“I-I-I…”
Behind him, Officer Beagle tried to speak up, but he didn’t get a full syllable out. “You shut up.”
“I-I-I…” I looked around Benner’s waist, then behind me, where the house stood silently, like a bored observer. My eyes raced over every shadow and shrub. I knew the prime was still there. I knew something was watching me.
“Stand up. You’re okay,” Benner said. Then he helped me. I wobbled on my own two feet, and braced. Mistakenly grabbing too close to the holster. Benner shrugged me off, and protected his firearm, looking at me as if I had committed the most mortal sins.
“S-s-sorry,” I said. “I… he attacked me.”
Beagle paced, fists clenched. Another officer had been restraining him and strafed from side-to-side in the effort to keep us separated.
“He tried to—”
Benner cut Beagle off once again. “I want him to tell me.”
“The prime. It makes people agitated. I know that was all that happened to your officer. It’s near. It’s so near. You have to believe me.”
“I do,” Benner said. “My forensics confirmed those aren’t the bites of a dog.”
My body tingled, like the wonderful sensation of stepping into a hot tub in the middle of a winter night.
“You do?”
“Animal Control came over and is confirming that the paw prints don’t match the victims’ dog. But it’s clear as day that they aren’t a match.”
“Yes, that’s what I was telling you.”
“You’re probably right, that its only chili around the dogs mouth, too.”
“What? No!” Beagle shouted. “He took me around here to kill me. He has a knife a syringe on him, sir!”
Benner squinted at me, asking without words.
“I do,” I admitted. “It’s a strong sedative of my own concoction. I assure you it was for the prime.”
“Prime?”
“The creature. Your killer,” I said.
“Okay, come in side. I want to get you opinion on one more thing.”
I nodded and tailed the detective with great persistence.
Benner snapped his teeth at me, while the other officer reminded him to settle down.
Benner skipped steps on the way up the back porch. I tried to do the same, but my adrenaline hurried me. I tripped, barely grasping the handrail. Benner glared back at me. A rush of understanding came over me as I felt just like one of Benner’s officers—like the inept Beagle.
Inside the house, the scene had changed. Camera flashes were bouncing off the walls. It was loud and disorientating as other members of law enforcement. We navigated around the living room into a back bedroom where I could hear, Spunk the family dog, whining in a cage. She had peed all over the floor and didn’t want to lay down in it.
“That dog is innocent. Set her free,” I declared, feeling a bit more like myself. Regrettably so, to some degree. For if my heart settled, I was off the trail. The prime was elsewhere. But I did not completely lament my sudden sense of security.
An animal control officer stood with a syringe in one gloved hand, holding it like an annoyed tyrannosaurs rex. “Can I sedate the poor thing already?”
“Just a minute,” Benner said. He knelt down and held his hand out. Spunk came to him, licked his finger in hops affection could buy her freedom. Once close, Benner motioned me towards the cage. I knelt as he kept Spunk occupied by scratching below her chin. “Right there, you see that?”
There were dried chunks of chili caught in her fur. But I only mistook that for a moment, as it became quite clear what Benner was pointing out.
“I’m not an expert in dogs,” I said. “But she must be pregnant.”
The animal control officer sighed, the kind of sigh that starts wars. When both Benner and I glared at him, he said, “She ain’t pregnant. It’s probably a tumor or a reaction to eating something.”
“It’s moving,” Benner said.
“Again, I don’t know what that means.”
“Detective? Detective?” Someone outside the room called. Someone instructed him that they last saw him going outside—then another corrected him and pointed the person back to us.
“Detective?”
“Yes?”
The woman held up a plastic bag. “You wanted to know ASAP. Well, ASAP it is. That’s chili form the dogs mouth…”
“I knew it!” I said.
“…and a lot of blood. I’m sure it matches the victims’.”
The wind came out of my sales so fast, if I were a sailboat, I’d tip over. And I almost did. I braced myself on the cage, startling Spunk. She bit at Benner and then growled like distant thunder.
“Benner kicked the cage and stood up, shaking more than just his head. Still he said to the woman, “Thank you.”
She nodded and went away.
“I assure you, Detective, that this is not the work of the family dog.”
“Can I put her out now?” The animal control officer asked.
“Fine, yes.”
“No,” I said. “She’s innocent. It’s possible she ran her muzzle in the bodies long after the fact but I assure you…”
“We’re going to cut her open and check it out. Or maybe she’ll poop out a finger,” the animal control guy said with a snarl.
“Aren’t you supposed to like animals?” I asked.
“Makes the job easier when you hate them. Just like it makes it easier to arrest people if you hate them too, right Detective?”
“Shut up, and put the damned dog to sleep.”
“But Detective…”
He twisted around so fast, I thought he was going to turn me inside out like the famed drill sergeants, but he only said, “Thank you for your assistance, Mr. Harrold. But I’m going to have to ask you to leave the crime scene.”
“This is the best chance we have of finding it, don’t you understand…the real killer is close by. I know it. I felt it outside.”
