Headless

  Tina and Dougie were dead. Were the rest? They didn't come out for the fire; they didn't come out for the screaming. Were all her friends dead? The thing couldn't have gotten all of them. It just couldn't have! She told herself as she kept running. And there she finally found hope, as she could just make out the bridge through the trees ahead. She was almost there.

  “Yes! Thank you, thank you!” she breathed.

  As the trees thinned, the rain grew heavier again, and the downpour soaked her as she pushed her way out of the trees and onto the dirt road. Well, it was more of a mud road at this point. The bridge sat about an eighth of a mile ahead of her, and she wasn't slowing down now. The hooves pounding through the mud blended into the sounds of the storm so smoothly that she didn't hear it coming. And she barely made out the whirling sound of the axe, as it spun towards her from behind. She turned and fell back to the mud, as the axe flew overhead.

  Kat rolled out of the way as the horse trampled over the spot that she was just lying in. She found herself falling back into the bushes she had just escaped from, and looked up to find the Horseman sitting atop the steed. It slowed, and turned in her direction, it's black eyes finding her easily, even in the darkness.

  The Horseman lowered itself from the animal, and stepped towards her. She closed her eyes waiting for the death blow to come. Katerina laid there, accepting her fate. She was so close to being out of this God-forsaken place. And she was going to die covered in mud, lying in a bush. His heavy boots dug deep, and loud into the wet ground, as it came closer, and closer.

  The shotgun blast filled the air. And for a moment, Katerina wondered if this was what it sounded like in her own head when blade split skull...

  CHAPTER XXIV

  That moment passed, however, when the horseman rolled end over end across the mud from a gunshot that may well have put an elephant down for good. Katerina's ears rang with a high pitched buzz that mirrored the on setting migraine in intensity. When she finally braved opening her eyes, she found that she was in fact, for the moment at least, very much alive. And there lying in the mud motionless, was the Horseman. She sat up and her head spun as the ringing in her ears threw off her coordination. She looked from the lifeless Horseman to Mrs. Jenkins who stood there with the shotgun propped against her shoulder with one hand, a bottle of vodka in the other.

  “Go on get out of here girl. This ain'cho fight. Get back across the bridge. He can't get you if you cross the bridge. He's cursed to this God forsaken land,” the old lady ordered, never taking her eyes from the Horseman's body.

  Katerina didn't need to be told twice. She groaned, climbing to her feet and very quickly her migraine dissipated – if only due to the fact that for the first time she had a chance to feel how sore the rest of her muscles were. Her calves and quads were on fire from the running, but it didn't matter. She moved as quickly as her feet could carry her.

  The old woman limped towards the Horseman, barrel still aimed at it. As she closed in, she tilted the bottle back, taking a long drink. “You killed the only man I ever loved didn't you, you sonuvabitch? So I'mma kill you. And if I can't kill you, I'm at least gonna make it hurt. You hear me, devil?”

  She kicks the back of his head once. It isn't very hard, but she can't be faulted for trying. Old Mrs. Jenkins swings the vodka bottle down and it cracks off the back of the Horseman's relatively new skull. The gash it creates almost immediately turns back in on itself, healing over. She raises the gun up to take aim, and the Horseman's hand lashes out, fitting his finger between the trigger and the guard. She squeezes, but it doesn't go off. The Horseman's black eyes raise to her, as it moves to it's knees and she continues to squeeze the trigger against his finger.

  The Horseman grabs the barrel of the gun with his other hand, and begins to slowly, albeit easily raise the weapon up towards her head. As the barrel of the gun moves under her chin, the mercenary slides it's finger out, and she squeezes the trigger. Anything that was left of old lady Jenkins' head was splattered across the mud as rain poured down into the crevice that was once her neck. The Horseman rips the gun out of the body's hands, and with one swipe, sends the small, frail body flying off into the trees.

  He turns his attention to Katerina, who is nearly at the bridge, and walks after her.

