Gabriel's Horn

by C Ross

Or are you just fat?”

  More pictures were taken of her scantily clad body imprinted themselves upon the film that would be headlines tomorrow. “Local celebrity also local slut,” the intoxicating nudity and violence was too much for any journalist to resist. If it bleeds it leads and this was a hot mess just leaking out.

  Hordes of journalists swarmed in like sharks at the smell of fresh blood, the mob carried her up the street. Delirious she caught sight of her destination which they were dragging her to.

  A neon crucifix loomed in the distance, its bright colours contrasting against the night sky. They propped her up against the cross, the hot luminescent glass burning her fair skin. She screamed and was silenced with a stab in the ribs with a sharpened boom mic before falling silent again. They had set up a press conference podium, on top of the crucifix. They placed a crown of microphones on her head from FOX, CNN, Sky, ABC, while all of their corresponding reporters ravaged her with questions. It was all a blur but she caught the end of one question, while her gut wound bled out.

  “What do you want to be remembered for Hiccup Woman!?” A man shouted

  “My name…”

  14:58

  “is...

  14:59

  “Linda…”

  Her body went limp and dropped forward. Linda’s lifeless eyes absorbed the camera flashes with no reaction.

  The clock grinned *15.00*

  As the journalists dispersed from the scene a voice echoed from the TV station.

  “Coming up next. Remembering Linda: A downward spiral.”

  Century Stench

  “In a mad world, only the insane are sane.”

  -Akira Kurosawa

  Another day working at this fucking accountancy and I will hang myself in the broom closet. That is if it wasn’t occupied by my boss who had been having an affair with the receptionist for the past two months. When he wasn’t giving the receptionist a raise he was watching YouTube (just like me I suppose). My boss doesn’t, the printer doesn’t work, and I don’t work. Everything in my life is operating under some sort of digital lag, a waiting time that is always just long enough to annoy me, but not to prompt any sort of action towards a solution. The cruellest fact of all is that I’ll be back tomorrow to do the exact same thing. It’s closing time and cheerful goodbyes are said (this is the only time the place is ever filled with a sense of cheerfulness) and at the back of every other employees mind, there is a sacred hope the cursed building would burn down over night. But ah well, it pays the bills, right?

  It just that it goes on and on, again and again. And here I am on a barstool again. Friday night, the same people, who I am glad to see, not because they are particularly clever, funny, or friendly, but because of some sort of Pavlovian response to the weekend arriving. Gwen, my girlfriend, said she was a few minutes away, but she’s still only on Facebook, so she clearly hasn’t left the house yet.

  I wait another fifteen minutes, Gwen says she is not feeling well, we will go out another night. I say goodbye to the dour bartender who simply nodded.

  The night was cold but a swift pace was enough to keep me warm against the freezing wind. Driving home drunk was a tempting idea, wrapping myself around a tree and never having to worry about any of this again. Little did I know, my decision to walk home was going to be just as dangerous as crashing my Toyota shitbox. These walks were usually uneventful except for the routine murder/suicide fantasy involving my boss and an AR15 assault rifle. Don't get me wrong I am not a violent person though I am physically imposing.

  I am almost seven feet tall and usually find myself confident in my surroundings because of boxing three nights a week, and I didn’t feel nervous walking home late at night by myself. Despite this, I found myself unsettled as I spotted the short man up the road. His strange body language deterred me from making eye contact. I could handle myself normally… but this man wasn’t normal. It went beyond the usual characteristics of your everyday weirdo due to a combination of several off-putting details, his gangly arms which were too short and thin for his wide muscular shoulders. Like useless appendages, they swung without purpose at his sides like loose sleeves of flesh. Closer and closer I came towards him on this lonely street, my jaw clenched with anticipation of a possible confrontation. Nothing will happen, I will pass by and think myself an idiot for being so worried.

  “Stop,” like a razor his words cut through that delusion. He stood only a few walking paces away. It was close enough to smell his musk which pierced through the dank woodland mist, a blend of cheap whisky and rotten eggs. Probably homeless.

  “You good, mate?” No point getting confrontational immediately, he might need help- but his posture said otherwise.

