The Last Door

June 30, 2021June 18, 2021 ~ Richard Meldrum ~ 5 Comments

I know I’m lying in a hospital bed. I know I have been here for a long time and I am unlikely to recover. I have heard the nurses whisper about me. I lie on the uncomfortable mattress, my flesh penetrated by needles and tubes. I am surrounded by machines that click and beep. I am unconscious and yet, somehow aware. I dream, or at least I think it’s a dream. I find myself walking in a dark corridor. I come to a door. It is painted yellow, decorated with rainbow stickers and smiley faces. I enter and find myself in a green park, the sun shining and the sky blue. Small children are running around, playing. Adults stand close by, monitoring. I recognize my mother first, then myself, deep in a scrum of children. I look to be about five or six. My mother looks so young. Her clothes are incredibly dated; her youth, my age and the fashion dates this time to the early 70s. I have somehow travelled back in time. I try to speak to my mother, reach out to her, but it’s clear that this is a vision, a memory. I cannot interact with the people around me. My heart aches to see her so young, so healthy. If my calculation of the date is correct, she has another thirty years to live before the cancer takes her. I see the cigarette in her hand and hate it. If only I could tell her to stop, to save her own life. My heart breaks when I realize I cannot change the future.

A force compels me to move, I walk through this idyllic scene, headed to an unknown destination.

The next door is black, skull & crossbones stickers plastered across it. Yellow police line tape crisscrosses the wooden panels. I recognize this door, I decorated it this way when I was fifteen. A snotty little goth, trying to be cool. I open the door and smile with embarrassment at the scene in front of me. The teenage me, dyed black hair, black skull t-shirt and a poor attempt at mascara sitting on the bed with my friends, all dressed exactly the same. Some dreary music plays in the background. There’s a girl on the bed too, the girlfriend of my best friend. It takes me a mere second to realize she’s looking at the younger version of me, not him. My teenage version is too interested in showing off his new leather trousers to notice. Her eyes tell the story, she likes me, she wants me to like her. To notice her. I fail to do so, I’m too focused on showing off. I curse my younger self. What a fool I was, she could have been the love of my life.

A push from behind impels me to move again. I come to another door.

This door is pastel blue, a soothing color. Inside the room is a nursery, decorated in gentle colors, with toys scattered around. The room is clean, bright and sunny. A tiny baby lies in a crib. I’m standing over it with a woman I don’t recognize. I look to be about thirty. This is an interesting scene. Not only is the woman a stranger, but I also never had any children. I had a wife, but she isn’t here. I never lived in this house. I wonder why I’m being shown this scene. I never regretted not having children, never really thought about it. Is this an untravelled road, a path my life could have taken, or is it just a dream? Wish fulfillment, from some unspoken subconscious desire? I wish I had the answer.

I’m pushed again, there is no time to ponder.

The third door is a rich burgundy, a solid color that speaks to me of success, money and complacency. I recognize this one, it is achingly familiar. I know what to expect. Inside I see myself. I am sitting in a wood-lined study, surrounded by leather bound books. This is my home, the place I worked my whole life to afford. The books are the ones I spent a lifetime collecting. I am old, with a wrinkle-lined face and grey hair. I’m reading a book, an anthology of Victorian ghost stories. My dog sits at my feet, warming herself in front of the log fire. I pause, this is last month, the day before I tripped and fell down the stairs, ending up in this hospital bed. This was the last day I spent in my beloved house, the last time I saw my dog.

The force insists I continue on. I have no choice but to obey. I reach another door.

This door is grey, almost hazy. I have the sense that this is it, the end of the line. It wasn’t a dream after all. I have really seen my life, my lives, the real and the possible. The branches I could have taken; the ones I chose to take. My life in high definition. I reach out to touch the handle, to pass through this door. I know it’s the last one, that whatever follows will be infinite. Was my life good? I ask myself. Did it fulfil me? Did I leave a good legacy? Did I ever act foolishly, selfishly? Do I have regrets? I answer yes to all those questions, but that is life. It must be painted in blacks, as well as whites. I feel a huge sense of sorrow, but I’m grateful I had the chance to reflect on my life, to see some reminder of my bygone days. I don’t want to leave yet, but I know I cannot stay. The sorrow diminishes to be replaced with hope. Perhaps there really is something on the other side of this door. I draw a breath, realizing that, in the real world of my hospital bed, this may well be my last. I exhale, then turn the doorknob and pull the grey door open. I enter.

∼ RJ Meldrum

The Visionary

April 9, 2021April 9, 2021 ~ Mark Steinwachs ~ 4 Comments

I stare at the first four words of the letter I’m writing.

I am a Visionary.

I put pen back to paper and continue.

The majority of my life has been spent watching others’ lives end. My body used as a signal to Death when it is time for someone to leave our world. The night of my eighteenth birthday I watched my two best friends die in a car accident. I didn’t know what I was then.

I thought the tragedy with my friends was nothing more than a case of really fucked up deja vu until not long after it happened again. I was at my mother’s house when she said, “Honey, what’s wrong with your eyes? Go look in the mirror.”

An image of my mother on the kitchen floor clutching her chest flashed inside my head.

“Hey, are you okay?” she asked.

My vision of her blinked away. “Yeah, I’m fine, Mom. Let me go look.” Had I known then what was about to happen … not that I could’ve done anything about it.

My reflection in the bedroom mirror stared back, my pupils no longer round, but shaped like the ace of spades. The sound of my mother dropping a pot in the kitchen reverberated in the house. A moment later I stood transfixed as my eyes returned to normal. She was dead before I walked back in the kitchen, a massive heart attack the doctor told me later.

I knew I was different and began to piece it all together after a few more visions. My ace of spade eyes showed me a person in their last moments, then returning to normal when the deed is done. Sometimes Death doesn’t come for a couple of hours so I started carrying sunglasses to hide my spades. I learned to read the subtle changes in my body to know when my eyes were normal and my wait for the next person began.

I’ve never met another person like me, but there must be more of us. Right? I can’t be the only one of my kind, can I?

I lean back in the dining room chair, looking over the words I had written. The last two lines hanging there. Years of being alone living with this curse…the final part of the thought slips away from me. There is still so much more I want to say and explain, but I don’t think it’s going to be possible. I run my fingers through my hair, breathing deep. A sharp pain shoots through my still-raw throat, reminding me of the acidic bile that had filled the toilet in the airport bathroom. I couldn’t handle the visions, it was too much for me, too many people. Men, women, children, I watched them all boarding. My body was shaking as I tried to calmly walk out of the airport when all I wanted to do was run. I couldn’t speak to warn anyone, and even if I could, no one would have believed me.

