As I walked over this lonely stretch of road, I counted my steps and watched the moonlight flicker among the trees. A fog crept over the asphalt, stirred by the wind, making it hard to discern where I was going.
Where am I going? I don’t know. I’m just walking…
Maybe it was the night, but I felt adrift in the shadows with no direction, the smell of autumn’s decay around me, the hard gravel of the roadside under my feet. Nothing but a misty horizon of desolation as my destination.
Am I eternally doomed to walk this long road?
A sound. The humming motor of a car. I turned. Headlights illuminated the night.
They’re slowing down. Stopping.
The passenger side window whirred open, and a young man leaned over the seat and smiled at me. “You need a ride, pretty lady?”
I smiled back and nodded, so he popped open the car door. Slipping inside, I sank into the seat and closed the door. The car remained idling. The driver leaned in, too close, his hand on my leg.
“How did you get stranded out here? Not the place to be walking alone. Especially at night. It isn’t safe.” He smirked.
Scooting closer to the door, I replied, “I was left out here. Can we get going?”
“Oh, yeah, sure.” The car lurched forward, back on the road. “Good thing I came along, though.” He reached over and patted my knee, his fingers squeezing. “A sweet thing like you shouldn’t be neglected. You needed a big, strong man to rescue you.”
“From what?” I pushed his hand away. He moved it back to the steering wheel.
“Guess you’re not from around here. This is Applewood Road. Known for car crashes, disappearances, people wandering with no memory. Legend has it that a ghost haunts the area.” He chuckled. “Just superstition, of course, but this road isn’t always safe.”
I smiled again, this time with a hint of fang. “I’ve never seen a ghost.”
Grabbing the steering wheel, I yanked hard, simultaneously unlocking his seatbelt.
He screamed, “What the hell, bitch!” and cursed as the car careened into a ditch, crumpling the front end. The airbag prevented him from going through the shattered windshield, but he smashed his head against the driver’s door.
Unbuckling my seatbelt, I wriggled from underneath the deployed airbag and pulled his unconscious body closer. I sank my fangs deep into his neck and drank my fill, savouring the sweet nectar of his blood until his heartbeat slowed, then stopped. I shoved his corpse back into the driver’s seat and licked my lips. The final touch was collecting a shard of glass from the dash and shoving into his neck to cover my bite mark.
Clambering out of the ruined car, I dusted off my clothes and climbed back to the road. I glanced back at the wreck.
“You were right, this road is dangerous.”
I laughed and started the long walk back to town. I had to inform the sheriff the job was done, and he had another death to cover up.
And one less predator roaming Applewood Road.
Tag: dark fiction
Pick Me Island
When the plane had to make an emergency landing in the Bermuda triangle, twelve girls swam to the closest land mass. They had been on a school trip, heading to Puerto Rico, and engaging in “compulsory volunteer work” with Habitat for Humanity.
Eight of the girls had resigned themselves to learning basic construction. They had hoped to get tan and perhaps meet some cute local boys who would entertain them in the evenings. The other four wanted nothing to do with the group. They declared loudly and often that they were “not like other girls” and were proud of their uniqueness.
“I don’t think we will meet any boys here,” Amber said, scanning the small island.
“Unless they’re part of a rescue mission,” Beth added hopefully.
The group explored the shore, with the mission of finding drinkable water or food. They stumbled over large bones that did not look as if they belonged to fish.
“Is that predator or prey?” Callie asked one of the “not like other girls” members. This one routinely skipped the school uniform and instead wore band t-shirts featuring obscure musicians that no one else was cool enough to recognize.
The girl didn’t answer, which was her usual response.
After finding zero coconut trees, the group began to consider other means of sustenance. Darcy turned to the “not like other girls” who always wore a taxidermized squirrel pinned to her uniform sweater. “Can you catch us something to eat? Like a fish or bird or…egg or something?” she asked.
“I’m vegan,” squirrel girl replied.
Darcy raised an eyebrow. “Wearing that?” She pointed at the squirrel that was worse for the wear.
Squirrel girl shrugged. “I didn’t kill it. Besides, we came into the world alone, we exist alone, and we die alone. I suggest we split up.”
The eight “joiners” were losing patience with the “not like other girls” crew, but they did not want to split up either. They believed there was strength in numbers.
