Megan managed to bring her emotions down a few notches as he stood up with a slight groan. He sounded like someone who was getting to the age where he couldn’t comfortably handle being in certain positions for extended periods of time.
She watched him remove the small knife from the siding on his thigh. This blade was angled, curving up to the point.
For carving...
Her eyes widened. She looked past him to the dead female occupying the other tree. She skimmed down the body like a panning camera, stopping at the thigh were jagged chunks had been removed. A stripe of bone stuck out from the dried up meat like a drainage ditch in sinking soil.
Megan looked at the man. He was almost to her, the curved blade clutched in his hand. “No, no please don’t…please…”
Waving the blade to taunt to her, he inched closer.
“Why are you doing this to me? Just…kill me. Get it over with!”
He joined her at the tree, putting the blade under her chin. She stopped shaking, her words died, but she didn’t stop trying to supplicate with her eyes. She’d always been good at that, even as a kid. It worked on her daddy whenever he tried to be firm. Her eyes had even worked on Kevin a couple times; not many, but whenever Kevin did cave to what she wanted it was because of her bright, pouty eyes that gleamed light like constant tears.
It wasn’t working now.
Through the torn holes of his patched together mask, his eyes glowered at her. Appetitive flair haunted his pupils. In them, Megan could foresee his next move.
And, she wasn’t surprised when he slowly lowered the blade.
Glided it down her chest, between her breasts, nudging her stomach, and resting it on her thigh.
“Don’t…don’t…please…”
He angled the blade against her flesh and sawed into her thigh.
Megan thrashed back her head to shout at the sky. It felt like sharpened ice serrating her thigh. She’d thought the slice on her calf had hurt, but it couldn’t compare to this…she didn’t think anything possibly could.
When the maniac gripped a handful of her meat and ripped it away from her leg, she realized she was wrong.
Megan nearly lost consciousness. Her vision turned dim and splotchy, as if she’d been staring at the sun for an hour and entered a dark room. Her weight sagged. Her hands pulled against the nails and a fresh tendril of pain pulled her back so she could watch him carrying a slab of her thigh over to the pan and toss it on.
It sizzled as it began to cook. Thin plumes of smoke curled up from the cooking meat.
Her leg felt broken although the bone was fine. And, she was so hungry that the smell of her frying meat made her stomach grumble, then it quickly soured when it realized what had pinged its attention.
16
Amanda, careful and vigilant, trooped onward. She looked around as she moved, turning to spy any noise she heard. Her gun was drawn, ready to fire. She stopped frequently to rub her sweaty hands on her pants. She could feel sweat trickling between her breasts, making her itch. She was tempted to stop and use her ranger shirt to dry her chest, but didn’t want to take the time away from her walk.
The sun had already begun its move. As afternoon ticked onward, the honey-colored blob would continue to shift until dropping out entirely. She assumed she had three, maybe four hours until the trees choked out the sun completely. She’d be moving in total darkness, although the sun wouldn’t have completely set yet.
That’s why I brought the flashlight.
But how long would the batteries hold out? She didn’t want to be traipsing around out here with nothing to see by. She might just march her stubborn ass right off a ridge and careen a mile or so down to her death.
A lot of help she’d be if that happened.
Someone ducked behind the trees ahead of her. She clearly saw a head and flapping of hair. Amanda jogged to where she’d seen them.
A branch was lightly swaying as if someone had bumped it.
I did see someone.
Someone, right. But, not who she thought it was. There was no way she could have seen her.
My eyes are playing tricks.
The heat, the stress, and the lack of food and water she’d had today. She was exhausted, maybe a little dehydrated, so there was no wonder she was seeing things that couldn’t be real.
That girl was dead. Her head had been left on her shoulders the wrong way. She’d seen the poor girl herself, even touched her rippled neck. Felt the broken bones prodding the skin. Suddenly it felt as if she could feel that cold dough touch on her fingertip once again. She extended her finger, then quickly wiped it on the tank top.
She’d just seen that same girl, looking just as dead as she had the last time, and moving around on her own.
Despite it being a record-breaking summer day, Amanda shivered.
There was a crunching sound that a foot might make beyond the barrier of trees.
“Hello?”
No one responded to her call.
She felt little legs scurrying all over her arms. She went to wipe them off but found her skin was clean. The feeling was still there, however there were no bugs.
Enough of this. You didn’t see her!
Amanda stopped, staring at the flank of trees. She’d know for sure what she saw—or didn’t—if she kept going.
No one was over there.
Let’s prove it, then.
Taking a deep breath, she shoved her way through the branches.
And saw the girl again several yards up. Only for a flash of a moment, then she went to Amanda’s left, disappearing around the backside of another tree.
Hurrying to the tree, Amanda didn’t see her, but knew this was the direction she’d gone. So, Amanda followed, hoping that she hadn’t lost her mind and was allowing her insanity to lead her deep into these woods to vanish with all the rest.
But if you haven’t lost your mind, where does that leave you?
“Following a damn ghost,” she muttered.
Exactly. So which would be worse?
