Mind Hemorrhages: Dark Tales of Misery and Imagination

by Dane Hatchell

  He removed a compass from his front pocket and adjusted the distance from his eyes until the needle came in focus. Satisfied he was still heading in the right direction, he lifted his head toward his destination.

  Hulking before him as large as the Bigfoot chiseled from wood at the Bigfoot Museum in Willow Creek, stood a real live female Bigfoot.

  Morty did a double take and rubbed his eyes. Even after taking another sip from his Mason jar the beast remained in his path.

  “Glory be! I was hoping to find little gray aliens and instead I found Bigfoot,” he said to himself.

  The creature remained reserved, hardly batting an eyelid.

  Thinking of ways he could communicate, Morty slowly removed his backpack and fished out an apple.

  “Are you hungry, big girl? I got a nice Granny Smith apple for you. Grew it on my place, I did,” Morty said, stepping cautiously forward. He rolled it on the ground over to her. It stopped when it bumped against her big toe.

  The creature curiously looked down at it, picked it up and lifted it to her nose.

  “Go ahead, it’s good for you. Eat it.”

  She bit off a small piece, and popped the whole thing in her mouth.

  “See, I was right, wasn’t I? How about a banana?” Morty hurried back to the backpack and snatched out the banana, peeling the skin down halfway. “Try this. It’s good too, even though I didn’t grow it,” he said, tossing it over.

  He was close enough to see her eyes light up when she sniffed it. She ate it whole, smacking her lips with obvious approval. Her eyes narrowed toward him after it was gone, looking at him with a cross expression.

  “What? Oh, you want more? I . . . I don’t have any more fruit. All I have is some canned soup,” Morty said, feeling the tension thickening the air around him. “Hey, how about some white lighting? That’ll knock the edge off of whatever’s bothering you.”

  Morty stepped toward her, slowly opening the Mason jar. He stopped within arm’s reach, and brought the jar to his mouth. “See what I’m doing? Just a sip. Just take a sip to get used to it.”

  He raised it up to her, balancing it on the open palm of his hand. She reached and grabbed it with her thumb and forefinger, lifting it to her nose. The Bigfoot’s nostrils flared. She emptied the jars contents in her wide-open mouth in one motion.

  White lightening and Bigfoot phlegm spewed out her mouth, raining all over Morty.

  “I told you to sip it!”

  Morty never contemplated that the last six words he would utter before his death would have been those.

  The hairy she-beast grabbed him by his pin-head and twisted it off like a bottle cap. After eating her fill, she disappeared into the forest.

  *

  The tracks along the stream’s edge and surrounding area were distinct and plentiful. This was totally out of character for a Bigfoot. The creature known as the Wise Man earned that name because of its ability to live among the Native Americans and for the most part elude detection. This female hunted in a confined area, and now he understood why, it was because of her mate buried not far away. For some reason unknown to him, it was binding her from leaving.

  It didn’t make any sense to Smith. She should have sought solace in her kind for protection. If not for herself, then for her child.

  Smith watched the bait struggle in the trap set for the Bigfoot, while hiding in a nearby tree after dousing himself in fox scent. A fat rabbit struggled amidst thick briers and tied to a willow near the stream. Smith had trapped the rabbit earlier, and then chained it securely to the root of the tree.

  The rabbit made plenty of noise trying to make its escape. Smith’s only concern was another predator would come upon it before the Bigfoot.

  Nearly two hours passed before Smith heard the approaching sound of two sets of feet mashing twigs and grass. His heart raced, he suddenly felt exposed high in the tree.

  He had no doubt the Wise Woman of the woods could climb, and now feared his 9mm pistol wouldn’t be powerful enough to stop her, as she and her child walked into view.

  She looked just as his great grandfather had described: More human than not, but fiercer than a mighty grizzly. A cross between a marvel to behold and the worst of nightmares. Mankind had a brother who lived hidden among them throughout time. Maybe it was merely being patient, waiting for man to make himself extinct before inheriting the planet.