Emily suggested that they build a shelter. The eight joiners gathered fronds and sticks and attempted to craft a makeshift tent while three of the other four sat and stared at the horizon. The remaining “not like other girls” member practiced yoga poses which is what she had been doing in the aisles of the airplane before the sudden landing
Fern looked at the “not like other girls” member who was cradling the thermos she always carried. The girl proclaimed the thermos to be full of alcohol and would make a show of sipping from it during class.
“Let me have your thermos, for the fire,” Fern said.
“It’s only water,” the girl replied.
“Good, let’s reserve it,” Gina suggested. “It’s not much, but we can add to it if it rains. In fact, we should gather shells and other items to act as water containers…”
As predicted, eight girls searched for large shells and washed-up items to retain rainwater and four girls contributed nothing.
As the sun sank beneath the horizon and the island became bathed in darkness, sounds of a strange creature could be heard.
Eight girls hovered beneath their shelter, while the other four shrank into the foliage.
“That shelter is not gluten-free,” one of the four whispered, more to herself than to her companions. They listened as the grunts and snorts grew closer.
They smelled her before they saw her.
A girl-like creature lumbered toward them. She was the height of two of them put together. Her snout was long and twisted, like a caiman and her hair was alive with buzzing bees. Her skin was scaley and it glistened in the moonlight.
The eight girls in the shelter were in awe of the being. They stayed still and watched as she turned her attention to the four who were screaming from the foliage.
An impressive blood bath ensued, and as the creature pulled a large bone from her mouth, Hattie exclaimed, “She really isn’t like other girls.”
∼ Elaine Pascale
© Copyright Elaine Pascale. All Rights Reserved.
The Unshriven
They come through the tunnels of Hell into the sunlight, wearing rusted armor astride horses of gore. Ancient swords hang at rotted hips and over decaying shoulders. Some carry morning stars, or battle axes upon which the blood of old wars has dried so hard it has bonded to the steel.
In dark madness they come, up fiery slopes of magma toward the snow-capped mountains of heaven. But the holy gates are shut against them and only earth is left to abide their time.
Unshriven. Unforgiven. No Heaven or Hell will have them.
Fortunately, they find that humans are both filling and taste great.
∼ Charles Gramlich
© Copyright Charles Gramlich. All Rights Reserved.
The Stray
The scent of rot permeated the air; I knew I was close. I could almost taste the stench. I took each step with care—silence was essential. My eyes searched the darkness between the trees, looked for any sign of its bodily form. I tried to keep my imaginings to nil, as I didn’t want to spoil my initial reaction when my eyes finally witnessed its flesh. I wanted to see the dream for what it was, not for what it could be.
Movement in the brush ahead halted my breath. I listened to the silence that followed with fierce intent. The musky air thickened. But I heard no steps approach.
My heart pounded with a concoction of fear and excitement. I’d been hunting this legend since I was a boy. Those tales told around a fire, or with a few drinks—they stuck with me. They unraveled my focus on all other things. This was what I lived for. To find out what it really was.
Local lore said it might have once been human, an orphan raised by the wilderness. Others said it might be nature herself, risen from the earth to take vengeance upon anyone it could. No matter its origin, the stories said it traveled on all fours, and its nature was vicious and feral. If you think it’s close, it’s already too late. That’s how the stories always ended.
A release of breath shattered the silent night. It was hot against the back of my neck. I slowly turned to see what I yearned so badly for. My eyes went wide and took in all the moonlight had to offer. She towered above me, bare-breasted and malformed beyond description—an amalgam of evolutionary paths borrowed from a dozen species. But aside from her eyes and nose, her face was close to human.
She stared down at me as she reared up on her hind legs and let out an animalistic vocalization of aggression. I put my palms up and backed away a step to show I wasn’t a threat. She returned to four legs on the ground, her face now level with mine.
She approached, seemingly curious, and sniffed about my shirt collar. Her smell was so awful I could barely breathe. But I was content in that moment. I finally found what I was looking for. A smile spread across my lips as she ran her tongue along my neck.
Then the pain of her teeth sunk in. I heard the rending of my flesh in her mouth as it was torn from my neck. Agony, shock, disbelief, all surged through me in crashing waves. Her front leg pinned me to the ground. My ribs audibly broke beneath the weight.