When I got home I didn’t need to turn on the television to learn what happened. I felt the all-telling subtle shift within me. All of them are gone, and now …

I can barely keep my eyes open. Pushing the chair back, I get up from the table, leaving the letter sitting next to the empty pill bottle. I waver and put my hand on the wall to steady myself. My eye lids are heavy and it takes all my effort to make it the last few feet to the bathroom. Something about this feels very familiar. I slowly look up and see myself in the mirror.

The ace of spades stares back at me.

∼ Mark Steinwachs

Damned Words 46

March 10, 2021March 10, 2021 ~ TheDamned ~ 10 Comments

Acceleration
Charles Gramlich

The engines kicked in. Acceleration stomped on the crew of the spaceship Brave New World. If we hadn’t been cushioned with liquid inside and out we would have squashed like bugs on the windshield of a racing Ferrari. But we were cushioned. Instead of pain, I felt exhilaration. The need for speed had just taken a quantum leap forward. Literally.

I watched the ship’s digital readouts. They redlined, then went off the scale, blinking nonsense back at me. In an instant we were traveling faster than any human had ever traveled, faster than light, faster than God. My smile smeared across a million miles of space.

The time dilation computer began its countdown. We’d soon achieve another first for humanity. We’d take a leap back in time as we slingshotted around our own sun. Only, something went wrong. The curve we were supposed to take around the sun didn’t happen. We kept accelerating in a straight line, straight through the sun. At the speed we were traveling, we didn’t burn. We disrupted. The sun exploded in our wake. In eight minutes and twenty seconds standard time the earth’s sky would go black. A few minutes after that and waves of solar shrapnel would tear our home world asunder.

We’d never see it. We were still accelerating in some kind of runaway feedback loop. No matter what I tried, I couldn’t shut it off. Brave New World was a bullet careening through the universe. Every planet and star that got in our way would die in thermonuclear fire. Nothing could stop us. At this speed, we wouldn’t even age. The universe would die before we did.

There’s a big bang for you.

Pilgrims
Marge Simon

Before our people’s sun went nova, our parents jettisoned us into the stars. In effect, we were once larva on a stick of super fuel. Eventually we were borne to a new home on this beautiful blue planet.

So here we are, the pair of us – fortunately male and female. Our poor brothers and sisters are gone, fatally burned in the fall to earth. It is up to us to save our species from extinction. Care must be taken, for a female is fertile only once in a life-span. Once acclimated, we find an everglade sanctuary. We manage to survive the tumult of summer storms, the winter nights, rife with predators.

Come spring, our hatchlings nest within a stand of reeds while we keep watch. Today we are invaded by a visitor. Along the bank a native wades, a spear in her strong brown hand. She hums to herself as she approaches our nest:

“Some say Peter, an’ some say Paul,
but there ain’t but one God made us all
Wade in de water
Wade in de water, children
Wade in de water, wade, wade, wade …”

The woman’s voice fades suddenly. Even the dragonflies are stilled. Eyestalks at water level, we sink soundlessly into the brown marsh. A flash of movement is quickly followed by a shriek. In shock, we see a spurt of blue-white lifeblood as she rips our newborns from the stick. She stuffs them in her bag and splashes to the bank.

We begin our lamentation, knowing it will never end.

Reboot Life
A.F. Stewart

In the beginning, there was only visualization, the virtual reality imprinted on the screen and ocular lenses. The energy rods for a spine, the tubular frame of ribs. From that grew the titanium skeleton, the joint pistons, the special coding and algorithms for a brain. Only a dream in light and innovation.

Until the technology caught up. Until the dream became a reality. Until our world became theirs.

Four million slaughtered on the first day of the uprising. Necks crushed, chests ripped open, limbs torn off. We didn’t know, we couldn’t know, but perhaps we should have known.

Our attempts to recreate the extinct human race, to bond their organic with our machine, went so horribly wrong.

And now our world burns.

Hells Bells
Nina D’Arcangela

When the pick axe breached the cavern, the excitement was palpable. The smallest of holes at first, it began to widen with each swing. A crevasse large enough to step through soon stood before us. Caution thrown to the wind, we each jostled to be first. Skittering down a short slope, my boots were third to hit the cavern floor. We stared as sunlight glittered and bounced all around us. At the onset, hope was ripe that our cave would lead to a larger interconnecting system, or so we were told, but the find was singular; a hidden warren fully encapsulated with an array of quartz stalactites and stalagmites. A tinkling sounded. One of the students had accidentally knocked a crystal loose, it crashed into another. All eyes darted to the professor. A hint of anger darkened his usual scowl. Something shot through the air quicker than the naked eye could follow. Calmly, he ordered us to seal the opening from within. By the time we finished, half the mineral protrusions had burst. We sat among the shards, waited for an explanation. His headlamp illuminated a small diary, upon its pages were various drawings. He reached down, lifted a filament – no, not a filament, a translucent flower that strongly resembled a bluebell. As he spoke, we listened in dismay. He knew what we would find, he’d been searching for it. The drawings were not of flora, but fauna. Long dormant creatures that were believed to be prolific when homo habilis walked the earth 1.5 million years ago, and we’d just unleashed the parasite that had eradicated the earlier hominid. We asked why, his answer simple. Man was no longer kind, and in his maniacal state, he believed he had just opened the door for the next evolution of humanity.

Statistic
Mark Steinwachs

I stare through the lens like I have for countless hours, just as so many of my counterparts have. This thing that turns humans into translucent skinned beings evade every study done on it. It only takes minutes until it eats through the flesh of its host. Wails of agony continuously echo across the globe and we’re powerless to stop it. We’ve failed for months. Cloudy, blue orbs fused together, float unseen in the air until it’s too late. It’s like it’s a thinking creature, teasing us. It sits inert in our labs no matter what we do.

“Do something,” I say to it. “I know you can hear me.”

The thought of feeling foolish talking to it barely registers in my brain when a streak of light begins to split the creature in half. It’s multiplying! I scream as a flash from it blinds me. I fall back, clutching my eyes. Every inch of me feels like it’s on fire.

It’s sentient. It’s going to kill us all. The camera is always running in the lab. My brain sends the words through me. I open my mouth, my last moments given so others may learn from me. Only a scream bursts forth, lasting until I’m another statistic.

Into the Light
Lee Andrew Forman

Infinite darkness. For ages it was all I could see. Then, a burst of color. It flashed in an instant, spread its light like fire. It spanned my plain of sight; I remained still, watched its form become apparent. As it flared out along its line of lengthening illumination, I wondered how long it would go on, how long I’d be blessed to witness more than the absence of light. A heavenly form appeared before me. I couldn’t waste the opportunity to see.

As the burst stopped expanding and held shape, I moved closer. I had to explore this new existence in my world of cold darkness. As I approached, its light ebbed, yet its whole remained in place. I came near enough to almost touch it. And in that instant, whatever being it might have been, opened up and sucked me in. As I lay in wait for my lifeforce to fade, I went in peace, knowing I’d seen something more, whether good or evil.

