MicroHorror

“It’s close, but not quite the same.”“It’ll have to do.”

“I’m pretty sure the color is off.”

“It’ll have to do.”

“Wasn’t it hanging lower?”

“It’ll have to do.”

“You shouldn’t have taken it down in the first place.”

“I SAID IT WILL HAVE TO DO! Jimmy will be home soon and he can’t see it missing.”

“All right, all right, no need to get snippy. Where did you find it anyway? The likeness is remarkable.”

“Down by the overpass. They’re all over the place there. Now hold it steady, I have to make sure it’s secure.”

A car door slammed outside and they could hear Jimmy laughing and calling to his friends.

“Crap. It’ll have to do.”

“I don’t think it will work. It’s been in the same place for years. He’ll notice the difference.”

“It’ll have to do.”

The door swung open and in ran little Jimmy.

“Hi Mom, hi Dad, hi Grandpa, I had a great day at school today.”

The boy got up on his tiptoes and kissed them each in turn and then ran off to play, never aware that the swinging corpse wasn’t actually his grandfather.

The autumn evening is cool and quiet. The day is over and your mind is at rest. You lean back in your favorite chair, close your eyes, and gently drift off into a doze.

At the edge of consciousness, you hear a sound. It repeats. As you rise up out of the haze of slumber, you realize that the doorbell is ringing.

Still half-asleep, you stumble to the front door and open it.

“Trick or treat!” chorus four voices.

You look down. Halloween already? It must be, because there they are, holding out pillowcases and shopping bags. A devil with plastic horns, a pirate grinning through smudged eyeliner stubble, Spider-Man with his own name written across his chest, and even an old-fashioned last-minute bedsheet ghost with scuffed sneakers just visible below the hem. You smile blearily.

“Give me just a second, kids, I know I’ve got something around here somewhere.”

In the kitchen, you rummage through the cupboards, looking for suitable treats. You’ve been so busy that you completely forgot to buy candy, and now here you are, with not even a Fun-Size Snickers to your name. You dig further, hoping for something acceptable, anything, candy bars, cookies, gum. Nothing.

You walk slowly back. The trick-or-treaters have stepped inside, and are waiting patiently by your front door. Red-faced, you shrug.

“I’m really sorry. I thought I had something. I hate to turn you away empty-handed on Halloween. Maybe I’ve got some spare change, do you want that?”

The pirate speaks up. “No, that’s all right. We really were hoping for treats, though.”

The devil nods in agreement. “I guess it’s time for the trick.”

And as the children shift into their true forms, you remember that Halloween won’t be here for weeks.

You didn’t do it. You saw the footage on the news just like everyone else, as the person who looked exactly like you murdered twelve people at the 7-11. It wasn’t you, but security cameras can’t lie. What could have been your own hand gripped the knife as it sliced open the stomach of the cashier. The young man fell to the ground, clutching his intestines, and the face that looked like yours grinned as it was splashed with steaming blood. Someone tried to tackle your twin from behind, but your twin was too fast, turning around and bringing the blade across the man’s throat. When the carnage was over, the store was a slaughterhouse. The young mother slumped across the corpses of her son and her daughter. And your twin just stood there, coated from head to toe in gore, and laughed in a voice that sounded just like your own, slipping away only moments before the police arrived.

At the trial, you have no alibi. You try to explain that it was your twin, your clone, your doppelganger. You were at home, alone, but no one believes you. The jury sees your face in the video, and fingerprints identical to yours were all over the murder weapon. There is no hope for you. The sentence is death.

Weeks later, in prison, you look up to see the judge who condemned you, watching you through the bars of your cell. You plead with him again, still insisting upon your innocence. The judge furrows his brow, and he speaks.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “There’s nothing I can do for you. After all, it wasn’t me who issued that sentence.”

You look puzzled, and the judge smiles.

“It was my evil twin.”

And the judge’s laughter mingles with the echoes of his footsteps as he walks away, leaving you alone in your cell to face your fate.

Just a ball of fluff when they brought him home, with round amber eyes, all black except for a crooked white blaze, and energy! Climbing the curtains, hissing at his image in the mirror, they called him MonsterKitty, and laughed.

He knew they were laughing.
He bided his time.
Let them keep laughing.
They didn’t know his mission. How could they?
They would never understand.
His power would grow.
He would travel where they, with their queer clinging to linear time, to
 three-dimensional space, could never go.
Even when their dead returned, they would never suspect,
 nor understand what they had lost.