She didn’t want to think about it. She would just keep going, and not allow herself to be influenced either way.
The girl appeared at the top of an incline, looking over as if to check that Amanda was still coming, then she was gone once again.
With a sigh, Amanda started to mount the rise, planting her feet into the ground, and moving with her body slightly leaned forward to keep her balance.
17
On the ground, he sat by the fire, angled in such a way that she couldn’t see him entirely. His mask was raised over his mouth, and she could hear the slurping sounds of his mouth as he dined on the chunk of meat he’d carved from her thigh. Only a partial section of his face could be seen from where she was, and it was hard to decipher from all the hair. It looked like a bush of brownish hair was stuck to his chin.
Whimpering, she glanced down at her wound: a black cavity, secreting blood. Her bottom lip began to tremble again, but she managed to get it pinned between her teeth. She could still feel it vibrating clutched between her teeth.
She was going to try talking to him again. When she’d been hired at the hospital they’d made her take a course on ways to properly handle yourself whenever one of the head cases from the loony ward broke out. There were countless methods they’d taught. But the one that stayed with her was trying to carry on a casual conversation with them. Supposedly it distracted them so you could escape or confused them into thinking you were their friend.
She never believed it.
But, she’d always been a good talker. Kevin had always told her she could talk anyone down from a ledge.
He was good at that, filling her with such garbage that it made her blind to the person he truly was. Even the day she’d finally confronted him about the affairs she had solidly proved he was having. He’d tried to convince her he was a good guy, like what she’d learned in the class.
But she knew the truth. She’d gotten on the computer to check her email
and found that, like an idiot, he’d forgotten to logout of Facebook. Not his regular account that she was friend of, but the secret account that was just one of several with a different name and fabricated personalities he had used to fuck multiple women…and even one man.
When she’d confronted him with the evidence, he’d made a face, and said, You really think that’s me?
“Yes,” she said, “I know it’s you…”
He’d denied it, but she wouldn’t stop until he admitted it all. When he was finally the one talking, she realized she really hadn’t wanted all the details. She got them anyway, and they’d haunted her ever since.
Disgusting smacks pulled her out of her painful reflections. She watched the man. He was licking off the blood that had dribbled onto his fingers from her cooked meat. When he finished, he adjusted the mask so it was hiding all of his features once again.
Now or never…
“I know you can understand me.”
He paused, slightly gazing back at her without turning his head all the way.
“Can you talk?”
He was immobile, like a piece of the woods that had sprouted from the ground.
“I bet you can. Want to talk to me?”
He turned his head forward. Now all she could see was the back of him, his shaggy hair and the entwined straps of the mask that was being devoured by the hair.
“Did I taste good? I sure smelled like I would. Is it like they say? Do humans taste like chicken?”
He stood up. Wiped his hands on his pants.
“What are you doing?”
He headed towards her. As he loomed closer, her breathing beefed up in speed. He removed the carving knife.
“No…please don’t…”
So much for talking him into letting her go, she’d been reduced back to the sniveling little twerp she’d been the whole time.
He grabbed her tank top, yanking it down to expose her left breast. The shirt didn’t rip, but it was now definitely stretched out. At first she thought he was going to start fondling her. When he put the blade to her nipple, she quickly grasped that she was wrong.
Her words turned to squeals.
She felt the blade prick the soft tissue.
Then an explosion resounded around them. His head snapped back. He staggered away from Megan a couple steps. The tank-top slipped away from his fingers. It fell back on her breast, but hung loosely, barely covering her. Bringing his head back down, she saw that just above his left eye was a perfect dime-sized circle. Flaps of the mask fluttered in the breeze around the hole.
He stepped back two more steps, dropped down on his knees, then collapsed onto his side. The blood pooled in front of his face, mudding the dirt into a thick red paste.
Megan was on the verge of panic. She stared at the fallen psychotic, her breaths now high-pitched wheezes. She was trying to understand what just transpired.
She looked down at her breast. It was okay. Just a slight cut that blood was now oozing out of, nothing major. Nowhere near as much as the amount coming out of the man’s forehead.
He’d been shot.
It was just the two of them out here. How could he have been shot?
She recalled the loud bang. Definitely a gunshot.
How do you know? It’s not like you hear them every day.
It was. She’d seen enough movies to know what they sounded like.
Okay. Then who was the triggerman?
“Allison,” she gasped.
Could it be?
She turned her head as far to the right that she could. It was easy to spot the new arrival. And it wasn’t her friend, posed with a hip cocked out and a gun aimed in front of her. But, positioned behind a tree, a gun with a long barrel pointing to the spot where the psycho had just dropped was a scruffy man who might have been in his thirties. A thin runnel of smoke wafted out from the tip of the gun.
“You all right, girlie?”
Shocked, she slowly nodded.
“Looks to me like I got here just’n time.”
Megan didn’t respond, couldn’t respond. She couldn’t take her eyes off him.
Lowering the gun, he strutted into the clearing, nonchalantly approaching the fallen man. He nudged him with the toe of his boot. After a beat, he whistled.
