by Justin Bell
CHAPTER TWELVE
The dream was never the same. Consumed by a dark brown sea of blood, he desperately swam to the surface; the thick current grabbed his shoulders and tore him down into the bowels of the ocean. Above the surface, stark blue lightning streaked across the dark sky, and in that dark sky was air? air that he desperately needed. Struggling through the oatmeal surface of the water, Strickland grabbed the liquid in scrambling fistfuls, pulling himself up and out, the surface getting closer and closer. With one last surge, he broke through, out into the clear night sky. Then he was pulled through a narrow tunnel, hurtling until he slammed into the wooden floor of the family cabin with a bone-shaking crash. Pulling his head up and around, the woman stood before him, reaching to him, crying for him, pleading to him? but the monster was there. Looming above her, the dark beast opened its fang-filled mouth.
"No!" Strickland tried to yell, but his mouth was full of clumpy seawater. "Don't! No!"
Tears streamed down the woman's face, her mouth contorted in a scream of fear and misunderstanding as the creature grappled with her and turned her head aside. Its mouth widened, teeth gnashed and it paused for just a second, waiting to close its jaws around the victim's throat? the sickening crunch echoed and lightning flashed across his wide eyes, then nothing.
Strickland jerked awake, and sat up in the inky black room that surrounded him. Panic settled into his mind as he felt his memory of the previous days and weeks filtering away, just at the edge of consciousness.
"Dammit, no!" he shouted trying to force his brain to recapture what had happened. What had brought him here? He didn't recognize his surroundings, but he knew his t-shirt was shredded, hanging off him in thin ribbons, and he could feel the sticky mess of wounds throughout his body. Nothing life threatening, but he knew he had been hurt? doing what?
Slumping out of the short bed, he landed with a thump on the beat-up wooden floor beneath him. Where was he? It was too dark to tell, but the crisp air felt like he was almost outside, only protected by a few thin walls. The cabin? He stood and walked to the full-length mirror that he could now see behind the closed door of the cabin and looked at himself, shocked with his condition. He barely recognized the face that stared back at him. His head was shaven nearly bald and a straggly goatee surrounded his mouth. A dark red smear mixed in with the goatee and he shuddered. Aches and pains consumed his entire body, but especially in his lower legs, which felt like they had been ground to powder, and then piled up and glued together again. Memories floated at the edge of his mind, not quite close enough to grasp. Where am I?
And where is my family?
He had a family.
A wife. Two daughters.
That much drifted back into his mind, although he couldn't picture their faces or names. Lowering his head, he wrapped a large hand around it and squeezed gently, trying to massage away the fog and bring the memories back. Turning from the mirror, he walked to the kitchen, which was little more than an extended section of the main living area, and turned on the tap, washing his hands and splashing the water over his confused face. He noticed something sitting in the corner and he walked over to it, almost unbelievably. A submachine gun rested in the corner, with a belt and two holsters coiled up underneath it. A vest, ripped and pockmarked, sat on a pile on the floor not too far away.
"What the hell?" he exclaimed to himself. Closing his eyes, he tried to picture his last memory, and he could almost make out a long glass hallway, and? bullets.
So many bullets.
Out of nowhere, a petrified face jumped into view, its mouth contorted open while Strickland buried his mouth in his neck and tore out-
The bald man ran towards the kitchen sink and threw up, noisily vacating the contents of his previous days' meals. He scowled, seeing a disturbingly red shade of liquid in the smooth metallic surface of the sink. Turning, he slumped to a seated posture on the kitchen floor, lowering his head in his hands.