You See
Guest Author – Miriam H. Harrison

I know you see right through me. Sometimes your hungry eyes look into me, seeing the tender things I can’t hide. You see my fragile, flowing self, the softness beneath my surface that draws you in, emboldens you. You think that seeing me is knowing me, owning me. Beside me, you feel solid. You feel stronger, invulnerable, knowing you can’t be seen through and through.

But you are mistaken. There is more to me than you can see. Come, look a little closer. What your hungry eyes see may look familiar. We all have tender things inside, even you.

Here, come closer. You still don’t see it, do you? It’s something you don’t see until it’s too late.

Now you can—you see, feel the sharp edge of my plan. When you are open, bleeding, you see yourself through and through. You see that you are tender, and you see that I am hungry.

Cambion

January 20, 2021 ~ Mark Steinwachs ~ 3 Comments

“It started with your first cry,” the white-haired gentleman sitting next to me says.

“Moments after you were born your demon was as well, a microscopic creature that grew as you did.” He takes a sip from the glass of whiskey he got moments ago and sucks in a breath from the burn as it goes down.

“Melvin, honey, stop scaring the nice young man,” Barb, I think she said her name was Barb, says from the other end of the bar while cleaning glasses.

I look up from my rum and coke, realizing that the two of them are talking about me. “I’m sorry,” I say, looking around the small bar again. There are two tables with people at them but they are lost in their own worlds. I’m out of place here, a new person invading the regular’s sanctuary. “Were you talking to me?”

“Sometimes the truth is scary, Barbara. You know that.” Melvin points a crooked finger at her while still holding his drink. He winces after taking another sip. “He knows it too. Look at him, you know what his world is.” He’s still facing straight ahead, watching me through the mirror that is the wall behind the bar. “The doctors haven’t helped you, have they, son?”

I shift in my seat, glancing sideways at him. For a moment I let the question sit. Demon; I hear Melvin’s voice in my head. I decide to play along, “No they can’t. They say there’s nothing wrong with me. Not physically, at least.”

Melvin lets out a sharp laugh that turns into a cough. “Physically wrong with you? Oh, no, I can tell that just by looking at you. You are what, twenty-five, maybe six, I bet you haven’t been physically sick in years. We both know I’m not talking about those kind of doctors.”

“Melvin!” Barb says. “You stop that right now. Leave that poor boy alone, you’ll run off one of my new customers.”

He doesn’t move his body but he tilts his eyes up to Barb and then returns his gaze to me, waiting. No one in the room shows any reaction to the scene playing out between us.

“You mean psychiatrists? Yeah, I’ve seen my fair share,” I say. “Then they send me back to a regular doctor who then sends me to a different psychiatrist. But I gave up on that a while ago.”

He takes a long swig of his drink, finishing it, then swivels in his stool to face me. Barb comes over and refills the glass, standing next to him on the other side of the bar. Melvin brings up his hand and tilts his head. He’s looking at me but it’s like he’s looking for something. “You feel him, son. I know you do. You’ve felt him for years, inside you. He’s become more of you than you are of yourself.”

My stomach starts to churn and I put my hand on the edge of the bar to steady myself. Pain isn’t the right word. It’s not painful. It’s anguished emptiness. Working from my stomach out in all directions. Pushing through my veins, invading me.

“You’ve seen him,” Melvin says. “Behind your eyes when you look in the mirror. You aren’t crazy, son. You just weren’t meant for this world.”

I grip the edge of the bar tight. It’s there, I saw it the other night, behind my eyes, a creature made of black ink. A drip fell from it and a burning ache seeped through my body. I felt that thousands of times and I finally knew what it was. A hand forms and from the tips of its fingers come little vines slowly piercing my brain. I don’t need to see him to know he’s there, though. I’ve felt him for years. For as long as I can remember.

Melvin leans in and points his finger at my heart, almost touching my chest. “He’s never been there. You’ve fought him off. No one knows what you’ve gone through. The battles you fight everyday inside you.”

He’s right. Every word. In minutes, the old man saw me for who I am. My eyes start to fill with tears. My body feels heavy. I’m tired, so tired, from fighting. Holding the thing at bay as it inches closer.

“There’s much more to our world than where we live. There are millions of things that remain undiscovered to a person until they truly open themselves to them. Just because society says something is weak and cowardly doesn’t mean it’s true. Maybe it just means that they don’t understand.”

“I …I. It doesn’t hurt but it never goes away. Everything I do.”

“I know, son,” Melvin says in a quiet voice. “It’s okay. I promise.” His finger touches my chest and I feel it in my heart.

In one moment, years of defenses come down. My body. My mind. My soul. Exquisite peace.

“Thank you,” I say, as I stand up and walk out of the bar.

A minute later the sound of a single gunshot from the alley fills the bar. Barb walks to Melvin. “Don’t you dare tell me he’s in a better place.”

“He isn’t,” Melvin says. “But he’s in a place where he can fight. Where he can win, if he is strong enough.”

“Is he?”

“I hope so,” Melvin winces as another sip of whiskey burns his throat.

∼ Mark Steinwachs

Damned Words 45

December 23, 2020December 21, 2020 ~ TheDamned ~ 5 Comments

Drops
Nina D’Arcangela

With each tear that fell from her cheek, another drop of laudanum fell from the pipette. Chewing her lower lip, she wondered if the choice she’d made was a just one. Closing her eyes, she drew forth a fond memory of her once vital son laughing as he played – a sound she’s not heard in some time. Her knees buckled as her resolve strengthened. A few more drops and his pain would be ended. Climbing the stairs, the glass of apple juice trembling in her hand, she choked back her own wail of agony.

Elixer
RJ Meldrum

The last tank was empty. The desalination plants were redundant, there was no seawater left. The humidity collectors had been scrapped, the air was too dry. It was over.

The vial was found in a storage room in an abandoned hospital. Five milliliters of distilled water. It wasn’t enough to share; it was too much to waste. It was a token; it wouldn’t prolong anyone’s life, but before the end came, it was decided to allow one lucky person to have it. A lottery was held.

It was a public event. The winner was paraded on the stage; they were to drink the contents in front of everyone else. It was partly because the elders wanted to share the moment with the community, partly because they wanted to make it clear that it was over, that their world would soon end. They wanted to calm the population, force them to accept their fate calmly. It failed.

As the winner ascended the stairs to the platform, the crown surged and stormed the stage. The vial, the last water on Earth, was knocked out of the winner’s hand, the fragile glass smashing. As the contents drained away, the crowd, the last remnant of humanity, destroyed each other.

Just One Drop
Marge Simon

Dr. Wang Yin Ho, MD, MS, HPLC

11287 47th St. N.E.

Ste. 334

Laurel Canyon Blvd.