“Deader than shit, and uglier than fuck.” A strap dangled from the gun’s barrel to the wooden stock of the other end. He threw it over his shoulder like a pocket book strap. “What’s going on, girlie?”
Her breathing still rapid, she managed to talk through wheezing huffs. “He killed my friends…Allison and Brian…”
Allison was dead, right?
“…and he came after me. I got lost in the woods, then Allison helped…” She looked at the man, saw his scruffy face scrunch with confusion, then decided to drop all references to Allison. “…I mean, he caught me, and brought me here. I don’t know where I am. Please-please-please help me…”
She was about to continue but stopped when she saw him ogling her. He was shaking his head, but not like someone in disgust or pity, but more like someone who was surprisingly thunderstruck, as if he’d been given a present he hadn’t expected. His eyes glanced down to her chest three quick times.
“Wuh-what?” she asked.
“Well, this just beats it all.” He looked away. “Rusty? Missy?”
There was some rustling in the woods, then two others even shabbier than this guy stepped out from behind the trees. A man and woman, both young, both armed. The man was bald on top with a horseshoe of stringy hair touching his shoulders, and had an ax, and the girl was furnished with a double-barrel shotgun. Her hair was in pigtails, and dressed like someone just off the train.
The entire hillbilly clan was smudged in filth.
“Whatcha got, Billy?” asked the girl, more than likely Missy.
“A gift from the Lord, himself. I told you if we kept workin’ hard like we was, he’d bless us fer sure!”
The other guy, Rusty, beamed. From all the way over there Megan could see his round eyes. “She’s for us?”
“She is now,” answered Billy. He turned to Megan, winked. “One good deed deserves a reward.”
“What the hell is this?!” shouted Megan.
“A good day fors us, a shitty ones for you.” He laughed.
Megan sobbed. What fight she had left had been depleted.
Missy and Rusty entered the clearing. On their way past the man Missy asked, “Who’s this?”
“Dead meat. I think he the one messin’ around our plants.”
“Don’t look like the kind to be doing that,” said Missy.
“How many other fuckers you reckon is this deep in the goddamn woods other than us?”
She shrugged.
“I think I took care of our problem and gots a reward all’n the same day.”
Rusty approached Megan, his goofy smile showing teeth pock-marked with cavities. “Can we keep her?”
“Just gotta get ‘er down first.”
“Stay the hell away from me,” said Megan. “Just leave me here…don’t you dare fucking touch me!” Staying pinned to this damn tree was more appealing than going anywhere with this batch of hillbillies.
Billy talked to the others as if she wasn’t there. “Come help me find a hammer. Has to be around here somewhere.”
“How you know that?” said Rusty.
“How else did those nails get ‘n her arms you fuck-tard!?!”
The comment looked to have hurt Rusty’s feelings.
Billy sighed. “Damn it, boy, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt ya none.”
“I’m all right.”
“Good. Then get to looking. Help your sister look over there.” He pointed by where the man lay.
Rusty seemed reluctant to go anywhere near the big man and Megan couldn’t blame him for it. He went regardless of his feelings, probably because he feared Billy just as much.
They scoured the small area. It wasn’t long before Missy gasped and grab
bed the hammer off the ground near the fire pit. “Here it is, Billy!”
Billy smiled. “Good eyes, Missy. You always been able to find a brown kernel in shit anyways.”
She smiled at that as if it had been the best compliment she’d ever gotten. She passed him the hammer.
Billy headed back over to Megan. She kicked a foot at him as he neared. Jumping back, he laughed. “Oooo-weeee! She’s a spirtfire if I ever seen one!”
Rusty laughed. “She sure is!”
All of them approached now, but it did nothing to deter Megan from throwing her legs up, trying to kick each of them.
She struck Missy in the gut, making her stumble back. Bent over, Missy shouted, “Damn bitch kicked me!”
“Rusty,” called Billy. “Hold down a leg, and Missy you get the other one.”
They pounced at once, not giving Megan a chance to kick again. Hugging her legs, they forced them to the ground, and kept them grappled in place.
Megan cried out. Angered because of the defeat, and the desire of wanting to inflict some kind of pain was going unfulfilled.
“Just hold ‘er tight. I have a feelin’ she’s gonna try and run for it.”
“Can’t go far with this leg,” said Rusty.
“Won’t stop ‘er from tryin’,” said Billy.
And he was right. Even if both legs had been severed, she would still try and run.
He faced the hammer claw-end out. He ran it up her arm, clutching a nail in the arch between the two claws. After another wink, he pulled down. The nail wrenched out of the tree, tearing through her wrist and delivering another rush of pain down her arm. She cried out. It was unbelievable she could still feel this much pain. Shouldn’t she be in shock by now? She wished for blank numbness to come soon.
Billy repeated the procedure with the other nail. It did not hurt as bad as the last. It was much, much worse. Her arms drooped by her side. She attempted a swing at Billy, but couldn’t lift her arm above her waist. It only dangled there like a useless appendage.
Last One Alive Page 7