MicroHorror

Drizzle plopped down onto Karen’s umbrella, as she hurried along the dimly lit dead end street, dodging potholes and puddles on her way to meet the environmental lawyer turned whistleblower.

Philip Dunbar stopped pacing when the Deputy District Attorney reached him. “What kept you?” he snapped.

“Well, I had to make sure I wasn’t followed,” Karen shot back. “Per your instructions.”

“You sure you weren’t? They can shape shift. I’ve seen them. They’re trying to kill me.” Philip’s words tumbled off his tongue in a single breath. He craned his neck, searching the shadows beyond where he and Karen stood.

“What?” Karen’s voice was sharp with impatience.

Philip narrowed his eyes at her. “Nothing. Let’s get this done.”

“Fine.” Karen stepped forward. “Why don’t you join me under my umbrella?”

“No!” Philip drew back. “The rain will protect me. It douses their fire.” He began to pace, again. “They almost had me, earlier tonight. Before I ran into the rain.”

Karen stood silent, for a moment, her eyes trailing Philip as he walked back and forth before her. “You’re losing your mind, Dunbar. Bad enough, you refused to meet anywhere but here. Now, you’re spouting off about some weird nonsense–” She paused. “I’ve jumped through too many hoops for you, already, over the past couple of days. Just give me the evidence so I can get it back to the office, safe and dry.”

Philip forced his feet to shuffle to his car and his palm to grip the driver’s side door handle. He kept his eyes focused on the better lit end of the deserted street as he reached into his sedan, his movement awkward and robotic. “It’s like the devil is the firm’s biggest client, now,” he commented, his fingers closing around the evidence Karen sought.

His hand trembled as he offered her the small stack of CD jewel cases he retrieved from his car. Incriminating evidence he’d risked his life to collect over the past two weeks.

Karen reached for the treasured CDs, tipping her umbrella forward to keep the stack from getting wet. Philip didn’t notice the onyx gleam that streaked across her corneas after the compact discs were in her possession.

“Nice to see you finally do the right thing, at last, by turning in your partners after all your years of helping them cover up water pollution by several chemical plants. Still not interested in telling me what spawned your sudden change of heart?”

“People just change, sometimes.”

“So is this all I need?” Karen asked of the CDs. Philip nodded. “And you’re still willing to testify?”

“As long as I’ve got immunity from the District Attorney’s office.” His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he swallowed hard. “And as long as you get me the kind of protection I need.”

Karen stood, staring.

The air grew thick, wrapping around Philip like a fist. His stomach tightened in fear as a low growl filled his ears. His knees wobbled when he realized the sound was flowing from Karen.

Thunder drummed across the sky. Lightning ripped in thin, crooked, white lines. Karen released her grip on her umbrella, and gusting wind snatched the umbrella away.

Her skin contorted and melted.

Philip staggered backward, swung around, and tried to slip inside his car. The beast masquerading as Karen burst from its deceitful cocoon, towering above him.

Rain bounced off of black, leathery skin. Fetid coils of white smoke rose from steaming flesh. The beast’s thick, forked tongue lunged from its gaping mouth, snaking itself around Philip’s torso. Bones cracked and snapped as the beast crushed him.

Philip’s corpse crumpled to the ground. The thunder softened. The lightning dissipated. The wind calmed.

The compact discs lay scattered in pieces in a nearby puddle, ruined.

“You were right about the rain, Dunbar. It protected you from my fire, earlier tonight,” Karen mumbled, after shifting back into the flesh and bones of her human costume. “But I always have a Plan B.”

Mark was seventeen when he learned to control his special ability and used his unique skill to smother his father as the sperm donor slept one winter afternoon in ‘87.

Seen drunk around town as usual the night he was discovered dead, the sheriff and the coroner figured Mark’s idiotic pop somehow managed to sleep with his face buried in his pillows. His father’s death pretty much put an end to unnecessary grief in Mark’s life. Until Mark’s wife decided she wanted a divorce on their son’s second birthday.

