Night of the Slasher

by Flint Maxwell

  “No, you don’t, dickface!” Zack said. He continued punching, and Maddie continued hanging on.

  It slowed Cageface down enough for me to get back to the box, but he was coming for me. I didn’t have to look; I could feel him.

  He was an unstoppable force of nature, the tornado you can only hope won’t touch down in your town and ruin everything you’ve built, everything you’ve worked for. I felt that force creeping all over my skin, giving me goosebumps, but I couldn’t let it slow me down.

  I swung the axe, hit the lock on the box. There was a spark that looked like a flash fire in the darkness, and my stomach clenched in fear—no, my whole body clenched. I was expecting an explosion, an apocalyptic maelstrom that would lay waste to us all.

  But all I got was a broken lock, and an unpleasant vibration up my arm.

  “Abe!” Maddie’s voice. “Watch out!”

  I dropped to my knees and opened the box. Inside sat the dynamite. The sticks were covered in old, waxy paper, and clumped together by two black bands. They were sweating nitroglycerin. I needed to be careful, but I didn’t have time to be.

  Maddie cried out, and somewhere behind me, I heard her hit the dirt. Zack screamed, and a black shadow crossed the wall ahead; Cageface had flung him away.

  I was all that was left. The last chance.

  I reached into the box and grabbed a stick. The wick was as brittle as the wood blockade at the mine’s entrance. I was sure that, as soon as I touched it, it would crumble.

  Holding it in my hand, I sprang up and turned around. My heart thundered in anticipation of what I’d find myself face-to-face with.

  I expected Cageface, yes, but I didn’t expect Maddie to be back on her feet, launching the mine cart at him.

  The cart struck him in the back of the legs, but it was too late.

  His dead hand was already around my neck.

  And the cart went down the rusty rails, with Cageface and me inside of it.

  38

  Last Final Showdown

  It took a long moment for me to right myself.

  The fact that Cageface was currently gripping my throat didn’t help. Here we were, two grown men, one dead, cramped into this mine cart.

  “Abe!” I heard Maddie shout; or at least, I thought it was her. It could’ve been Zack or Jason. I wasn’t exactly sure, because the sound of the voice was growing more distant by the second.

  I realized as we drove deeper into the darkness that I’d dropped the stick of dynamite, and I didn’t think I’d dropped it in the cart, because if I had, it would’ve exploded by now.

  My fingers closed around Cageface’s, trying to pry them away from my neck. He was squeezing so tight. I wasn’t sure if I was blacking out, or if it was just that dark.

  The cart shifted sharply to the left. Cageface lost his balance, and I went with him, but I felt his fingers loosen slightly, a natural reaction to nearly getting pitched over the side.

  That surprised me. Cageface was anything but natural.

  I struck out with my knee, connected with his midsection. Heard that terrible squelching noise again. Even worse, I felt the squelch. Cageface fell backward, taking a seat at the other end of the cart.

  The track bumped, and I stumbled forward. As I did, I felt a cold tube of steel.

  The brake! I thought, but really, I had no fucking idea. So what did I do? I grabbed that steel, and I pulled it back.

  It was the brake, and I instantly regretted pulling it.

  The wheels screeched on the tracks. Sparks flew all around us. In the light, I saw that the track ended about fifteen feet farther down, at a slope. So it was really impeccable timing for braking.

  Or so I thought, before the cart pitched over with us still in it.

  I flew through the black air, the afterimage of the sparks tattooed on the back of my eyelids. Weightless. Not knowing where I was going. It was an odd sensation, but not one I completely hated. In this long moment in which I floated through the air, I was sure I’d gone over the edge. I was falling into the endless dark of the long abandoned mineshaft.

  This is what infinity feels like, I remembered thinking. It could be worse.

  Then it got worse.

  I hit the ground. Jagged rocks stabbed at my kidneys, and I coughed. Tasted blood in my mouth. I knew that Cageface couldn’t have landed too far off, but I was content with lying there, with dying. My whole body was crippled with pain. Something was stabbing me in the backside, even after I’d shifted away from the rocks that had greeted me. Something—

  Then I remembered the lighter Jason had given me to light the torch. It was in my back pocket, jabbing me. I reached down and pulled it free, then flipped the top off and struck a flame.

  It stayed lit, but I almost wished it hadn’t. The fire, bright as hell down here in the dark, showed me that I had come about two feet from falling over the edge into the endlessness below.

  That was really nothing, though. I turned away from the broken track, and saw Cageface coming for me. He was near the downed cart.

  So was the stick of dynamite.

  Somehow, someway, it hadn’t exploded.

  If there is a God, I thought, He is totally on my side. For once. Okay. No fear. Go for it.

  I clicked the lighter closed and screamed at the top of my lungs, running at Cageface like a madman.

  In the dark, I brushed against death—literal, standing death. I tripped over the rail, but when I hit the ground, I somersaulted. It wasn’t very smooth; I’m usually about as smooth as the toads I tickled. But somehow, tripping was a godsend.

