just stared up at him for a moment, his brow knit tightly over his eyes, before finally he spoke.
“Do you know Shane Corso?” he asked, rising from the floor and settling back onto the couch.
“Sure,” Scott replied, bewildered. “But I haven’t seen him since high school.”
Harry stared at the dark line beneath the love seat where the yearbook had slipped beneath.
“I think we should try to get in touch with him.”
“What’s going on?”
“I was looking through that old yearbook of yours and…”
“And what?”
“And I think that he’s going to be the next to die.”
The ringing phone startled both of them as Scott looked to Harry to elaborate briefly before walking from the room and into the kitchen. He grabbed the receiver from the rechargeable stand and pressed the “talk” button.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Ramsey?” the voice on the other end asked.
“Yes.”
“This is Bob Goode with the People Network.”
“Oh, hi.”
“I just wanted to call to let you know that I have been assigned to the location that you requested.”
“Okay.”
“I’m going to go ahead and give you my phone number and extension where I can be reached should you have any questions or any information that you may find pertinent to the situation.”
“All right,” Scott said, pulling a pen and a small notepad from the top drawer of the cabinet beneath. “Go ahead.”
“Area code 206, 541, 2064, extension 302,” he said, pausing briefly. “Did you get that?”
“Yeah.”
“Well then, Mr. Ramsey, I look forward to helping you, and thank you for choosing the People Network.”
“Yeah, thanks,” Scott muttered into the phone as the he heard a click at the other end of the line.
Replacing the cordless unit atop the charger, he walked back towards the living room.
“It seems almost silly to have them look for the kid you pulled out of that house, but I didn’t know exactly what to say.”
Harry was standing in front of the cou
ch staring out the window as the snow multiplied, a white sheet of the enormous flakes hammering into the large picture window.
“Do you have any way of getting in touch with your old friend Shane?” he asked without turning around. Some of the color had returned to his cheeks, but he still looked quite pale, the lines of age clearly defined across his face.
“I don’t have a phone number or anything, but I think his parents still live in the same house and I doubt they would mind giving me his number.”
“Good.”
He still stared out into the storm.
“But I don’t remember their phone number so I’m going to have to go look in the phone book.”
“Why don’t we just stop by, there’s something else I would like to take a look at while we’re out.”
Harry finally peeked back at Scott, but only long enough to give him a worn smile of reassurance, returning his gaze to row of spruces in the front yard, and the yellow, glowing eyes of the stag that stared back at him from within the branches of the trees.
XV
Tuesday, November 15th
Noon
The forest green Cherokee rolled to a stop against the curb in front of the house. A large “For Sale” sign was staked in the lawn in the front yard just to the right of the driveway. In the right corner was a picture of the smiling Realtor, her pseudo- smile so large it threatened to rip her face in two.
Scott stared up at the vacant house for a moment. He had more than his share of memories within this house. He could remember so many afternoons where they had gone one on one in the driveway beneath that freestanding basket that had been painted green to match the house. There had been the times where they had brought girls over to bounce on the trampoline in the back yard for no other reason than the bounce.
All of the window coverings had been removed, and even through the second story windows he could tell that the house was completely barren. From what he understood, the house had changed hands close to a half dozen times over the last decade plus, with none of the owners staying lone enough to even trim back the Mugho Pines that crowded the front walkway, covering the slate.
The Bloodspawn Page 26