  “Please just a bit farther,” Katerina prays out for anyone, or anything listening. God hears prayers even from cursed land, doesn't he? Not for wealth, power or fame. Not for World peace, or an end to hunger. All she needs is a bit more energy; a bit more stamina. “God, I don't want to die.”

  Her abdomen cramps; her legs burn; her vision is blurry. Survival instinct is the only thing driving her home at this point. As the rain is shielded by the roof of the bridge, she stumbles to a stop, her hands falling to her knees as she gasps to catch her breath. Katerina finds even the most miniscule, otherwise commonplace things coming to mind as reasons to live. Her mother hugging her too long in front of her friends; shitty country music; getting a speeding ticket. It was all worth living for. Every bit of it, because even in the worst of scenarios, she was still alive.

  She found herself still stumbling forward, albeit much slower at this point, as she noticed the van still sitting in it's spot on the bridge. If she could drive out of here, even better. As she limped along the wood bridge, the gunshot echoed out behind her and she hoped the old lady took the fucking thing's face off. Kat grabbed the back door handle, and yanked it open, only for Caleb's decapitated body to flop out, and on to the deck. His pants around his ankles and the condom still clinging to the tip of his penis.

  “Caleb!”

  Was it his headless body, or the penis that she recognized first? College. Things happen with friends when you're drunk in a field. She reached in, knowing there was nothing to do for him now, and grabbed his leg, pulling him the rest of the way out of the van so she could get in past him. She pulled the back door closed behind her, locking it for extra precaution. She stared down at the pool of blood that had formed along the bottom of the back doors, and gagged at the heavy scent of death that was forming.

  “Oh God...” she gagged, pushing on towards the front of the van.

  Katerina climbed over into the driver's seat, and reaches for the keys. No luck. She fumbles around along the dash, at the visor above her, and under the seat. Why did he take the keys if the van couldn't be moved anyways? She gripped the steering wheel tightly trying to fight back tears.

  “No, no, no, NO!” she screamed, beating her hands against the steering wheel until her hands hurt so badly she had to grip them, hissing in pain.

  The van shook once, and the bridge cracked a bit more under the right tire that was stuck in the hole. She paused, and sat deathly still as she worried she had caused the van to move so much. It rocked again, and again. This force was coming from outside the van. It wasn't her doing. And then the back door wrenched open. Then it wrenched from it's hinges and flew several feet back.

  “WHAT THE FUCK!” Katerina screamed out, turning towards the loud noise, and began whimpering seeing the Horseman staring in at her.

  She immediately tried to push the door open, but it slammed against the wall after opening only a few inches. There was no way she'd fit out of that. She yanked the door shut, and began cranking the handle to roll the window down. The Hessian wearing her dead friend's head climbs into the back of the van coming after her.

  Kat turns, climbing out of the driver's side window, trying to pull herself out of the window. The massive figure coming after her lowers the axe, and pulls back, swinging. She lifts herself up and out of the window just in time, as the blade sticks into the door frame. She squeals out as she hears metal cut into metal. She leans back down as the Horseman starts to come towards the window and punches him in the nose as hard as she can, causing the Hessian to stumble back on the seat. Katerina grabs the handle of the axe through the window and wrenches it free from the door frame, falling over and rolling down onto the hood.

  She groans, hitting
the hood hard, but rolls over, and climbs to her knees, turning towards the interior of the vehicle. The Horseman had already moved back towards the driver's side window and was reaching out towards her. He hits the horn several times and she jumps at the loud noise. The Horseman reaches around the glass, a look of anger crossing his face. The mercenary's body is too big to fit through the window gap. Katerina looks at the axe in her hand, and then to the Horseman reaching out for her.

  “Fuck. You.”

  She jumps up, and brings the axe down, removing Dougie's head from the Horseman's body. It rocks back in shock as the head rolls under the vehicle, and the blade of the axe sticks into the bridge. The Horseman reaches out for her, rocking the van as it does so. The weight and the motion are too much, and the wood gives way. The van drops a couple feet and it rocks the Horseman back into the seat. It turns towards her in the driver's seat, and she pulls the axe from the wood, looking back in at it. Lightning flashes, and illuminates the near-psychotic look on her face, as she holds the axe up.