  I felt Cageface’s hand pass close by my head. It was there…then it wasn’t, just a breeze ruffling my hair.

  My own hand struck out and grabbed the stick of dynamite. I was being too rough with it, I knew that, but I figured I’d take my chances. I’d gotten this far, right?

  It was now or never.

  My back against the upturned mine cart, I struck the flame again. The brightness showed me that Cageface was a few feet away, with both arms out, his bear trap knocked askew. Something grayish-white was leaking from open sores on his squishy face.

  “It’s over,” I told him.

  As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew I shouldn’t have said them. I knew the wick wouldn’t light.

  But it did.

  Sparks flew from the end of the dynamite. I shoved the stick between the trap’s spikes, and kicked out with all the strength I had left in my body.

  Cageface tottered backward, his arms pinwheeling. The heel of one of his boots caught in one of the railroad ties, and he fell.

  Into the endless blackness.

  39

  The Last Chapter

  I expected an explosion. When I didn’t get it, I walked slowly to the edge, the lighter still in my hand.

  This was the equivalent to looking down the barrel of a loaded gun that won’t shoot and pulling the trigger, trying to see what the problem was.

  As soon as I looked down, I saw the bloom of fire somewhere deep below. Slowly, it rose—or at least, it seemed slow until I felt the heat on my face and heard the roar of the flames, so loud my eardrums felt close to bursting.

  The invisible force of the explosion, the wave of heat, sent me backward. I landed hard on my ass. Knocked my head on the metal railing.

  Then—more blackness.

  I don’t know how long I was lying down there unconscious, but I woke up to the sound of Zack’s wailing voice. It was like an alarm clock, the worst and best alarm clock on Earth.

  “Zack?” I called back. More of a screech than anything. The heat seemed to have zapped away any energy I had. I could smell burned hair and smoke. Lots of smoke.

  I heard their footsteps. Forced myself to stand. It was not easy. My legs felt like noodles, and I was pretty sure I had third-degree burns running up my back and along my arms. Pretty sure I’d never be able to grow hair back there.

  I’ll be a naked mole rat for the rest of my life.

>   Footsteps now.

  I lit the lighter, hoping it would be my beacon.

  It was.

  Maddie and Zack carried Jason between them. Their faces were glistening in the firelight of the torch they held, its flame so low, it was pretty much useless. Jason was all right, aside from his broken arm and a couple of gashes on his face, but supporting that much weight wasn’t easy.

  I offered them a weak smile.

  Maddie slipped out from under Jason’s arm, leaving Zack with all the weight. “Gee, thanks,” Zack said.

  She ran over to me, catching me before I could fall. “Are you all right?”

  I nodded.

  “Where’s Cageface?” Zack asked.

  “We heard the explosion,” Maddie said.

  “Did you…?” Zack continued.

  I made a boom sound, and parted my hands.

  “That’s what I smell,” he said.

  “C’mon, let’s get the hell out of here,” Maddie said.

  “How’s Jason?” I asked.

  “All right, mate,” he said and grinned. His teeth were red and shiny. “Thank you.”

  I didn’t reply. I wish he hadn’t thanked me. I didn’t do anything besides my job, and a fairly shitty job, at that. Ellen died, Freddy died, and the town was attacked by a crazed serial slasher.

  But it could’ve been worse. So much worse.

  “Oh, shit!” Zack suddenly said. He lifted up one of his hands that was supporting Jason, and Jason slumped against him, almost taking them both down.

  I spun around as quick as I could, but the pain prevented me from being anything remotely close to fast.

  Maddie crouched like she was ready to attack.

  Zack set Jason down and ran toward the chasm.

  “The son of a bitch isn’t dead,” he said.

  Sure enough, on the edge of the tracks, where Cageface had seemingly disappeared, was his burned and bloody hand.

  In the light from the flickering flame, I saw little wisps of smoke drifting up from the skin. The fingers dug into the dirt and pulled themselves forward.

  My mind was spinning, and I was thinking, Oh please not now does this shit ever end—

  That was when Zack started laughing.

  I didn’t know what the hell he was laughing about, but I knew whatever it was surely wasn’t funny. Maybe he was going to stomp on the fingers, make sure Cageface couldn’t pull himself up.

  It was a good idea, except getting that close to the slasher could prove to be fatal; especially when so close to an endless abyss.

  But that’s not what he did.

  “Zack! What the heck are you doing?” Maddie cried. “Get back here!”

  He bent down. What is he doing? He and Cageface’s secret handshake?

  Because his back was to me, and the shadows down here swallowed everything up, even with the lighter, I couldn’t really tell.

  All I knew was that we were pretty beat up ourselves, not to mention weaponless. If Cageface clawed his way back up, we’d be screwed. There was no chance we’d be able to beat him again, especially without dynamite.

  The lighter in my hand grew hot. I dropped it, and the flame guttered out completely. I was quick to bend down and pick it up, despite my protesting and sore muscles. Maddie and Zack’s torch just wasn’t enough light.

