MicroHorror

She was dreaming. She had to be.

Something was inside her head, trying to get out. She could feel it scratching and pawing inside her brain. Somehow, she knew it had been there for years, incubating. And now it wanted out.

Two evil little claws broke through her skull and ripped her head open like tissue paper. A foul-smelling imp, black as night save for two emerald green eyes, climbed out of her head and took its first breath. Moonlight fought its way into the bedroom through closed curtains, and the creature sucked it in, making the room darker merely by its presence.

The tiny demon turned to her nightstand and picked up the lamp, ripping the cord out of the wall. All she could do was turn her head and watch as it stepped over her chest and lifted the lamp above its puckish head. Without hesitation it raised the lamp high in the air and brought it down on her sleeping husband’s face. Again and again it raised the lamp and smashed it back down, until bone and skin, cartilage and tissue, were nothing but a damp pulpy mess.

The gremlin dropped the bloody lamp and turned back to her. She hadn’t so much as screamed. Its eyes locked with hers and she stared into its ancient, eternal soul. Then it opened its mouth wide like a snake, needle teeth glistening in the moonlight, and swallowed her.

She woke with a start, sitting bolt upright in bed. Sweat poured down her face and soaked her faded nightgown. She sank back on her elbows, heart pumping wildly, and an icy chill spread through her body when her left elbow touched something wet and sticky.