Daniel Huntslinger was born in rural Iowa in 1971, a bright young man in general good health. In 1987, he started noticing a fleshy lump above his right hip. An examination concluded that it was a benign tumor, and operation would be unnecessary.

In 1998, when Daniel was 27 years old, the lump, which had never caused him discomfort before, suddenly began hurting intensely. The pain was overwhelming, and Daniel collapsed on the floor of the retail warehouse where he was employed.

Daniel was rushed to the nearest emergency room, and an operation was performed to remove the softball-sized lump of tissue. Upon its removal, the doctors were stunned to see that the so-called tumor possessed hair, several fully-formed teeth, and two tiny fingers, growing out of a shapeless mass of flesh. Daniel had lived his entire life with a teratoma, an unborn twin that had died in the womb and been absorbed into his body. The dead tissue was disposed of, and Daniel made a full recovery.

That was the story the doctors told. But they were wrong, of course.

I didn’t die.

Thud Thud

What’s that? Ahh my head, it pounds so from the wine and Carnival.

Thud

Thud

No, ’tis something more. My wrists they ache. This insufferable dark. The walls too close. That smell.

“Nitre?”

Thud

Thud

What brings me here?

“Amontillado.”

Thud

Thud

‘Tis my heart- it shall explode from my chest.

“MONTRESSOR!”

Thud

Thud

Though my heart beats hard, this sound, it comes from without.

Thud, Thud

Thud, Thud

The sound, it quickens. Of course, these catacombs are not his alone.

A reveler heard my moans. Or perhaps days have past whilst I slept. Montressor is a weak man, and friends will have seen us together. He would crack and they would search me out.

Thud, Thud

Thud, Thud

Closer and faster, I hear it above me now. Encouragement, I must give it.

“I AM HERE! I AM ALIVE, HURRY!”

Thud

Thud

It slows, they are certain of my safety.

Thud

A voice, it comes distant through the wall.

“That is good, my friend, I was afraid we lost you the other night.”

“Montressor–”

Thud

It is naught but another brick set.

Thud

Run for your lives, boys,
 run for your lives. 
This thing has got tentacles,
 bazillions of eyes. 
It oozes, it slithers, it skulks
 and it crawls. 
It sits on the ceiling,
 and clings to the walls. 
It hisses, it gibbers, it babbles
 it howls. 
It looks like it sprung from
 Hell’s very bowels. 
To look on its visage would
 be very bad. 
To see its true features
 would drive you quite mad. 
Flee, run away, hide very well
 the end is forgone–we’re going to Hell.

We’re going to die, but prolong if you can. 

This thing can be killed by no mortal man.

Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages, step right up and see the Freak Show! Marvel in wonder and delight at the twisted monstrosities behind this very curtain! Nature’s most horrifying mistakes crawl out of the darkness and parade their misshapen forms before your gaze. Step forward! You will see the hideous, the grotesque, the gruesome, that which was not meant to be! See the–I’m sorry? How much does it cost? Oh, no, you misunderstand me, child. You see, you’re already inside.

 I can’t ooze as well as He can.
He’s always been better–
 thicker and blacker,
 more syrupy than I’ll ever be.

He starts when the victim enters the room
 fumbling for the light switch–but it’s covered
 with something black and slimy,
 and very cold.
When He reaches towards His victim
 the pain of His touch feels like
 your hand has been severed by an oven door
 but you still feel your fingers burn a smoldering black.

The soothing smell of sizzling flesh
 rises to the victim’s nostrils.
He’s more acidic than I am
 and more talented. As He eats through the victim’s skin
 He can slide a writhing tentacle into the throat.
The vocal chords are cut and consumed
 before the victim can cry out.
Soon the victim is engulfed,
 and mere minutes turn a man
 into a dollop of oozing goo.

It will be a long time
 before I will be able to match His might.
For He is a thousand years old,
 and I was human yesterday.

Suicide is more difficult than most people think. (Plank J goes perpendicular to Plank C; screw in the angle bracket. Got it.) If you screw up slicing your wrist, you’ll only cut the tendon. Try to shoot yourself in the head, you could be paralyzed but aware for years. (Where did I put that screwdriver?) No, you’ve got to be careful and do it right the first time. (Double-check the directions. This is B here, not H, right?) That’s why I was so glad to find this kit. Once it’s all done, all I have to do is put my head through the hole, pull the cord, and the blade will slice right through. I love Swedish engineering. (Assembly A ought to fit in these grooves here… perfect.) Too bad I’ll only get to use it once.