Gasping for breath and drowning in my own blood, I struggled to gaze upon her one last time before she feasted on my body.
∼ Lee Andrew Forman
© Copyright Lee Andrew Forman. All Rights Reserved.
The 6,666th Circle Rotation
They still scream. Even after centuries, they never stop. The flesh rots, grows back, rots again. Their throats tear anew. It’s almost musical now, like a choir stripped of harmony. All bound to one shrill note of agony.
I should be tired of it. But, honestly? The pain stains me awake.
Today I was assigned three new arrivals. All of them preachers in life, they swore their souls were flameproof. I enjoyed peeling that arrogance like parchment off of wet bone. Their tongues, once full of sermon, hung in silence from my molten iron. I keep them in the ash pits where the smoke claws the lungs until coughing turns to bleeding.
One tried to beg for mercy. I reminded him of every unanswered prayer, every molested child that never saw justice. I showed him those memories while I shoved his face into the coals and watched his face melt, again and again. Mercy tastes like ash here.
What unnerves me, what I do not record lightly, is the sound I hear when my duties are done. When the halls are quiet and only the cinders whisper, I hear…laughter. Not the shrieks of the damned, but something deeper, older. A sinister chuckle that vibrates through the stone.
We are supposed to be the tormentors, not the tormented. Yet when the laughter rises, even I feel the itch under my skin, like claws testing the limits of my sanity. Perhaps it is Hell itself, amused at us all, kings, demons and sinners alike. I end the entry here…the laughter grows closer.
∼ Kathleen McCluskey
© Copyright Kathleen McCluskey. All Rights Reserved.
No Madonna
At sunset she serves herself with a candle on an oaken tray, a glass of wine, a plate of fruit. As she eats, she flips through an album. It contains her trials, loves and tribulations in photographs. There is the damask tablecloth from Surrey, embroidered towels, silver spoons; that certain green silk dress, a size too small she wore for King Henry ll’s ball … Melmac dishes from the sixties, the kind a gypsy could afford, they never broke when thrown … the dark-haired boy with smoky eyes, (she made him happy for a time, until her needs got in the way) … a shredded ticket to Belize with Sven, who never understood a word but never did that matter, at the time. One last sleigh ride in snowy Switzerland. Green yarn from a knitted hat. That sad faced man with the cowboy hat, and the older gentleman, the one she wed, both cattlemen and rich, back in the day. A columbine, pressed in wax paper. The lady smiles, having rekindled memories of her many passions. She blots her lips, wipes her fangs with a clean blue napkin.
∼ Marge Simon
© Copyright Marge Simon. All Rights Reserved.
Let It In
Awake in my bed, I embrace the oppression of the silence, that moment, not at midnight, but before dawn when the night struggles to remain. It presses against your skin, tangibly scratching at the surface of my being. A smell engulfs me, not the stench of old houses, moldy, stale, but the bitter, smoky scent of lightning in summer.
I wait for it, an unearthly presence constraining at the edges of nothing, an impervious void lingering behind the smell. It murmurs cryptic words, weaves unfathomable visions, its existence liberating fear and solace, like the icy touch of death for a terminal patient.
Sometimes I fight against it; more often I concede, accepting its supremacy over my mind. I squirm as it wiggles inside my brain, excising parts of my existence with surgical precision. Yet, I feel free afterward, and my burdens of conscience, of benevolence, vanish.
With the light of day I function as I was, but I am changed.
Hour by hour, day by day, I become…detached.
Yesterday, my perception altered.
It granted me the gift to discern its reality.
It is here.
My home is its conduit.
Slime oozes through the wall cracks, past the floorboards, thick black goop painting my house in shades of the void. A physical manifestation of my entity, cold to the touch, and pulsing with a rhythmic heartbeat. It is my connection, my lifeline. Alive, subsuming, struggling to enter our world.
In response to the cadence, my blood roars, energy surging deep inside my veins, my thoughts explode in a kaleidoscope of radiance and colour, while a lullaby of starfire sings in my ears. And still no outward sign. I still smile and serve breakfast to my oblivious family.
They used to be my world. A husband and two children.
No longer.
I feel nothing…not as they die, not as I feed their blood and meat to the slime.
Not as I watch the black ooze grow, invading, slithering inside this empty house.