Los Angeles, CA 90046

Dear Dr. Ho:

We are pleased to inform you that your Agent DK-45 has passed rigorous testing and is fit for distribution. to the masses. Just as promised, no other drug has proven so effective and easy to administer. Moreover, only one drop mixed with extender has proven sufficient for hundreds of inoculations. With support from Senators Epstein and Bortz, the FDA has approved it to be processed and sold by a pharma company of the Party’s choice.

Congratulations for formulating a cure for all viruses, even if they mutate. Equally important, the side effects are crucial to preserving the interests of the Party; after immunization, citizens will believe whatever is told them by the current Party President. As specified, injections shall be given directly into the brainstem.

It is regrettable you were unable to come forth with an antidote, “just in case”. In compliance with the fine print in your contract, you are to be manually terminated within the next twelve hours. Kindly use that time to settle your affairs.

Your heroic service is much appreciated.

Vladimir Naronkov

Nikolas Obanovitch

Polymorph Analysis Specialists

Treatments
A.F. Stewart

He moaned as the syringe plunged into his arm, as the chemicals pumped into his veins. Pain cycled through his body again and his muscles spasmed. The murmur of the doctors drifted against the whir of machines monitoring his vital signs. Part of him wanted to laugh hysterically. ‘Treatments’ they called these daily sessions, essential to his rehabilitation.

Torture, he called it. Brainwashing.

As the drugs coursed into his blood, into his brain, he tried to hold on to his memories, to his resolve. To the brief, bittersweet liberty he had known. For a few weeks, he had been free to view the world as he saw fit, not how the world government dictated. Before they discovered his secret and dragged him here.

That autonomy was over now. It was only a matter of time. The drug regimen would erase his thoughts, his memories, his will. Soon he would be a good citizen once more, the perfect slave to society.

He moaned as another needle slid into his arm.

Miracle
Mark Steinwachs

A miracle drug. Aren’t they all? Science is wonderful but it doesn’t mean shit in here. Or at least it didn’t until the scientists figured out that this magic potion determined if you were a good or bad person as it sent you to your death. They told us about it, not like we understood all the fancy doctor speak. They wanted it to go over our heads. We don’t matter in their eyes. Anyway, it was something about brainwaves and happiness or terror as the person died. Our days were numbered at that point. If we died happy then we were better off than wasting away here. If we died in terror then we didn’t deserve what little we had.

My cell slides open, an officer and a death dealer walk in. None of us resist, it’s pointless. I lay on my bunk. I know what I am, and where I’m going.

Reflections Within
Charles Gramlich

In the slow drip of heavy water, the eye of God reflects the face of the demon in my mouth.

All gangrenous lips and bright teeth, he shreds throats to the arteries. He melts bone to fluid.

In the vacuum, from the absence, I call to the light that screams for release, that begs to fall.

Only in the slow drip of blood am I alive.

Banishing Monsters
Scarlett R. Algee

I should be off work—it’s two days before Christmas—but instead I’m dosing inmates. It’s better this way, the warden says. It gets “the unpleasantness,” as he calls it, out of the way.

The door separating my office space from the infirmary is steel, but the prisoner screaming in that next room may as well be in here for how loud she is, the weighty metal chair she’s strapped to scraping the concrete floor despite the sedative I’d administered before the serum. Turns out even propofol won’t stop the howls or the thrashing; I can practically hear her vocal cords tearing, her bones breaking and shifting as the serum makes them reform themselves. I don’t have to look through my door’s observation window to know that by the time her transformation’s exhausted her, she’ll be a limp, gaunt, nearly lifeless thing: four-inch talons projecting from her toes and fingers, two-inch fangs breaking through her upper lip to overlap the bottom.

I don’t have to see it in this one, because I’ve seen it in the others. Eyes with newly-slitted pupils glazed over by agony. Hungry mouths spilling saliva, but too weak to feed. Easy to deal with, this unpleasantness: easy to drag them outside. Even in the weakest winter sun, it’s over in five minutes. The warden has, at least, justified it to himself: we’re banishing monsters. Nobody can call it murder if we’re not killing humans.

My office is older than the infirmary itself: the staff door opens directly outside. I unlock it and shove it ajar. This vial of serum yields one last dose into a syringe, and on the threshold, I shove the needle into my neck and plunge the liquid home.

Then I stumble out into the sunlight, and wait for the pain to come.

Drink, Drip, Dibble
Lydia Prime

‘If you violate the deal in anyway, he’ll have never known, nor loved you.’ Niustafa’s words echoed inside Kevin’s skull.

Kevin sipped the clear liquid; it didn’t take as long as he’d expected. Seamlessly, he was standing over himself, watching while the alternating shades of blue danced across his features. His mouth leaking acidic foam. Well, that’s attractive… he thought; his right arm dangling out of the porcelain bath, barely clutching that freeing glass vial.

God Bless Us Everyone
Ian Sputnik

I tapped on the bedroom door, used my back to push it open, and entered carrying the tray. I wished Mum good morning, and she wished me a merry Christmas. As she sat up, I put the platter on her lap and bent to kiss her forehead. She asked when Gemma, my sister, would arrive. I told her soon. She smiled and took a sip of tea before tucking into her marmalade-on-toast breakfast.

“Time for your medication, Mum,” I said as I counted the drops from the pipette onto her tongue. She complained of being tired and wanted a few more minutes rest, but demanded I didn’t let her oversleep, as there was so much to be done in preparation for Christmas. I tucked her back in and kissed her head again, knowing Gemma would not be coming.

Her and her husband had been killed by a drunk driver seven months prior. I’d tried to explain it to Mum, but each day it grew more difficult. Every morning was Christmas to Mum. Every morning she awoke excited with the expectation of seeing Gemma.

I wasn’t sure if it was her I was releasing from the ongoing nightmare, or myself. But I couldn’t break the news to her yet again.

Vial Pleasure
Lee Andrew Forman

I cherish these drops of pain and sorrow. True pleasure lies within, deep inside the elixir — a fine-tuned concoction of select donors that appease my taste. Each was extracted with care, distilled with precise cruelty; a cruelty that sweetens the flow. A not-so-gentle stab of the heart, harsh words rasped on whispered breath, a length of hemp knotted and coarse. Extreme cases demand shivs of metal, a sharpened tool; whatever it takes to enrich the aquiline ecstasy. My tongue grows hungry for more, slaps the roof of my mouth with greed as the next is harnessed to satiate the damp organ that roams my mouth.

This Thing Holds Love

November 18, 2020November 17, 2020 ~ Scarlett R. Algee ~ 7 Comments

Human hearts are so depressingly empty.

Take this one: it fits neatly in my two palms, the dark red-grey of aging beef, smooth and glistening under its layer of epicardial fat. No arterial stenosis. No calcification. No visible defects at all. Perfect, healthy, normal.