Unlike his father, Mark was a good daddy. But now, Susan wanted sole custody of their toddler son, Timmy.

After being served with papers from his soon-to-be ex’s lawyer, Mark went to Susan’s to protest her latest ploy and was arrested for violating her restraining order.

He hadn’t done his thing on purpose for about six months, but Mark remained confident in his skill.

Appearing asleep on his jail cell cot, he coaxed his essence forward. Through mere thought, an onyx shadow rose from Mark’s body. Freed of the confinement of flesh and bone, Mark floated, unseen, out of the county jail and toward Susan’s house.

He might as well make use of his perfect alibi.

Charles sighed at the tinkling of Mrs. Allen’s summoning bell. He rose from his seat at the computer, Mrs. Allen’s dead husband’s bulky leather chair crinkling beneath his movements.

He would’ve quit as her butler years ago, but he was enjoying himself far too much, lately, to even consider departing now.

On his way to the widow’s bedroom, he retrieved a serving tray from the kitchen, ignoring the stench of burned flesh and the splashes of blood on the countertop.

Mrs. Allen snacked on finger sandwiches on Mondays. On Wednesdays, she craved sweetbread. Fridays were reserved for devilled eyeballs. Today was Monday.

After caring for the widow, Charles settled back into his seat, returning his gaze to the live video feed of the fingerless man trapped in the cellar.

Eugenia swiped a dish towel in circles absentmindedly drying a plate, her face growing hot as her jealousy bloomed over her elderly neighbor’s garden. She stared out her kitchen window at the purple, pink, and yellow flowers trembling in the spring breeze. Flowers she’ll probably never grow.

The front door slammed, snagging Eugenia from her thoughts. “Harv,” she whispered, realizing her son had been gone from the kitchen for too long. She scolded herself for bitching so much in front of Harvey, especially when it came to Mrs. Percival and the old bag’s garden. But ever since Harvey was a toddler the wench gave her and her son hell about staying away from her precious garden. And to make things worst, every attempt Eugenia made to grow her own garden had failed.

Harvey’s footsteps stopped at the kitchen doorway.

Eugenia swung around to yell at her slow son, but paused. Harvey’s smile caused the twenty-year-old man to appear even more childlike. Eugenia’s eyes focused on the red stains on his shirt. “It wasn’t time to go finger paintin’, Harv.” She sighed. She loved her son, but sometimes she grew so tired. “And what’re you hidin’ behind your back? Let’s see it.”

Harvey shifted his feet. He glanced down and back up at his mother. “Happy Mudder’s Day,” he beamed, pulling his arms forward.

Eugenia froze at the sight of her son’s gift. “What’ve you done?”

Seconds later, her lips curved into a smile as she took the two wrinkled thumbs Harvey offered her with his bloodied hands.

Eugenia stashed the thumbs in the freezer, and sneaked over to the old woman’s place, entering through the back door so no one saw her. With no family, it might take months before the crone was discovered missing. After Eugenia and Harvey cleaned up the blood, mother and son hauled away Mrs. Perceval and the butcher’s knife used to sever her thumbs.

Two weeks afterward, Eugenia finally had a garden of her own. In her back yard, along the tall, wooden fence, purple, pink, and yellow flowers grew, fertilized by the corpse beneath the soil.

Roger stared at the wall. Some of the tacked newspaper clippings were yellowed, curled at their edges, and as old as five years. Others were whiter and dated as recent as two weeks ago.

Muffled words regained Roger’s attention.

He ripped the gag from the other man’s mouth. “Where’s the stuff you took from the women?”

The bound man laughed from the chair that held him captive.

Roger raised his Glock. He squeezed the trigger. A bullet shot through the silencer aimed between the killer’s eyes.

Roger had been just as much an expert in tracking down his copycat as he was in picking his victims.