  It was then he noticed the mother held a human arm by the wrist. Lifting it to her mouth, she pulled the meat off the bicep with her teeth, and chewed with obvious satisfaction.

  Cold sweat ran down Smith’s neck. He prayed for her not to smell his fear.

  Immediately hearing the rabbit, she dropped to one knee while pointing for her son to see. She whispered something in his ear. He lowered himself to the ground, as if waiting to launch on her command.

  With a slap on his rear, the child beast ran with the speed of a pouncing cougar toward the rabbit, which now lay still, its nose to the wind.

  Just before the boy could make his dive for the prey, the ground cover of leaves and branches gave way underneath, sending him plunging into the twelve-foot deep, narrow gully below.

  The child’s all too human scream and his disappearance from sight had the mother quickly over to the hole and down in its belly to save her son.

  Smith dropped past branches and onto the ground as fast as gravity would allow. The gully was nearly six foot wide. It wouldn’t take very long for her to climb out.

  He ran to the side of the gully and looked down at the surprised faces of his captives, grabbing a pouch from his belt. He reached his arm over as much as he dared and shook out the contents of the pouch.

  A cloud of dust rained on the two Bigfoot beasts, over ferocious protest. Powered hallucinogenic mushrooms once used by his tribe’s Shaman to induce dreams of the future filled their lungs. It channeled the inner rage through a wild wonderland unimagined, ushering a rollercoaster ride into oblivion.

  Smith let the pouch drop and rolled away on his side. He didn’t want to breathe any of the airborne hallucinogenic.

  With a sigh of relief, he removed the phone from his pocket and assured the voice on the other end that the deal was now complete.

  Over the next thirty minutes, Smith celebrated his catch with water and several pieces of jerky. Enough time had passed for the powder to settle. He brushed his hands clean on his thighs and removed the Berretta 9mm from its holster.

  The two creatures lay motionless, as harmless as stuffed animals at the fair. Smith put the sights between the mother’s eyes and cocked back the hammer. Something fought against him from the inside, denying him the ability to pull the trigger.

  The two were just animals, he told himself, ones to be feared at that. He had no idea how long the mushrooms would hold them in its spell. He needed to close the deal, and still, he couldn’t bring himself to squeeze the trigger.

  Mother Earth took him by the hand and led his mind through the eyes of the wolf, hunting with its brothers and sisters. Then, through the eyes of a buck deer, charging through the woods to meet another challenging his territory. Finally, from above he soared on the wings of an eagle, spying a squirrel hiding still on a tree limb.

  Then, he saw himself through the eyes of the Bigfoot. A horrific monster, bleeding from open wounds gashed out by the talons of lust and greed. Turning instantly to rot everything that his spoiling fingers and his selfish dreams touched. Spewing refuge on the simple ways of nature, and in his gluttony stealing any hope from the pure and innocent.

  Smith found no justification in killing the creatures. In fact, he felt they deserved to live more than he.

  Faint engine roars of four wheelers fast approaching pulled him from the deep pit of shame. He stood with the 9mm hanging limp in his hand.

  Evans was the first to dismount as the rest of the entourage killed the engines and followed. The lot being a sordid looking bunch, armed to the teeth, and hungry for blood.

  “How did you know
where I was?” Smith asked.

  “The phone is also a GPS transmitter. We’ve been tracking you all this time. It is Bigfoot . . . my God. Are they dead?” Evans said, as he stood next to Smith, looking down at the prized catch.

  “No . . . I couldn’t do it. The deal is off,” Smith said, his eyes filled with tears.

  “It doesn’t work that way, Smith, and you know it.”

  “It’s going to work that way this time. These creatures are innocent spawns of evolution that have toiled over the eons to become a vibrant part of the living, breathing, Earth. They aren’t food to eat, or beasts subject to the whip of man. They are the innocent souls with whom man never wanted to share glory. Man chose to squander the pure light he originally possessed, which led us to darkness bent on satisfying every wanton lust, at no matter the ultimate cost. Our self-centeredness will end now. I won’t let you harm them,” Smith said.