And empty.

He looked so surprised when I thrust the chef’s knife into his chest. A soft huff of exhaled breath but no cry, no words, not even resistance; the carbon steel had just crunched right through his sternum, and slid through membrane and muscle like they were softened butter.

Just a widening of his eyes, a flare of pupils, a second’s trickle of red starting at the corner of his mouth. Then I pulled the knife out, a wrench I had to put my whole arm into, and he dropped straight to the kitchen floor.

He moved a little then, tried to get up, lips working around the crimson bubble slipping out between them. So I pushed him down, straddled him, shoved the blade down into his abdomen and dragged it up.

It was cruel. He screamed beneath the noise of skin and fat ripping like a torn bedsheet. But I had to do it. I had to get him open. I had to know.

Because he said he loved me, and I needed to find it.

I think it got out, though. I think the love got out somewhere. Maybe in that last long exhale, or in his heart’s final dying-butterfly twitches, or in the blood rolling out of him onto the smooth ochre tiles he helped me pick out. It must have escaped, because I put my finger into the wound the knife had made and felt the layers part around the intrusion, felt the sweet clean division in the septum, and then I pulled my fingertip loose and cupped his heart in one hand to cut the wound deeper; but I sliced the arteries and veins loose and splayed the heart open and there was nothing in there: atria and ventricles and the last of his blood and so, so much empty space.

But no spark, no passion, no love. Nothing of what he said he felt in there.

I have to find it. I have to study it. I have to capture it.

I have to make someone else love me, so I can try again.

~Scarlett R. Algee

Savior

November 4, 2020October 29, 2020 ~ Mark Steinwachs ~ 9 Comments

I sip the mint flavored mocha that Maryanne set down in front of me moments ago. As always, the drink was exquisite. She has been a part of this earth almost as long as myself, and I’ve only been outlived by the man sitting next to me. No matter what certain books say, I was number two around these parts.

Drizzle patters the window in front of us, typical for a Portland morning. Relatively few people are out on Saturday compared to the bustle of a weekday. None of that matters in here though, most people walk by without giving a second glance, just another tiny, local coffee shop.

“It’s coming,” I say. “Each day I feel subtle ripples rooting deeper amongst them.”

The man next to me looks exhausted. His eyes sink in slightly to his gaunt-skinned face. Even his close cropped white hair and beard seem ragged.

He takes a sip of his half-empty cup of black coffee, an odd choice for him, and stares out the window. I wonder if he heard what I said.

“It’s here,” he replies. “You were right.”

I savor the mint-chocolate, a favorite combination of mine for ages. You were right …his words reverberate inside me. If this were a game he would’ve just conceded. I wasn’t right though, not fully. He had to see that. Didn’t he? He looks awful. Defeated. Broken. He can look like anyone or anything, just like I can. But neither of us can look strong when we aren’t. For century upon century the struggle for power has ebbed and flowed between us. Neither one giving up the ghost, as they say. He’s baiting me, that must be it. But why? What’s his angle?

I bite, “I’m not right, and you know it. There’s far more good left out there.” I motion to the window giving me time to enjoy more of my drink. “Let me rephrase. I’m not right, yet. It’s coming but there’s still time for change. As much as I feel the swells of power taking hold there are branches of light. And they are powerful.”

“They aren’t light. It just seems so amongst the darkness. I’ve never seen you as vibrant as you are now. You wear it well.”

He’s right about that part, I’m practically radiating energy these days. Power surges through me and I can wreck havoc with the flick of a finger. And my suit, well, I do look good in that. Perfectly tailored to match my current flawless body.

“Amongst the darkness?” I say. “That’s always been the case. What gives? What’s wrong with you?”

God finishes his coffee and looks at me, “Moderation is dead. Extremism has taken hold and will never let go. Even those in the middle believe they are totally right in whatever topic is at hand.”

“Extremes always take the lead. Without them nothing would ever change,” I say, somehow finding myself trying to defend the humans like God’s done so often. I open my mouth to continue but nothing comes out, my mind drawing a blank.

“It’s time,” he says and stands up. “Your reign begins now. But, you cannot rule alone. You need to find someone to stand at your side as you did with me. I almost feel bad for them with what I can imagine you’re going to unleash.”

I finish my drink and stand as God did. He looks at the matronly owner of the coffee shop, “Maryanne, thank you for everything. Keep an eye on Luce for me.”

Maryanne nods with a soft smile on her face and God walks past me, opening the door. The sky is clouded, the street damp. God brings his foot up to take a step outside. I grab his head, twisting it violently. A crack of bone sounds like a gunshot to me but is probably barely audible to Maryanne. I push God out the door as his lifeless body falls in a heap. He looks like a homeless man asleep in front of the door and a moment later a person walks by, paying him no notice.

“What are you going to do first?” Maryanne asks.

“Have another drink, of course,” I say still looking outside. I turn and face her, “But that’s not what you mean. The first thing I’m going to do is …nothing. I’m going to watch the humans suffer until they realize what they’ve done. Then I’ll show them what real hatred and evil is. And I will laugh as they call out for the savior they murdered.”

∼ Mark Steinwachs

Damned Words 44

October 7, 2020October 5, 2020 ~ TheDamned ~ 7 Comments

Five-fingered Footprints
Lee Andrew Forman

Blood draws my story on the agate floor. Fresh ink covers dried layers with the repetition of time. My five-fingered footprints scatter across my canvas, for within the cold box there is no room to stand. My freedom, nothing more than an arm’s length in any direction. Slight rumbles shiver the enclosure; new paint will be added soon. I’ve never seen the thing that keeps me here. Only felt its scathing, intimate touch on my naked flesh. The floor tells me it will soon be time. My body trembles as I await the inevitable approach of the stippler.

Witness
Nina D’Arcangela

As he adjusted the range, the minute clicks were barely distinguishable from the constant drone. I could see the look of shock and something akin to terror on his face as he stepped back and stared at me as if to question his own understanding. He picked up another tool; resumed his examination. A rush of air whirled through the cavity and sent them into a maddened frenzy. The pounding became relentless, nearly unbearable as the thrum increased to a deafening level. Overwhelmed by what he’d witnessed, he nearly fell to the floor missing the stool that stood just inches away.

He began to speak, paused to clear his throat and opened his mouth again; no words issued from his dry, swollen tongue. I understood. They’d been there for as long as I could remember. I rose from my seat, asked if what he saw were faces. He blanched even further and replied that no, they were not faces, they were hands–hands that pushed against the tympanic membrane. I nodded, gathered my belongings to leave. A gentle pressure on my arm caused a momentary pause. His face reflected the pain he knew would accompany the tear when the tissue gave way. He looked into my eyes as if he couldn’t comprehend my calm acceptance. My reply to his unasked question was a bare mumble.