The telephone rang, cutting into Ilene’s nightmare. She flipped opened her eyelids. Her breasts heaved. Her pulse throbbed in her ears. She lay face up, staring. Shadows from her dream slinked into the corners of the ceiling as she let the answering machine catch the call.

“Hey, babe, looks like I’ll be late. There’s been some kinda chemical spill. I’m swamped with patients in the ER, but will be home ASAP. And yeah, I promise to finish cleaning the attic no matter how tired I’ll be. Love you.”

Calmed by her husband’s voice, Ilene eased onto her side. She fell asleep soon again.

Quaking thunder woke her hours later. Ilene flipped opened her eyes. Pitch darkness greeted her, and her heartbeat leapt.

She reached for the handle on the nightstand drawer, her fingertips fumbling until tapping against the drawer’s handle. She pulled. Dipped her fingers into the drawer, grabbed the flashlight, and then got out of bed.

When she reached the bottom of the stairs, sudden knocking startled her. She inched toward a window, peeped out. Two sheriff’s deputies waited. She yanked opened the front door.

“Ma’am, I’m Deputy Richards, this is Deputy Sykes. Are you Mrs. Palmer?” Ilene nodded. The deputy continued. “We’re sorry to say, but your husband suffered fatal injuries in an accident. We suspect he was on his way home when he grew ill and lost control of his vehicle…” Richards paused as Ilene began sinking to the floor. He and Sykes caught her by her elbows and led her to the couch.

Sykes sat Ilene’s flashlight upright on the coffee table to illuminate the living room. “Is there anyone you’d like us to call?”

Ilene shook her head, tears dripping off her chin.

Floorboards creaked overhead.

“You’re alone, aren’t you?” Richards asked.

More than ever now that Marvin’s gone. Ilene managed a nod.

“I’ll go check things out, anyway.” Richards flicked on his flashlight, and headed upstairs.

Minutes later, pop pop pop banished the silence.

Ilene’s shoulders jumped along with her heartbeat.

“Stay here,” Sykes yelled, clicking on his flashlight and running upstairs.

Seconds later: pop pop pop pop…

Dense silence followed.

Ilene grabbed her flashlight. She rushed to the kitchen. Slid a butcher’s knife from the wooden block on the counter. She turned to leave and halted when her eyes found the backdoor ajar. “Marvin…,” she whispered, her lips quivering. You’re supposed to be here protecting me! Not dead on a cold slab of steel waiting for me to come claim your body!

She aimed the flashlight upwards to light the walls, and then crept out of the kitchen.

She stood breathless outside the attic room. The door sat ajar, floorboards screeched. Ilene trained the flashlight onto the floor ahead, and pushed past the door.

She gasped at the sight of Richards and Sykes sprawled near each other, their blood pooling. She swung the flashlight up toward the movement on the other side of the attic.

The beam spotlighted Marvin’s reanimated corpse.

Ilene staggered backwards. She stared as Marvin fought to stack cardboard boxes with mangled arms. As he forced his rigor mortis legs to stumble forward.

There’s been some kinda chemical spill… “What happened to you, my love?” Ilene’s voice was hoarse with pain.

Her flashlight’s beam glinted in Marvin’s eyes. He shot toward her in preternatural speed.

Ilene raised the knife. But Marvin was too swift. He snatched the weapon. Then, thrust the thirteen-inch blade into Ilene’s stomach, once, twice, and again.

Ilene sank to the floor, still gripping the flashlight.

Marvin dropped the knife. Turned away, and retreated to the other side of the attic, his steps awkward and off-kilter.

Ilene soon lost her grip on the flashlight. No, not like this, she cried in her thoughts.

Marvin began mumbling, his words thick and slurred, spoken with an undead tongue.

 Ilene struggled to understand him. “I promised…I promised…” she heard, as the darkness of unconsciousness oozed down onto her, and she exhaled her last breath.