“Then you can keep looking for it outside.” There was something gentle in his tone. He wasn’t actually kicking me out. I could see that now. Benner wanted me to keep investigating. He really did believe me. “Someone put on a pot of coffee. You want some before you go?”
Caffeine—in my current state—never.
There was a loud yelp behind me.
And then Spunk slipped in her own urine.
I apologized silently and followed the detective onto the front porch. The door had been left wide open, but the mosquitos and flies were likely enjoying the festivities in the kitchen.
“If you feel anxiety, an unbearable sense of malevolence, then it is close, Detective.”
He nodded. “I’ve felt that since I got here.” His eyes glided over and past me. I looked out among the neighborhood, wondering what interested him. Was the properly manicured lawns? The children hiding behind bushes in the neighbor’s yard trying to see a dead body? Or had something moved—something that stirred every fiber of his being.
I felt my heart again. It hadn’t actually stopped racing—I’d just become numb to the sensation. Everything felt heightened. From my ears which kept perking up to match the conversations emanating from the house, to my nose, which smelled cut grass, fresh mulch, and a pine tree that was more than a hundred feet away from me—or was it just a cleaning product being used within the house. I couldn’t be sure. My senses felt betrayed—overstimulated. I was as good as blind, I thought. Now’s your chance, prime. Come and get me!
Detective Benner felt it too. He grabbed his firearm. Not out of immediate need, but to top the trembling of his hand.
“Tell me everything,” he said.
So I did.
When I was done, he thanked me. I knew the orange evening sun was more than just symbolic. The day was done. Our conversation hushed several times as forensics, animal control, and other officers came and went. The sleeping Spunk was left in a cage on the back of the animal control truck. The officer bent over and tied his shoes and then then an
officer called him over. He’d forgotten his keys apparently.
It all felt so humdrum.
But we shared an aversion to make eye contact with each other. Animosity, thick as smoke.
He jogged back out to his truck and yelled—not screamed.
“What the?” He came around his truck, but Benner had already left me on the porch, sprinted across the lawn and met the animal control officer at the side of his truck.
“What, what is it?”
“You better tell me!” the animal control officer said.
I stumbled my way over, finding every crack in the pavers to stub my toes. When I reached the truck, there was enough silence as the two men looked that I could already hear the globing drops of blood. It made me stop, as I stared at the puzzle and suddenly felt as if my ankles were naked and in danger.
I eased around the truck, skipping to get behind the detective.
Anger cracked my voice when I saw it. “I told you it wasn’t the dog!”
The animal control officer grabbed me. Shoved me to the ground. I scraped my hands on the asphalt driveway. I prepared to fight, but Benner kept us separated again. And so I sat on my butt and stared at the mangled cage. Pried apart with ease. Just like poor Spunk’s belly. Almost like a knife had cut it surgically for an autopsy. The cage, had even pinned the flaps open and in the direct light of a setting sun, I could even make out bits of beans and black-eyed peas from the chili.
Frozen again, I stared, knowing the whole world could move around me. The prime could get me, if it so desired. It could get all of us.
“We can’t turn on each other…” I said. “We are not enemies…we’re prey now.”
“The bastard hid in the dog’s belly.”
“Probably why your lady found blood in its mouth, don’t you think. As I’ve said, it wasn’t the dog.”
The animal control officer trembled. “Is this some kind of alien thing, cause I handle domestic animals, we’ve got a guy for exotics. Anacondas and shit.”
Benner sucked in his lips and shook his head at me. He raised both eyebrows, not just one this time. “I don’t know how to handle this, either.”
Now they both stared at me.
I’d be lying if I said I felt no vindication in this moment—but it was not as pleasant a feeling as one would have imagined. My silence proved disagreeable.
Benner grabbed his radio. “I need all officers to go door-to-door. Get neighbors to lock up. Our killer is on the loose.”
Then he walked over to me, and picked me up off the ground. “I want you to get somewhere safe.”
“Huh?”
“You’re the only person who knows anything about these things, these primes. You get out of here. Get somewhere safe. Stay by your phone. You have a phone?”
I nodded. I desperately fished in my pants to prove it. It rolled out on the ground. Benner picked it up and dialed his number.
“Now I have your number and you have mine. It’s also on the card I gave you earlier. I’m going to call you when I need you. I figured this thing makes us lose our minds a little, right, so if you have a clear head, if you’re thinking right, you can guide me. Got it? Oh, and that syringe…. That homemade cocktail. Will it work?”
“I don’t kn-kn-know.”
“Fine. Give it to me anyway, just in case,” Benne said. “Now, go get out of here. And you better pick up when I call you.”
“I will, detective.”
I scrambled over to my car, jumping between steps, like that small creature would come for my feet first. It was small enough to fit inside the belly of a dog after all. That was far smaller than I’d been on the lookout for. It changed everything—even the little thread of security that I felt because I knew these things existed was gone.
I hit the button on my key chain and my doors, Unlocked. I snapped the handle and dove inside. I slammed the door, almost bonking myself in the head. Not almost—I did, only it didn’t hurt because I was freaking out. Luckily, it was a keyless ignition. I didn’t fumble keys as people do in this moment. I jammed my finger and my car started. No shaky motor—shouldn’t that have brought comfort. I started down out into the street, but was struck by a sudden urge to check one more place.