  I struck the lighter again, afraid of what I’d see.

  My throat felt like it was closing up, like the darkness itself was finding its way inside of me, choking me, bringing me close to eternity.

  “Hi, guys!” Zack said and then laughed.

  “What the—?” Maddie said. “Zack, you’re sick.”

  He held Cageface’s disconnected arm in his hand, and waved it back and forth.

  “I’m not sick,” Zack argued. “But…I am gonna keep this.”

  “You did a good job,” Octavius said. “Better than most could do.”

  We were back in his office. He held a cigarette, and Chip, beneath the bell jar, made a face worse than death at the drifting smoke.

  “How’s Jason?” Maddie asked.

  “Healing.” Octavius tapped his ashes in an empty coffee cup from Dunkin Donuts. “He’ll be out of his cast in a few weeks.”

  “Good,” I said.

  “Yeah, give him our best,” Zack said. He had since gotten another pair of sunglasses, this time of the cheaper variety. “And tell him I’m ready to arm wrestle whenever, as long as it’s with his bad arm.”

  “He’d still beat you,” Maddie whispered.

  Zack said, “Wanna bet?”

  “I will,” Octavius said, smiling. “Give him your best, that is. The arm wrestling…well, we don’t need any more broken limbs.”

  Maddie snickered.

  I didn’t. My mind had been going over what had happened since we’d left the mine and the town a week ago. I’d learned that most of Moonfall had been deserted. The few hundred still hanging around the dying town were the old and stubborn, the ones who would never believe in a thing like Cageface, even if he was knocking on their front door with a bloody machete.

  They’d be fine, anyway. Cageface was gone. And BEAST now had part of the slasher’s arm in their evidence room—Zack didn’t get to keep it. It had since stopped moving, and the decomposing flesh was nearly gone to the bone. The mineshaft had been sealed from the outside with concrete; no one was getting in or out of there for a long time.

  Pretty soon, Octavius was standing up and shaking Zack’s hand, hugging Maddie, saying their goodbyes. A good five minutes had passed, and it was time for us to head back to up Akron.

  “Oh, Abraham, I’d like a word with you alone, if you don’t mind,” Octavius said.

  “Uh-ohhhh,” Chip said. Octavius took out that sheet and covered the bell jar with it. “Hey!” But then he instantly shut up. That sheet worked like a charm.

  “We’ll be out in the lot,” Zack said. They left.

  Octavius smiled at me. There was something like pride in his eyes. “I’m sorry, Abe. I’m sorry for all that you had to go through.”

  I shrugged. “All part of the job.”

  “Are you ready to resume your training? A soul-slayer must not let his powers dull.”

  “Yeah…about that,” I said. “You said Moonfall would be good exercise, but when I tried using my powers or whatever on Cageface, it didn’t work.”

  “Well, you should’ve known,” Octavius said, crossing around his desk and leaning against it, “an undead creature such as Cageface, is without a soul.”

  I shook my head. “Why do you have to be all cryptic, Octavius? Can’t you just tell me these things? The confusing Yoda wisdom is getting a little old.”

  “I can only tell you these things if you tell them to yourself first,” he replied.

  I screwed my face up in confusion. “What does that even mean?”

  Octavius shrugged.

  I laughed and he clapped me on the back. “I’m proud of you,” he said. “I really am. Thank you for keeping my nephew safe.”

  “I couldn’t save the others.”

  “We can’t save everyone,” he said.

  “But we can try.”

  He crossed his arms and nodded. “So much like your father, Abraham.”

  I reached out to shake his hand, but he pulled me in for a hug. I was a little surprised at first, but after it passed, I hugged him back.

  When we parted, I said, “Call me when you have another job.”

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  Afterword

  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I love slasher flicks. Many years ago, I remember binge watching all of the Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street, and Friday the 13th movie
s. Those films helped forge my love of all things horror.

  Fright Squad 3 is my love letter to all those blood-drenched, cheesy, neon-colored slashers of decades past. Hope you liked it.

  F.M.

  June 28th, 2018

  About the Author

  Flint Maxwell lives in Ohio, where the skies are always gray and the sports teams are consistently disappointing. He loves Star Wars, basketball, Stephen King novels, and almost anything horror. You can probably find him hanging out with one (or all) of his five household pets when he’s not writing, reading, or watching Netflix.

  Get in touch with Flint on Facebook

  Also by Flint Maxwell

  Jack Zombie Series

  Dead Haven (Book 1)

  Dead Hope (Book 2)

  Dead Nation (Book 3)

  Dead Coast (Book 4)

  Dead End (Book 5)

  Dead Lost (Book 6)

  Fright Squad Series

  Fright Squad: A Comedic-Horror Adventure

  Fright Squad 2: The Monster Games

  The Midwest Magic Chronicles

  The Midwest Witch (Book #1)

  The Midwest Wanderer (Book #2)

  The Midwest Whisperer (Book #3)

  The Midwest War (Book #4)

  Something Dark: Horror Stories

  Let Us Out