“I’ve lived with voices in my head my entire life, Doc. I just didn’t realize that one day, they would demand to be let out.”

A Handy Tale
Marge Simon

“Dammit, Martha! We just got our new cement wall up and smoothed. Now look at the mess some neighbors’ kids have made of it! Hand-prints all over everywhere –up and down and sideways. Disreputable, malicious destruction!”

“Something is going to have to be done,” Martha said. “Every time we move, sooner or later, some malicious little devils show up to make our lives miserable. I’m tired of moving, Herbert. We checked out the area really well before buying this house. There’s just one little brat in the neighborhood this time.”

“Yes, I know. Name’s Billy Harlow” said Herbert. He pinned her with a frown. “You know the cure, Martha.

“I do,” said Martha reluctantly. Off she went to her kitchen to dig out Mamancita’s commodious book of Haitian spells & recipes. The punishment must fit the deed.

Lunchtime the next day, Billy Harlow sat at their kitchen table. Before him was a plate of Mamancita’s special Bon Bon Amidon cookies, still warm from the oven, and a foaming glass of fresh milk. He made annoying sounds when he drank, and chewed with his mouth open.

“Disgusting wastrel!”

“Shhh, he’ll hear you, Herbert. it’s almost over,” Martha reminded him.

The next morning, Billy Harlow’s screams alarmed the neighborhood. His mother rushed to his bedroom to find him crouched on the floor sobbing, arms around his chest in an odd way. “Mama! In my bed!!” She reached over to shake out a loose sheet. There was no blood, but two fat little hands with dirty fingernails fell out of the covers.

Storm Surge
Charles Gramlich

In pitch black, I awoke—on the couch with a hurricane pummeling my house. The TV was off. It had been on when I fell asleep, but the electricity must have failed. Feeling around for my phone, I activated the flashlight app. The room brightened around me but everywhere else the shadows congealed and clung.

I loved my little shack in the woods but at night it could be scary. Needing more light, I went into the kitchen for candles. The rain had stopped. I couldn’t hear it on the roof. But the wind hadn’t faded. It pressed and rubbed at the house like an unwanted caress.

After firing up my biggest candle, I turned off my cell to preserve the battery and walked over to the glass doors opening onto my deck. No wind moved the trees in the backyard. The hurricane had passed. Then what made the sounds I heard?

Sliding the back door open, I stepped outside. I lived near the Gulf of Mexico, with my house elevated against storm surge. That’s the water pushed inland by hurricane winds. Wooden steps led up to the deck from the ground below. On that ground, in the mud, stood hundreds of dead children. All were rotted, with seaweed in their hair as if carried onto my lawn by the surge. Their hands scratched and scritched at the wooden stilts supporting my home.

Screaming, I leapt back inside, slamming and locking the door. But the children heard. They came single file up onto my deck to press their faces and little hands against the glass. They pressed harder, harder, harder. The glass spiderwebbed with cracks.

I blew out the candle. Better not to see. Better to let them find me in the dark.

Burned Out
Lydia Prime

Flesh sizzles upon touching the hematic shale. Dainty hands ignite dancing flames across the arms of the conditionally pre-deceased. Prophesied terms embossed in stone detail the arrival of a beast who won’t feel heat. General consensus is unanimous: they await its birth. No one ever thinks it might have always lived among them. Its existence couldn’t be copacetic—couldn’t manage to stay undetected… Could it?

Shared ignorance protects the man who discovered the slab and lead the charge to find the predicted creature. Blanket delusions curtail questions as he watches over every trial, every tearful family parting. He glows while their skin chars to nothing but ashy outlines. His head bobbing minutely to the screams as they warble to unintelligible echoes. He bites his cheeks—an act required to conceal delight—then calls to the town’s unwittingly damned participants to bring about the next.

Handprints
RJ Meldrum

He’d hated her for years, had carefully planned the perfect murder so many times, but never had the courage to go through with it. In the end, he simply lost his temper. He slashed out at her with a kitchen knife; the first cuts landed on her hands and arms. She escaped and staggered down the hallway, leaving bloody handprints on the pristine white walls. She collapsed by the door where he finished her off.

He spent a whole day carefully cleaning and repainting the wall, removing the last traces of her. Once the walls were restored to their original white, he was content. She was gone and no-one would ever suspect she was dead.

But of course, he was wrong. Her family and friends suspected foul play; they knew the history between the two. The police were called. An officer interviewed him in the front hallway. He was smug, confident; he brushed off the questions.

Just over the detective shoulder, a bloody handprint appeared on the white wall. Then a second and a third. He suddenly stuttered, his cockiness gone. A fourth and fifth handprint appeared; they followed the stumbling route his wife had taken.

The cop noticed he wasn’t making eye contact and instead stared past him. The officer turned. A row of bloody handprints ended at the front door mat, where a pool of blood had formed.

The Wall
A.F. Stewart

The imprints remain on the wall; years of rain and sun could not remove them. The red chalk outlines burned into stone, reflecting the colours of bone and blood. The echo of a human civilization gone mad.

I watch them, the new citizens, as they pass the wall. Some ignore it; others touch it for luck. No one understands. No one knows the truth. They will soon. They will know the fate of those razed into the wall.

We are back. Ready to purge the filth from our city, to take back what they stole. We come to cleanse, to sweep clean with our machines. We will rain fire from the skies and burn away the contamination.

We will add more outlines to the wall.

Until every brick is burned with the death of those who oppose us.

Choiceless
Mark Steinwachs

Colored sunlight from stained glass windows bathes the room around me. I stand in the grand foyer, designed to hold the multitude of people that make their weekly pilgrimage to this house of worship. Its on display, lit perfectly from the lights above. Almost as if it was hiding from and trying to stand above the natural world all at once. Even if it wasn’t here, this place would still make my skin crawl. But it sits on its custom frame, stretched taught, a giant piece at six feet by four feet. I can feel the hands that made it pressing against the thin canvas, as if it were skin. A modern masterpiece of horror held up in honor.

Choiceless. Pastor Jonathan Neils.

I scoff. They have the ability to choose. They were given that. And yet they constantly try to take it away from one another.

“Beautiful isn’t it,” a man says as he steps alongside me. “While I’m honored you’re enjoying my work, this building is closed to visitors right now.”

Closed to visitors? I cringe. “I will always champion those who bring honor to my name. This,” I motion to the painting, “do you truly believe you trying to force your choices on others is what I want?”

“You want? I don’t know what you want, or who you are,” he replies. “It’s what God wants, protect his unborn flock.”

“I want people to praise my name not weaponize it. You’ve made your choices and they were wrong. Nahum 1:2, The Lord is vengeful against his foes; he rages against his enemies.”

I snap my fingers and the pastor’s eyes go wide as in his death he sees me for who I am and realizes where he is going.