  The rapid discharge of fully automatic AR-10s firing from behind turned Smith’s insides the jelly. He looked over and saw three warriors of gloom pass smirks of victory between each other, and then walk away as if nothing had happened.

  Down in the gully, two spirits rose from the dead bodies and floated toward infinite blue sky. The mother and child would join the father in the next world. A world hopefully without the menace of man.

  “You had no right . . . this is their land,” Smith said, dropping to his knees.

  “You’re wrong, Smith. This is my land,” Evans said. “This was your ancestor’s land at one time. We bought it, it’s ours now. They sold their soul, and we bought it. Just like I bought the souls of those two Bigfoots. I bought them from you,” Evans threw four thousand dollars in cash in front of Smith. “‘The sins of the father are passed down to the son.’ I guess you were destined to repeat the same mistake.”

  Inhuman shrieks of rage surrounding the five men turned the openness of the forest into a cage that started shrinking in size.

  “What in the hell was that?” Evans said.

  Smith rose and looked around, capitulating to the numbness death would soon ensure forever. “I only remembered after the spirits of the two touched me as they left for the heavens.” Smith went silent.

  “Remembered what?” Evans’s voice cracked as countless numbers of the mighty beasts emerged from the forest.

  “The Wise men are territorial, with many square miles of land in their domain. But they share a kinship that binds them as one.

  “I found the female’s mate dead and buried. I didn’t realize at first that it was only a temporary resting place. The clan has been gathering for weeks, from near and far, for all to honor the fallen one together. The female was to choose a new mate after the burial ceremony and reclaim the domain as a family.”

  The three hired guns searched frenziedly around for a path of escape, as the circle of Bigfoot monsters tightened.

  “We have woken the sleeping giant. It is time for us to all pay for our indiscretions,” Smith said. “I suggest each of you save one bullet for yourself when the time comes.”

  Smith opened his mouth and stuck the barrel of the 9mm in.

  The blast from the bullet discharging at supersonic speed made Evans jump.

  Evans unholstered his side arm and held it with two hands closely to his chest. He couldn’t decide if he would make the futile attempt to defend himself, or just to go ahead and mix his brains with Smith’s across the beautiful green foliage in the wilds of Willow Creek.

  The End

  The Time Potter’s Wheel

  A human head atop a pile of severed body parts in my trashcan grinned at me. If its broad smile had been induced by a joke, something must have gone terribly wrong. At least I now knew why the damn trashcan was so heavy. The bloody face cast a web with its distant gaze, dragging me toward a dark future.

  I jumped back and let the hinged lid crash down. A puff of stale, putrid air blew past my face and made me feel dirty and greasy from the thick, warm odor. The minds-world spun backward and didn’t stop until my knees touched the ground. Bile heaved from my stomach to purge the stench from my nose and the vile taste that invaded my mouth. What in the hell is this? A threat? A warning? Is it even real?

  The sickly-sweet smell of rotting fruit and fermented bowel gases drifted in the summer breeze. It churned my stomach once again. I had to push my nose to the grass and breathe its earthy aroma in order to keep my breakfast down.

  This is definitely real.

  It was time to follow protocol and contact my superior at Flyback. Something hadn’t gone as intended, and we were so close to the mission’s end.

  The phone in my hand came to life and played a delightful tune ironically scoring the background to the horrific scene.

  A human body cut to pieces hid like common garbage in the trashcan. My trashcan. A human butchered in the same manner as a pig in a slaughterhouse.

  I was dumbfounded. The week was as ordinary as the first time I lived through it. I kept my basic daily routine, adding only data gathered from the news and history books according to the mission’s requirements. Still, something had been responsible for the glitch in the continuum.

  Perhaps I had been wrong. Maybe I did end up in a parallel universe.

  No, nothing that had occurred in my week suggested that. There were wars, budget deficits, asshole Democrats and asshole Republicans arguing how to spend borrowed money from China. People all across the world found new reasons to hate each other. It was the same crappy universe I grew up in. Filled with the wonders of creation and spoiled by the sordid ways of man.