Not as it embraces me, unravels my flesh and drinks my blood.
I welcome the pain, the promise.
We will be reborn as one.
~ A. F. Stewart
© Copyright 2025 A. F. Stewart. All Rights Reserved.
Natural Inhumation
The rolling landscape extended beyond sight in all directions. The emptiness engulfed me in insignificance. This dead world I found myself on was as lonely as I. The howl of the constant wind was my only companion, and this planet was accompanied by a dying star that would one day stop sharing its warmth.
Tumultuous rumbles shook the ground. My compass pinned it south, so I headed north, away from whatever force caused the terrifying shakes. My footprints were swiftly erased by the constant gusts of sandy air. I mentally weighed how I might find my way back to the ship if I went too far, but disregarded those thoughts when I remembered there would be no reason to go back. It was irreparably damaged. I was stranded with no hope of rescue.
I knew this place was where my journey ended. Somewhere on this barren world my corpse would lay with no one to bury it. The distress call would eventually reach home, but by the time it did, it wouldn’t matter—the flesh will have rotted from my bones.
I almost wished for a crack in my visor, a tear in my suit, then at least the scythe would greet me with haste. But I had plenty of oxygen, I’d waste away before I suffocated.
I looked behind me every time the ground quaked. Despite my walking in the opposite direction, the vibration grew stronger. I could feel a violent power in the distance, something I didn’t want to be near. I supposed it didn’t matter, I’d meet my end here one way or another. But fear is the great motivator, it pushes one to survive even when there is no hope to be had. So I walked on.
Soon, daylight receded and the vast abyss of unreachable stars yawned above. I’d never felt so desolate and alone, never so meaningless and fleeting. Madness crept into my skull and began wrapping its fingers around my fading mind. Logic and training would soon fail me, I’d watch them fall with relief. They served me no more, not in this cursed place.
The next quake hit with ferocious tremors, its origin no longer beyond sight. The ground opened in front of me, sand poured in as the hole grew larger. Terror struck and slunk behind by back like the coward I was, fear wouldn’t even allow me to run.
As the sand began to move beneath my feet, I welcomed the swifter ending it would bring. This world would consume me. At least my miserable corpse would be buried after all.
∼ Lee Andrew Forman
© Copyright Lee Andrew Forman. All Rights Reserved.
The Call of Possibility
She had heard it at the strangest times. When she was young, she had heard it one day while digging beneath the playground slide. It was there, in the cool darkness of the sand, deeper than her plastic shovel could go. Almost a song, more of a whisper. She never could dig deep enough to find it. Then, when she was older, she heard it again in the empty hallways of her high school. An uncanny sound, eerie and beckoning. Somewhere just around another corner, always in a deeper shadow than she could reach. There were other times, too. Times when possibilities stretched beyond her knowing. And those possibilities would sing, whisper, beckon.
Yet she had almost forgotten its call. In the years since, amid the certainty and structure of adulthood, there were few softly singing possibilities. But now, again, she heard it. Despite the beeping of machines, the droning of equipment, it was there. Echoing along the hospital corridors, singing from the labyrinth of passages. It beckoned, and though she could not lift herself from her bed, she could feel herself drawn to it. She could hear it becoming clearer. Drawing nearer. Closing her eyes, she gave way to the call of possibility.
∼ Miriam H. Harrison
© Copyright Miriam H. Harrison. All Rights Reserved.
A Lovely Day
We gazed out from the promenade towards the sea. The tide was in and the sun glittered off the small waves heading towards shore. Despite the weather, the town was nearly empty. We’d snagged an ice cream from a harassed vendor who was on the verge of closing up. We wandered down to the sea front clutching our cones.
“Your ice cream is melting,” I said.
Lucy licked her fingers. Behind us a car roared away, its tires squealing. Maybe it was the ice cream vendor, there weren’t many folk left.
“What a waste of time.”
We watched the sea. I checked my watch. It was nearly time. I took Lucy’s hand.
“It’s been a lovely day.”
“It has.”
Above, the sky was ripped open and a fiery streak blazed overhead. It was predicted the asteroid would land somewhere in the mid-Atlantic. And then, that would be that.
“Yes, what a lovely day.”
∼ RJ Meldrum
© Copyright RJ Meldrum. All Rights Reserved.
Pen of the Damned 