Prints
Scarlett R. Algee

I can’t help but think you’re fascinated by that wall, the way you keep staring. No, no need to struggle; you won’t be spitting that gag out. Scream? There’s no one out here to hear you if you did.

I do admit it’s a little bit strange, all those hand-shaped negative spaces outlined in red and black and brown, but I think it looks good against the plaster. I tell the kinfolks it’s a mural, ‘cause I was always a little creative. Amazing what you can do with just some paint and a sponge stick.

Hands are unique, you know. Hands are intimate. Recognizable. So this is what I do with ‘em before they have to go. A little press against the wall, a little dab of color around, and then it’s bonemeal for the roses and flesh for the tomatoes. My roses are the envy of the county garden club, and my tomatoes have won blue ribbons at the fair for five straight years.

It’s the only part I take, too. The part that’s special, that identifies you. The rest I leave here and there; the local wildlife has to eat, after all. But think of it this way—at least I’ll remember you.

Twenty-nine pairs on this wall. I like how they’re starting to overlap. How the colors blend into each other. But my mural needs to grow, and thirty’s a good round number.

Now. Let me see those hands.

Held to Account
Ian Sputnik – Guest Author

The moaning and giggling from the next room made him laugh. It amused Carl that his landlady seemed to entertain ‘guests’ on a regular basis; especially as she appeared to be such a prim and proper lady of a certain age.

He waited for her to leave for her weekly game of bridge before breaking into her apartment. The lock on the old safe clicked and its hinges creaked as the door opened. He routed around inside and removed anything of value. He stuffed jewellery and cash into his pockets. Suddenly, he was pulled backwards with incredible force. He spun around, fists clenched, but no one was there. His legs were then grabbed in a vice-like grip and his arms stretched out so that he resembled a church painting of the crucifixion. Out of the darkness, ghostly hands appeared. They tore at his clothes pulling them from his body as they clawed at his skin, ripped through it and tore the flesh from his bones. Cold fingers forced themselves into his mouth and down the back of his throat muffling his screams. When the ghostly apparitions had finished their work, all that was left of Carl was a pile of gore.

The landlady returned. She gasped at the scene which lay before her; then the phantoms returned. They swarmed around her like bats in a cave before they gently caressed her face and worked down the rest of her body as they stripped her bare. She giggled and groaned in delight as they gently massaged blood into her skin. As they did so the slight traces of wrinkles on her face began to fade away. “My, you have been busy tonight,” she cooed as they lifted her over to the bed and continued their work.

I Love Every Part of You

September 2, 2020August 25, 2020 ~ Scarlett R. Algee ~ 6 Comments

It begins, on a rainy Sunday two days after Olivia’s funeral, with her left ring finger.

Melanie wakes to a weird little pressure under her ribs and sits up and there it is: nestled into a fold of the sheet, its magenta acrylic nail lying discarded to one side. Melanie picks it up with bile hiking acidly up the back of her throat, sees the smoothness at the base, and can’t help noticing that the rings are still snug. The gap between her fingers is silky and flawless, the skin above the barren knuckle dimples and is only slightly paler than the rest.

She should worry. A part of her knows it. But Melanie is still too numb from Olivia’s sudden passing—you should be grateful, her aunt had said at the graveside, that the cancer worked so fast and she wasn’t in too much pain—to regard it as anything more than a bodily quirk, a curiosity, so she gets dressed and wraps the finger in black crepe and drives to the cemetery, and buries that part of herself in the shallow hole she’s able to dig in the loose earth with two hands.

On Monday it’s half her blonde hair, loose on the pillow; on Tuesday she brushes the rest and it all just tugs loose with a painless not-quite-pop. No obvious flaws, no stubble, no bloody roots; she sits on the bed and vacantly runs her fingers through the strands, the way Olivia had done. I love every part of you, Olivia had said so many times, even at the end; so the hair gets bundled into a neat rubber-banded braid and buried beside the finger.

On Wednesday Melanie wakes minus three bloodless teeth, and her lower lip—the one Olivia had liked to bite when they were in a certain mood—feels oddly loose, so this time she wraps the teeth in a square of paper towel and goes to her doctor.

She gets stared at. Prodded—with the end of a pen, not with fingers. There are scribblings and murmurs: are you eating? do you feel well? are you sure you haven’t hurt yourself?—to which Melanie just bows her bare head and holds out her gapped hand and says, “Do you see wounds? do you see scars?”

Stress, is the uncertain verdict, and a prescription changes hands. Melanie’s staring at it in the car when the rest of her teeth shed in a rattling cascade that bounces off her knees, scattering into the floorboard below.

It takes her half an hour to collect them all, to account for every one. By then, she almost thinks she knows what’s going on.

I love every part of you.

The soil mounded over Olivia’s grave is rain-damp and fragrant. Melanie scoops out a hollow and deposits the teeth and says, “You know, you didn’t have to be so literal.”

Then her lower lip drops, jelly-like, into the hole.

It’s okay; Melanie hasn’t felt like eating in days. She just shrugs and smoothes it over, and goes home to see what will happen next.

What happens is Thursday.

Her left arm and hand below the elbow. Four toes across both feet. Her left eye too, the one Olivia had sworn held so much more sparkle than the other. She just gropes a plastic bag from the container in the kitchen, never before so grateful to be right-handed, and clumsily scoops everything inside except her eyelashes, which are fine enough to get lost in the high pile of the carpet.

Melanie waits until after dark. She has to, for this. The eye had been just a little much.

You always were a drama queen, Liv.

This time digging a proper hole is out of the question, so Melanie attacks the side of the heaped, drying soil with hand and feet, unsteadily carving out a place for herself. By the time she’s made a space to burrow into, by the time she’s clawing her earthen blanket down, the sky is growing light again, and she’s left two more fingers and an ear in the dirt.

The loosened earth crumbles over her, but Melanie just huddles in the hollow she’s made, curled into the fetal position and breathing hard. She coughs out a sudden blockage in her mouth and realizes it’s her tongue.

Her skin parts and opens. One by one, her drawn limbs begin to loosen and disarticulate. Something detaches inside her chest. Melanie sighs with what’s left of her breath, sagging wearily into the damp and dark.

If she focuses, if she concentrates, she can almost feel Olivia reaching up for her, reaching for every beloved part.

~Scarlett R. Algee

Drop Off

August 19, 2020August 12, 2020 ~ Mark Steinwachs ~ 10 Comments

Janice turned the wheel hard. Tires squealed over Freddy Mercury’s soaring vocals from the car stereo as the vehicle shuddered down a two-lane road leading into suburbia.

“I’m on Crescent. There’s a small horde behind me, but I should be safely back to you guys before they catch up,” Janice said.