  I first had to start with the simple things, little clues that might lead me in the right direction. Finding the gate open to the backyard this morning should have tipped me off. I hadn’t left the gate opened, and it wasn’t open the first go around. Finding that open gate was a direct result of violating the forward motion of time. In some way I was responsible. The gate, the body, the trail would ultimately find its way back to me.

  The image of the face kept pushing at my mind’s eye. Those vacant eyes kept pecking away at the walls of my unconscious, forcing a message through my fear.

  I know those eyes.

  Pulling myself up with the support of the trashcan, I returned to my feet. Federal Agent training prepared me for the unexpected. This certainly qualified as the unexpected. I told myself this while lifting the lid and looking beyond the mask of the reddish-brown dried blood smeared across the face.

  It hit me. Far worse than that ass whipping I took from a rival pack of Frat boys my freshman year in college. I knew this kid. This man. It was my son’s college roommate and longtime friend, Mickey Wells.

  I don’t even remember dialing the numbers to my son’s phone, just the eternity that seemed to pass as the ringing switched to his voice mail. To my relief, Paul answered during the outgoing message.

  “Dad?” his voice was weak.

  “Paul! Thank God you’re okay.”

  Voice wandering. “I wasn’t going to pick up . . . then I saw it was you.”

  I didn’t know how to tell him. “Son, there’s something terribly wrong.” Then I started to chicken out. “We shouldn’t talk about this on the phone.”

  “Dad . . . I know . . . I mean, I don’t know. There’s blood everywhere,” his voice quivered.

  My relief vanished. “Blood? I don’t understand . . .”

  Silence.

  Not ready to handle this alone, I said, “Do we need to contact my lawyer? If you’re in some kind of trouble . . . I don’t want to get the police involved right now. Be straight with me. Do we need my lawyer?”

  “I . . . I had dreams, horrible, dreadful dreams. Mickey and I did some mushrooms last night and I passed out. I dreamed wild dogs attacked from all directions. I fought them with my bare hands. But they kept coming and didn’t stop until I killed them with a knife. Dad, Mickey’s not in the apartment and there’s blood everywhere,” Paul’s voice gave way to another burst of tears.

  Moments
passed.

  “What if these weren’t just dreams?”

  It was my turn to be lost for words. Nothing I said now would make any sense to him. Keeping my cover was instrumental in controlling the situation.

  “Paul, listen up. Listen closely to what I say. Clean your apartment. Stay inside. Don’t open your door and let anyone else in. Don’t answer the phone unless you see it’s me. I can’t tell you how, but I am going to fix things. I am going to make all of this go away. It will be as if it never happened. I know you don’t understand, but you have to trust me. Paul, do you hear me, son?” The words echoed hollow even to my own ears.

  “Yes . . . I hear you. But I—”

  “I know, son, I know. Trust me. I promise you by tonight, Mickey will be back. I’ll explain everything then. Trust me, son. You have to trust me.” It felt like I was trying to convince a fish in the ocean to buy water.

  “Okay, Dad. I will,” his voice drifted off and then the connection dropped.

  The phone went back in my pocket and my plan into action.

  Rolling the trashcan into the garden shed took more effort than I expected. Using the lock off my mountain bike to secure the shed’s door would keep any unwanted eyes from discovering the body. My wife, Tamara, didn’t know the combination.

  *

  As the security arm on the entrance lifted at Project Flyback, I drove past two MP4 toting Secret Service members. Their eyes looked as if they could kill with a blink.

  My destination for the morning was Project Flyback’s debriefing room where my associates would play ‘badger the time traveler’ for another few hours. Asking me details from the previous day in world news from the previous time I lived it and comparing that to what happened the second time I lived it. The team needed convincing I did indeed arrive in my own universe.

  My chair waited for me cocked to one side on a weak spring. Steve Williams, wearing his shirt two sizes too small, and Rick—the prick—Hander, repeated the customary ‘Good Morning’ while hunching behind separate computer monitors, waiting for me to settle in so we could get the final debriefing over.