  “Go back to hell where you belong.”

  She raises the axe above her head with both hands, and swings down at the wood under the tire. As it splinters and cracks, it gives way under the weight and the vehicle pushes through, caving in the old wood. She falls back away from the hole, as the van disappears into the darkness below. After a moment, a loud splash, and metal crashing on rock fills the air. Dougie's head and Caleb's body follows the van down the hole.

  Katerina sits back on her hands staring at the hole, then falls back lying there a moment, catching her breath. The World spun in her head at a million miles a second. Everything was rapid-fire, but slow motion at the same time, as she let her mind catch up to her body. She climbs to her feet, and limps to the edge of the hole, looking down in it. The sound of water rushing echoes up to her. She looks down at the axe, still barely stuck in the wood, and she kicks the handle, sending it spinning down into the darkness as well. She reaches up to grab her ribs, fighting back tears. It was all over. Now she just had to live long enough to get back to civilization.

  Katerina turned, and began walking away from this God forsaken place called Sleepy Hollow.

  CHAPTER XXV

  November 1st, 6:05 AM

  What few birds were left this time of year chirped softly off in the woods. The faded grass had morning dew resting on it, and the crisp Fall air was giving way heavily to winter as Katerina made her way down the seemingly never-ending road. She had been walking for hours. She knew that much. It only took a half mile from Sleepy Hollow down the main road to lose any trace of a storm.

  If it weren't for her tattered, filthy clothes, wounds, and exhaustion it would be nearly impossible to believe that anything at all had happened last night in such a close proximity. Even the smoke from the house that had caught on fire was long gone shortly after she started down the road. Katerina's teeth clattered together softly, as she hugged her rib cage. Each breath she took produced condensation in the air before her, as her skin grew pale in the cold morning weather.

  She still hadn't even fully dried from the previous night's events, as there was no heat and the sun was just rising over the tree line. Her hair was matted to her face and neck from mud and sweat, and her lips seemed dry and cracked. Kat coughed out heavily, as she struggled to keep her body moving, and producing any energy.

  “I can't believe I made it through that shit, just to die from hypothermia out here,” she sighed to herself as she continued down the road.

  For hours now she hadn't seen anyone. She assumed everyone was dead at this point. All of her friends, and the old lady at the very least. She had a sneaking suspicion that they weren't the Horseman's only victims that night, either. She pulled her cell phone from her pocket, and tried dialing.

  Still no signal.

  “Fuck this hell hole!” she screamed, spinning a one eighty and yelling back in the direction she came.

  Her voice echoed into nothingness. It was a quiet morning, even taking into consideration the sounds of nature. She tugs at her hair a moment, frustrated, and spikes the phone on the cracked pavement, shattering it. As soon as this happens, she gasps and kneels down trying to put the phone back together. That may have been the nail in her coffin and she realizes it immediately.

  “You're a special kind of dumb, Kat,” she mumbled to herself, holding the broken pieces of the phone in her hands.

  Her stomach growled audibly and she dropped the phone, grabbing her abdomen. The survival shows from television had already started playing in her head. Hunting squirrel, rabbit, snakes and alligators for survival. She knew at least one of those things wouldn't be available to her, but she'd gladly gnaw the head off a live snake if it meant eating something at the moment.

  She gazed along the tree line, hoping for a lemonade stand; a hot dog vendor. Shawarma sounded fantastic. Her hopes were momentarily raised when she saw what looked like a triple bacon cheeseburger dripping in cheddar cheese with a fried egg on top, only to have her dreams dashed when a second glance produced a very inedible pine cone in the same spot she had just looked. Exhaustion, hunger and dehydration were all playing tricks on her at this point.

  “I'm so hungry I'd eat Jackie's Meatloaf Surprise,” she laughed to herself, before her train of thought led her to miss her best friend dearly, and she had to fight back tears yet again.

