Even the sun can't stop this darkness
Maybe it was me.
Dear God, I hope not.
It seemed such a pleasant enough late night/early morning. I did my radio show, free-form. I played a little MJ in the middle, and then I thought: Oh, I haven't heard "Thriller" in a while, I should finish up with that!
More the fool I.
Maybe it was "Thriller". Maybe it was playing bits of the Evil Dead Off-Broadway soundtrack. Probably I had nothing to do with it, but I can't help thinking it.
As Vincent Price's laughter peaked in my headphones, the sky lightening with the coming dawn, the dogs went apeshit. Out into the backyard, barking their fool heads off. This is not an uncommon occurence - they'll hear a cat or rodent, and out they go. But it went on, and they didn't listen to us telling them to come inside.
Then the light brightened, and I saw. Shameful though it is to admit, I devoutly wished for a return of the darkness. Rising from the ground - in our own backyard! - a dead man. It's astonishing what one notices in these moments. Time seems to drag, and details etch themselves in the brain. The way the flesh was drawn across the right side of his face, and the left side had no flesh at all, but muscle, with some bone showing through. The hair, visible only in patches, white and long. The greenish cast to the skin, save those sections black with ... mold?
His eyes were rolled up, sightless, but the ears must have been keener to compensate. As he freed his left arm from the ground, he swung clumsily at one of the dogs. He caught her only a glancing blow, but she flew back against the fence. She ran back to the house, yelping, and the other dog, thankfully, followed her. I was frozen, watching him. His right hand seemed stuck in the ground. He braced his left hand against the ground and heaved - but the ground held fast, and his arm separated at the wrist. He made no cry of pain, did not stop freeing himself from the ground.
The shock of this sight seemed to free me from my terror somehow. A good thing, too - as he got more free from the ground, he seemed to move faster - as though the earth had been slowing him, holding him, and he felt nothing should hold him back again. I ran to the back door - kicked and shoved the dog-door panel out, slammed the door closed, and latched it. If he couldn't see, he couldn't try to open the door, right?
My mistake.
In my haste, I had left the radio playing, in my headphones. I returned to my room to see him at my open window, head cocked at the faint sound of the music issuing forth. His ruined right arm ripped the screen, his left reached to climb in. I grabbed the nearest thing - my old cell phone - threw it at him, glancing it off his shoulder. Candles followed, pelting his chest, slowing him not a bit. My foot bumped against something - a bottle of wine I had taken up to Valhalla faire that didn't get drunk. No time to mourn the loss of a good Zinfandel, it was the next thing out the window, striking him in the head.
He staggered. In a flash, I remembered stories about the walking dead.
"Jack!" I screamed. He had to be awake by now, with the commotion. "Bring the gun!" I'd once been a little apprehensive about having one in the house. Not now. Now I was thanking anyone, or any One, that might be listening. He brought it. I grabbed it. He's probably a better shot, but the adrenaline was coursing in my body. I brought it up, somehow remembered to disengage the safety, and fired.
Luck? Skill? Friendly blessing from above? I don't know. All I know is the bullet hit the thing (I'd stopped thinking of it as a man now) in the head. The head exploded. It was like - it was like nothing I've ever seen. I've heard descriptions before, from the serious ("Blood spattered on the walls") to the irreverent ("It was like a watermelon at a Gallagher show"). In that moment, I doubted anyone had ever seen what I was seeing, and maybe they're right. Brain matter was blasted back against the fence, the entire left side of the face fell off to one side, and the right side of the face just seemed to disintegrate. The body collapsed to the ground and stopped moving.
I stood there, shuddering. I couldn't let go of the gun. I stumbled forward, closed the windows and latched them. I looked at Jack. He had an expression of disbelief. "Please tell me that isn't what I think it was."
"I don't know what else it could be," I said. "How's Jessie? She- she got hit by that thing." He ran to check on her.
I sat heavily on the bed. I managed to engage the safety, set the gun down. I forced myself to look out the window. The body was still there, unmoving. I went to Jack's room, looked out his window. Nothing else was in the backyard, but the earth was unmistakably disturbed. And there was the hand, still embedded in the ground, rotted broken bone rising up from the wrist.
This was real. This is real. I've been up for 18 hours, but I can't sleep. This is no hallucination, I swear it.
I sat to write this, to record it. So I know it's not a drea-
Oh my God. I've just realised. Remembered. Whatever. We live about two blocks away ... from the cemetery. I've got to make sure the front door is locked.
Edit: loupyone posted something last night. I didn't notice the sirens when I was running Arcana Evolved - I was too into the game. I'm not crazy. But I think I wish I was.