  The shadows that were cast on his face shifted into what I could only assume was a smile, “Oh I have finally found something good.”

  “T-That’s great.”

  Hold it together, just cross the road. I turned to cross but something collided with my foot. I knew it was metallic from the scrapping sound it made across the concrete. I looked down to see it was a knife, its blade shined in the yellow fluorescent street lamp.

  “Pick it up boy,” the fiend was holding a second knife, casually he held it hanging between his thumb and pinkie, playfully swinging it back and forth.

  All those moments of bravado in pubs across the country were nothing compared to this insanity. Adrenaline burst throughout my veins, pulsating up my neck, the blood pounded my inner like a war drum with every heartbeat. Fight or flight battled within the chemical confines of my brain, at that point flight had the upper hand.

  “If you run I’ll cut you down like the last boy, no gift was given to him,” he said as if reading my mind. I’ve got to placate the lunatic.

  “A gift?”

  “Ascension”

  Several moments of stress went by before I controlled my breathing, “To what?”

  “The chain which spans the universe... Now it is your turn to choose child: Death, or woke from the dream of life.”

  What a complete nutter. I weighed up my options. I had drunken myself into a bit of a stupor in bitterness from being stood up by Gwen and now came to the realisation I wasn’t going to be able to stay upright if I ran. I picked up the knife. I won’t use it, I promised myself. A quick hook to the side of the chin and I’ll put this fucker onto the pavement.

  “Nick work champ!” the madman said with the fervour of a demented coach, “We have a winner!”

  What the fuck am I doing in a knife fight? Before I could answer myself, he charged like a banshee, he held his own knife high above his head as he charged. His greasy black hair blew back, revealing his fiery enraged eyes which would only be quenched by my blood. He bared his yellow teeth at me as he swung his knife in a downward arc towards my face. I skipped backward with my hands ready to retaliate. Again, he swiped and I ducked out of the way. His stubby arms swung around flaccidly but with unnatural precision and strength. Like a viper he darted back and forth as I grew tired, I managed to kick him away but up again he rose, never seeming to grow tired himself.

  My legs felt strained even in my adrenaline fuelled state, I had to finish this now. Like I had done almost a dozen times before, I darted left as he stabbed right but instead of backing away I pounced. Like all men who have committed that terrible sin, it comes down to survival, it’s you or them. I gripped the knife and shoved it into his leg. The knife’s point ploughed through his stained jeans and slide easily into the flesh of his thigh. The knife was completely enveloped into his leg which began to wobble and squirm. It was as if his skin was paper thin, handfuls of loose muscle and tissue poured out of the thin wound. His thigh deflated like a grotesque inflatable limb filled with blood, but he only laughed. The knife was completely enveloped in the wound.

  Astonishingly, with only a minor hesitation the fiend let out a roar and ripped the knife from his leg knocking me away. “It isn’t human… it can’t be,” I remembering thinking to myself. I rolled to
the kerb but once again he was upon me, slashing and charging with the same intensity. Crawling away in desperation, I felt a blow on the side of my chest that knocked over onto my back. I wheezed and suddenly felt wet. I got up and ran a distance before I fell down, my legs simply collapsing.

  Had I fallen in puddle? But the liquid was warm, must be blood but whose blood? I looked down to see a 6-inch blade protruding from my ribcage. This is it, I resigned myself. I remember my mind racing over all the useless problems I had been worrying about and realised they were all solvable, all my problems could be fixed, except for this knife jammed in my chest. I stopped worrying all of a sudden and laughed. Despite everything I was laughing, I would try to survive. I don’t know where this decision came from but in that moment I knew I was going to fight to the end.

  My abstract thoughts were interrupted by mad cackling that became louder and louder. I was grabbed by the shoulders as the maniac squatted over my broken body.

  “You are worthy, don’t cry now, you are worthy, worthy!” he shouted over and over again as I drifted in and out of consciousness, “We’ll be one.” In a purely instinctive reaction, I thrust my head forward to vomit out of fear, only to have my forehead collide with his mouth. Several teeth fell from his gangrenous gums releasing a stench of sulphur. He didn’t give a momentary indication that he felt a thing