  She sat back on her legs, as her upper body slumped. Whether it was the physical toll, the emotional or both, she was done. Her body was done. She sat there on her knees, sobbing intensely for friends she would never see again. A nightmare that nobody would ever believe. Who was she going to tell what happened? Who would ever believe her?

  She was going to spend the rest of her years in an asylum, not because she was crazy, but because others would think she was. And no story she had attempted to fabricate over the past several hours made any more sense than the last. Why should they? How can a lie be sane, when the truth is even more insane?

  The car approaching in the distance never registered in her mind. She was blocking everything in the world out, and just hoping to slip into that peaceful darkness at this point. It rumbled closer and closer, until it pulled to a stop next to her, the blue and reds on top igniting, and Sherriff Williams stepped out of the car, looking at her. She was a wreck. He walks around the front of the car to her, and squats down, resting a hand on her shoulder.

  “Dear God girl, what happened to you?” She breaks down leaning against him and bawling, as he pats the back of her head. “There, there. Come on, let's get you something to eat. Come on.”

  He stood up, and took her hand, helping her up and leading her to the passenger side of the vehicle.

  Katerina stared blankly out of the passenger window, as the trees passed by in a blur. Whether she was even conscious or just unaware, Sheriff Williams didn't know, nor really care. She was still alive. He could tell by her chest moving in and out as he snuck a peek down her torn, dirty shirt out of the corner of his eye. The old man clears his throat, and puts his attention back on the road.

  “So are you going to fill me in on what happened to you girl?”

  “You wouldn't believe me if I told you,” she whispered, not moving an inch.

  “You're one of them kids that was at the gas station yesterday, aren't you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Where are the other kids at?” he asked. After a couple moments of her continuing to stare blankly out of the window, he insisted a bit more strongly. “The others that were with you, girl. Where are they?”

  She continued to stare out the window.

  “Hey! I'm talking to you!” he raised his voice, grabbing her by the collar, and turning her towards him.

  “THEY'RE DEAD!” she screamed back at him.

  He let off the gas pedal a bit, as he made eye contact with her. They were still in the middle of nowhere. He was highly unlikely to hit anything. He cleared his throat, and let her go. She slid a bit closer to the passenger door, staring
at him out of the corner of her eye, as she hugged herself tightly.

  “I'm sorry, I got a bit frustrated,” he whispered, turning his attention back to the road.

  She gave him a second glance, then looked back out of the passenger window. There was something off about the way he spoke. The way he treated people. She noticed it at the gas station yesterday, but didn't think twice on it. She had, however, had time to realize that the old lady that ran the gas station seemed at least somewhat familiar with the demonic monster that tried to kill her last night. Maybe not familiar, that was the wrong word, but she also wasn't shocked by the fact that a shotgun blast didn't kill the thing.

  “It killed them, didn't it?” She looked over at the Sheriff, not sure she had heard him right. “The Horseman, you saw it last night didn't you?”

  “I – I don't know what you're talking about,” she whispered, completely stunned, but trying not to show it.

  “Nobody's ever gotten out of old Sleepy Hollow alive once the Horseman came after 'em. You're either very tough, or very lucky. How'd you do it?”

  She didn't notice the patrol car pulling to a stop.

  “I cut it's head off.”

  “The Horseman doesn't have a head. Not anymore.”

  “It took my friend's. I took it back.”

  “The Horseman claimed a new head, huh? They thought that might happen. Your friend must have put up a hell of a fight.” He nodded, putting the car in park.

  “Who thought?” She inquired, confused.

  “Never you mind about that. We're here,” the Sheriff nodded, putting the vehicle in park.

  She looked around, while he climbed out of the car. They were still in the middle of nowhere. Where was he planning on getting food out here? She was confused by this sudden turn of events, still trying to process the fact that the Sheriff somehow knew about what was going on back at Sleepy Hollow. He opened her door, and she felt his grip pull at her hair, as he yanked her from the car. The old man was stronger than he looked.