Edited at 0602 PDT on 13 Jun 2007
Dear God, I hope not.
It seemed such a pleasant enough late night/early morning. I did my radio show, free-form. I played a little MJ in the middle, and then I thought: Oh, I haven't heard "Thriller" in a while, I should finish up with that!
More the fool I.
Maybe it was "Thriller". Maybe it was playing bits of the Evil Dead Off-Broadway soundtrack. Probably I had nothing to do with it, but I can't help thinking it.
As Vincent Price's laughter peaked in my headphones, the sky lightening with the coming dawn, the dogs went apeshit. Out into the backyard, barking their fool heads off. This is not an uncommon occurence - they'll hear a cat or rodent, and out they go. But it went on, and they didn't listen to us telling them to come inside.
Then the light brightened, and I saw. Shameful though it is to admit, I devoutly wished for a return of the darkness. Rising from the ground - in our own backyard! - a dead man. It's astonishing what one notices in these moments. Time seems to drag, and details etch themselves in the brain. The way the flesh was drawn across the right side of his face, and the left side had no flesh at all, but muscle, with some bone showing through. The hair, visible only in patches, white and long. The greenish cast to the skin, save those sections black with ... mold?
His eyes were rolled up, sightless, but the ears must have been keener to compensate. As he freed his left arm from the ground, he swung clumsily at one of the dogs. He caught her only a glancing blow, but she flew back against the fence. She ran back to the house, yelping, and the other dog, thankfully, followed her. I was frozen, watching him. His right hand seemed stuck in the ground. He braced his left hand against the ground and heaved - but the ground held fast, and his arm separated at the wrist. He made no cry of pain, did not stop freeing himself from the ground.
The shock of this sight seemed to free me from my terror somehow. A good thing, too - as he got more free from the ground, he seemed to move faster - as though the earth had been slowing him, holding him, and he felt nothing should hold him back again. I ran to the back door - kicked and shoved the dog-door panel out, slammed the door closed, and latched it. If he couldn't see, he couldn't try to open the door, right?
My mistake.
In my haste, I had left the radio playing, in my headphones. I returned to my room to see him at my open window, head cocked at the faint sound of the music issuing forth. His ruined right arm ripped the screen, his left reached to climb in. I grabbed the nearest thing - my old cell phone - threw it at him, glancing it off his shoulder. Candles followed, pelting his chest, slowing him not a bit. My foot bumped against something - a bottle of wine I had taken up to Valhalla faire that didn't get drunk. No time to mourn the loss of a good Zinfandel, it was the next thing out the window, striking him in the head.
He staggered. In a flash, I remembered stories about the walking dead.
"Jack!" I screamed. He had to be awake by now, with the commotion. "Bring the gun!" I'd once been a little apprehensive about having one in the house. Not now. Now I was thanking anyone, or any One, that might be listening. He brought it. I grabbed it. He's probably a better shot, but the adrenaline was coursing in my body. I brought it up, somehow remembered to disengage the safety, and fired.
Luck? Skill? Friendly blessing from above? I don't know. All I know is the bullet hit the thing (I'd stopped thinking of it as a man now) in the head. The head exploded. It was like - it was like nothing I've ever seen. I've heard descriptions before, from the serious ("Blood spattered on the walls") to the irreverent ("It was like a watermelon at a Gallagher show"). In that moment, I doubted anyone had ever seen what I was seeing, and maybe they're right. Brain matter was blasted back against the fence, the entire left side of the face fell off to one side, and the right side of the face just seemed to disintegrate. The body collapsed to the ground and stopped moving.
I stood there, shuddering. I couldn't let go of the gun. I stumbled forward, closed the windows and latched them. I looked at Jack. He had an expression of disbelief. "Please tell me that isn't what I think it was."
"I don't know what else it could be," I said. "How's Jessie? She- she got hit by that thing." He ran to check on her.
I sat heavily on the bed. I managed to engage the safety, set the gun down. I forced myself to look out the window. The body was still there, unmoving. I went to Jack's room, looked out his window. Nothing else was in the backyard, but the earth was unmistakably disturbed. And there was the hand, still embedded in the ground, rotted broken bone rising up from the wrist.
This was real. This is real. I've been up for 18 hours, but I can't sleep. This is no hallucination, I swear it.
I sat to write this, to record it. So I know it's not a drea-
Oh my God. I've just realised. Remembered. Whatever. We live about two blocks away ... from the cemetery. I've got to make sure the front door is locked.
Edit: loupyone posted something last night. I didn't notice the sirens when I was running Arcana Evolved - I was too into the game. I'm not crazy. But I think I wish I was.
Edited at 0602 PDT on 13 Jun 2007