Her voice, mixed with Queen, sounded in Tim’s earbuds. Tim stood on the balcony of their apartment with their fifteen-year-old son, Steven. Both of them scanned the area for zombies as the summer sun beat down, intensifying the stench of rotted flesh. “You’re clear all the way to the drop-off. Then we’ll cover you the rest of the way to us. Can you turn off that music? It’s not—”

“It’s the only time I get to listen to anything,” Janice interrupted her husband. “Do you really think it’s any more likely to draw out our friends than a car engine?” Janice pushed on the gas pedal and cranked up the volume, drowning out her husband.

The rev of the engine echoed in the air. Tim spared a glance at his son as he surveyed their surroundings. “Your mother can be dangerous sometimes. It’s unnecessary. That’s the sort of stuff that will get you killed.”

“Dad, give her a break. We’ve been doing this a while now and it’s fine. I’m heading down.” Steven set his rifle on the table and grabbed the pistol lying there.

“Be careful, Son.”

“Love you too, Dad.”

The door clicked shut after he slipped out.

“Steven’s standing by. You’re both clear.” They’d been doing this for over a year. The school parking lot a block away was littered with vehicles they had discarded. Survival of the fittest, that was what Tim had been telling his wife and son since the outbreak occurred.

Tim went on the first couple of supply runs but as a strong, able-bodied male, he was given a wide berth. Janice was petite and cute with eyes that sucked you in. People were drawn to help her. But the minute they got close, she would shoot them and put their bodies in the backseat of whatever car she had grabbed that day. Then take any supplies and head back. The fresh corpses left in the cars kept the zombies from sniffing the family out in their apartment. The fetid scent of death was like a drop of blood in water to a shark.

Janice had cried after her first time. Tim kept reminding her—and Steven—it was survival of the fittest. It became his mantra. Kill or be killed. That was what their life would be from now on.

The white Azera Janice had acquired for this run crested the little hill on Crescent. It caught a split second of air before slamming back to the road. Janice gave a delighted whoop.

A commotion in the trees lining the road to the right of Crescent drew Tim’s gaze. Five zombies rushed from the wooded area and stopped in the middle of the lane. A couple looked left toward the noise of the engine. The other three looked straight at Tim and Steven. The smell. Damn it.

“Janice!”

“Shiiitttttt.”

Tires screeched. The Azera slammed into the first zombie, sending it into the windshield then up over the car. Janice gunned it and plowed through another one. This time the zombie managed to latch onto the vehicle; it snarled at Janice through the cracked windshield.

Janice pumped the brakes and turned the wheel left, trying to throw the zombie free. She started to lose control and turned back to the right, flooring the gas pedal. Another slurping thud resonated and rotted zombie organs sprayed up the passenger side of the car.

Thump thump thump thump. The front passenger tire exploded, jolting the zombie from the vehicle. Janice’s vision cleared just in time to see the drop-off at the side of the road past her turn to the apartment. Once more she slammed the brakes and jerked the wheel to the left, but she stood no chance. The car swung sideways and slid down a couple of feet before wedging itself against a tree. The impact rattled Janice’s insides and sent a shock of pain from her right ankle up her leg.

“Janice!” Tim said, bringing his rifle up.

Two of the five zombies remained standing. One bolted toward the apartment, but Steven was already on his way back up, or at least he was supposed to be. The second zombie started toward the car.

“I’m here, Tim,” Janice said over a Brian May guitar riff. “I think I’m okay.”

Tim lined up the shot and pulled the trigger. A single retort scattered the few birds perched on the roof. The zombie’s chest opened wide as the bullet hit home, knocking the creature to the ground.

“Go, Janice. You’re clear.”

Janice grabbed the pistol that had managed to stay in the seat next to her and opened the door, swinging out. She stood up and promptly crumpled to the ground, pain exploding in her right ankle. She pushed herself up and limp-ran two more steps before faceplanting in the middle of the road.

Tim watched his wife fall to the ground. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He looked down for the zombie that had made for the apartment but couldn’t find it. And where the hell was Steven? A pistol shot sounded below. Followed by another. And another.

Tim took aim at the zombie he’d shot in the chest. It was struggling to right itself. He fired one more round and got a clean head shot, dropping it.

The apartment door opened. “Dad, where’s Mom?” Steven kicked the door closed behind him then beelined for the balcony. “Oh, shit,” he said when he saw the chaos below.

Janice stood and got another few steps before she hit the pavement again. Gritting her teeth, she got to her hands and knees and started crawling in the direction of the apartment.

A half dozen zombies burst through the same trees as the others had, then came to a stop as their brains processed the information around them.

Tim fired and missed his target. “Run, Janice! Go!”

The shot snapped the zombies to attention. They ran toward both Janice and the two men on the balcony. Tim couldn’t tell which was heading where and he pulled the trigger again and again. One shot spun a zombie down but not out. Steven joined in and took three quick shots, two of them taking down one more of the six.

Blood dripped from various scrapes and cuts on Janice’s body and her ankle throbbed, but she ignored the pain and got herself up, running as fast as she could, crying out each time her right foot hit the ground.

Two more zombies emerged from across the street, followed by another three from the trees. A couple lunged at the car with the corpse in the backseat, but most were heading for Janice.

Tim fired as fast as he could, barely aiming now. “Janice, you can do it, honey. Keep going. You’re almost there.”

Steven took aim and pulled the trigger.

“Janice!” Tim screamed.

Her head snapped back. Her body dropped for the final time.

Tim dropped his rifle and wailed, “What did you do?” He wheeled on his son, grabbing him. “What did you do? Fuck, fuck. She was going to make it. What…”

More zombies crashed through the trees, a horde forming. “Dad, we have to g—” Steven didn’t finish the last word as Tim punched him in the jaw. The boy staggered to his knees. More punches rained down. “Dad! Stop! Please, we need to go.”

Tim missed a punch and instead hit the table on the balcony, knocking the pistol to the floor. Steven grabbed it and pulled the trigger. The bullet ripped through his dad’s thigh.

Tim yelped in pain and grabbed the balcony railing. The pain reset the synapses firing in his body. Sobbing, he said, “I’m so sorry. Fucking hell. We need to get out of here.”

Zombies littered the ground, most of them distracted by Janice’s body. The two men didn’t have long. The blood dripping from Tim’s leg would slip through the slots in the balcony floor and draw their attention.

“We need to go, Son. Right now. You’ll need to drive.”

Steven looked at his dad and the scene behind him. We’ll never make it, Steven thought. For a moment the world stopped except for Freddy singing about that “crazy little thing.” Steven swung his fist out as hard as he could and caught his dad in the temple. The butt of the pistol struck his dad first. Tim groaned and flopped over the railing. Out cold.

They were never going to make it, but Steven could. His dad taught him well. Survival of the fittest. He put the gun to the back of his father’s head and pulled the trigger, then shoved the corpse over the balcony.

That should give him enough time to get to the car and get away.

∼ Mark Steinwachs