I stopped my car at the end of the driveway. I gazed at the mailbox, and then I thought better of it and drove home. An ease engulfed me the further I drove, until I realized it was just the ease of having avoided a mutated hornet. No, my heart still raced, a weight still hung over my thoughts and shoulders.
Why shouldn’t there be lasting trauma. There had been some before—the only other time I had been in their presence. For days, I felt as if it lurked right over my shoulder. Still, this felt different.
Of course, I checked my rearview mirror. I couldn’t take my eyes off it. There was nothing in my backseat. And I always locked my car doors when I exit. The only moment it could’ve gotten in was when I slid myself in. And I had to trust that I would’ve seen it. I had to fight these primitive inclinations.
I had to convince myself I was safe now.
I reached the interstate, when Detective Benner called.
“The twilight made it a little hard,” he said. “But it left a small trail down the driveway. Then it wiped itself off on a bush. It knew it would be followed. Christ, these things are smart aren’t they?”
“They had to be, to evade the species that nearly wiped them out centuries ago,” I said.
“I feel better now,” Benner said.
“That’s good. That means it’s not around anymore.”
“I wish it was. I wished I could catch it,” Benner said. “I mean it, I do believe you, Mr. Harrold, but it’s still unbelievable. If I could’ve caught it, it would’ve made sense. But now it’s like I don’t know the face of the bogeyman. I just know he’s out there. It makes me uneasy.”
“I’ve lived with that feeling most of my life, Detective.”
“That so, you’re an old man, so I guess there is hope for me.”
I checked my rearview mirror again. It seemed like the moment something would jump out at me. Things had gotten quiet. Except for the passing tractor-trailers on my left, the interstate was just as calm as a babbling creek.
“If you never saw one, how did you know they existed?” Benner asked.
“My father told me,” I said. “Of course, I didn’t believe him. Then one die he was dead, and I knew. I knew it had found him.”
“Is it…”
“Vengeful?” I finished his question. “I don’t think they can really tell the difference from one human to the next. They’re animals. Dangerous animals. If they could really tell the difference between us, then they would surely hunt me down. I’m the one that keeps telling people about them. If they kill me—they have the element of surprise again. They could take back this planet.”
The groan was inaudible, but I almost felt it through the cellphone. Once again, I’d said one too many words and sounded like an old kook.
“Should I stop by your office this week, I can dig out my old of the case studies I’ve done.”
“That’ll be fine, Mr. Harrold. Have a good night.”
The case files required no digging, of course. My mobile home was well organized. I hadn’t connected any power to it, and the even in the dim light of a Wal-Mart parking lot, I could find them sitting on the food out desk, where I had read them the night before, over and over again. But they were incomplete. I read them repeatedly because I thought I’d remember something or have something to add. Maybe now, I had more to add. I had a size to the primes that I never really had before. I had an idea that they could live within the bellies of animals to evade capture. But Detective Benner would want more.
No, I thought. I was better not showing him any of my life’s work. He was a real detective. He wouldn’t stop until he got his man. And if I dared to admit, I felt like getting out of this town. Maybe it would remember me, but I’m sure I could drive further than it would look to find me. I just
needed to hook the trailer back up to the car, and I could be on my way first thing in the morning. Just wake up and drive on.
Cars still, came and went, as the shopping center stayed busy. It wasn’t even going to be a pleasant place to sleep. Trucks flew by on the interstate and loud bass rumbled from shoppers with no agenda.
I made up my mind to leave right then and there. Loud bass had always unsettled my heart, thrown it off its beat, made it feel like everything inside me was rattling around.
I bent over to hook up. And it dropped.
It dropped like a glob of putty from my transmission. Flat as a pancake—and that was what my mind wanted to believe it was—as if a truck full of pancakes had dropped a few and one just happened to get lodged in my undercarriage.
But then it sprung, uncoiling from a flat round wafer—inflating itself into a four legged, two armed, one headed, one large mouthed creature of forgotten nightmares remembered. Like a creature of the deep sea had been lodged in the throat of a limbed afterbirth.
I screamed, but not a soul bothered. Good for them.
I wished them safety not harm.
But it was not death that muffled my screams.
I remembered thinking, this is how I die—choking to death.
But then my gag reflex kicked in and I thought I’d throw the prime up.
But it fought too. My eyes watered and my mouth felt empty. My throat ached as it pushed up against my spine. Then the prime did something and I swallowed. I swallowed it whole.
It rummaged around in my stomach—making its damned self comfortable.
I found the use of my feet and ripped open the motorhome door. I thought I would cut it out. But something calmed me. And I thought of Spunk, and how she had been calm when the police arrived. Did the prime do something that my body now absorbed through digestion? I had an urge to write it all down.
So I did.
And then I drove through the night, feeling like I knew where I was going. But I made turns before I thought about them. And though I knew I should cut the prime from my belly, or be afraid of it bursting out and ending my sad pathetic life.
I was happy… and not in the least bit hungry.
9 Tales Told in the Dark 22 Page 3