B. A. C. Squared
By Kave Catheson

PART 1: BLOOD ALCOHOL CONTENT

gly people are evil?” Mark asked, laughing.

“That’s not what I said. If you look at a large majority of books and movies, there is often an unattractive antagonist to indicate some lapse in morality. Maybe they have a scar, or some type of exaggerated deformity that distinguishes them from the heroes. Regardless, it is that very distinction that provides an automatic guilty verdict from the audience before the opportunity for crime occurs. It all falls back to our obsession with appearances,” Will said.

“Why are you telling me this?” Mark asked.

“Because you are obsessed with image,” Will replied. “You have fallen into a permanent state of superficiality that holds no weight outside of fiction. You are either callous or dismissive with those whom you deem unattractive.”

“Yeah,” Mark nodded, “because they’re evil.”

“You are missing the point.”

“And I am okay with that.” Mark pulled the keys from the ignition, and turned to face his passenger. “Will, we met two attractive ladies in a bar, they invited us back to their place, and—in case you haven’t noticed—we’re here. I would like to hang out with these girls for at least a few minutes before you put them to sleep with your observations. Just relax, have fun, and whatever you do, don’t speak.”

Mark opened his door and exited the ’89 Camaro, leaving his exasperated companion alone in the vehicle. Shaking his head, Will released the seatbelt and began to follow suit, when Mark leaned his head into the cab.

“By the way, I call dibs on the brunette,” Mark announced.

“Her name is Melody.”

“Whatever,” Mark said, before he slammed the Camaro’s door.

Will climbed out of the vehicle as Mark ran up the steps of the front porch. The structure was small and simple, with a brief staircase leading to a four-foot square platform, practical only in that it allowed entrance into the mobile home. Two young women were collectively fumbling through keys while bathed in the luminescence of a weak porch-light, beneath which a tornado of moths was cycling erratically. It resembled a small regimen of bees vying for their turn at a blossom, the nightly equivalent of nature’s innuendo.

As Will waited from his position at the bottom of the steps for the others to enter the house, a stridulation caused him to turn from the porch. The audibility of the grating screech, whether due to the distance it traveled or the size of the creature from which it originated, allowed only a slight dissonance with the raised voices of the young women, and Will strained to contradistinguish the noise as he plodded in the direction of its source. After a few steps, he heard it again: a harsher sound than a cricket's chirping and more timid than the call of an owl, yet it possessed characteristics of both. When an answering call came from another section of the resolute darkness contained by the trees, Will realized that he no longer heard the voices of his companions. At the prospect of being alone with any inhabitants of the wooded area, Will turned toward the mobile home to see Melody waiting for him.

“Are you coming?” Melody asked. She was standing on the threshold of the entrance, holding the front door open. "All of the hot girls are in here."

Will grimaced, experiencing a level of self-betrayal as his face became flushed. “Sorry. I thought I heard something.”

She laughed and shrugged. “Probably frogs. There’s a creek through those trees; it's not prime for skinny-dipping, but it’s scenic, once you get past the strange smell of the water. Maybe we can take a walk later. Besides,” Melody said, "I'll probably need a break from our drunkard friends as the night rolls on."

Melody pressed the storm door outward and leaned against it to let Will pass. Having ascended the porch steps, the young man was immediately assaulted by a mélange of exotic smells, consisting of the scented arsenal with which a woman attacks the olfaction of unsuspecting males. It was all Will could do not to linger in the pleasant tendrils, an action which would undoubtedly bring chastisement from Mark.

Having immediately migrated to the kitchen upon entering the home, Mark and April were positioning several liquor bottles onto the counter, which rested upon a small island located in the center of the room. When Mark cast an investigative glare in the direction of the late arrivals, Will noticed that his friend’s eyes lingered on Melody as she closed the front door.

Two shot glasses, filled with a clear liquid, were consumed as Melody and Will approached. As soon as the glass cylinders met the table, they were hastily refilled, with vodka spilling over the rims and onto the counter. Noxious fumes rushed into Will's nose and mouth, purging the enticingly persistent smell, which he had gained as a result of Melody's company, from his senses. April quickly caught the spill within a dishrag, but the damage had been done; Will's olfaction was saturated with the reek.

While disposing of the rag into the sink, April’s face burst with pleasant surprise. "We should play Never Have I Ever!" she exclaimed. Her voice and expression announced to the group that she was quite pleased with herself, prior to triumphantly downing her shot.

“No way,” Melody said vehemently, shaking her head. “Uh-uh.”

April’s expression plummeted into disappointment. “Mel,” she pleaded, “why not?”

“You know why,” Melody accused. “You always call me out.” Mark gave a quick wink to Will, who grinned sheepishly at the small conflict.

“Ugh,” April rolled her eyes as her shoulders fell. “I won’t call you out, okay? C’mon,” she traveled around the counter, grabbing Melody’s hand to lead her into the living room. “It’ll be fun. Plus, we’ll get some interesting facts about our guests.”

Mark quickly assumed a position on the living room floor next to Melody, with the young lady effectively ignoring him. Will sauntered slowly to the small congregation, wary of each step into unknown territory. Conflicting emotions were evident within the circle of young adults: Mark was uncharacteristically withdrawn; Melody brandished a distrusting sneer to an oblivious April.

“Who’s going to start?” April asked.

“It was your idea," Melody said. "Why don’t you go first?”

“Fine.” April announced. She was sitting Indian-style and swiveled to face Will, leaning toward him with an interrogative intimidation. “Never have I ever…” Her eyes rolled up, as if they could turn and read some valuable hint or information directly from her brain: a cognitive cue card. “…Cheated on my boyfriend or girlfriend.”

After a brief pause, during which the participants studied each other for signs of falsities, Mark smirked and gulped his drink. April smiled as a giggle slid through her white teeth.

Melody’s mouth dropped open. “You dirty little boy!”

April leaned over and put a hand on Will’s thigh. “You know how to play this game, right?” Will shook his head, and April seemed pleased that he was a virgin to a ceremony with which she had experience. An agenda was looming, one where promiscuity served an advantage. "Someone says ‘never have I ever’ blah-blah-blah (she fluttered her hand in the air as if the topic was an insignificant mosquito to swat away), and then, if you have done said-thing, you take a drink. From your friend’s reaction, for example, I now know he has cheated on a partner.” April spoke the last statement with an accomplished smile as she shot a knowing grin to Melody. She shook her head, “Shameful.”

“I could have just been thirsty. Or bored,” spilled from Mark’s twisted grin.

“Okay Mel,” April said. “Your turn.”

"Hmm.” Melody thought out-loud, squinting her eyes at Will. “Never have I ever—”

A violent percussion against the storm door interrupted her, with the large glass pane shuddering within the thin aluminum framing. Every face turned in the direction of the noise, but no one moved.

Will caught Melody and April as they exchanged a worried glance. A boyfriend,he wondered. He felt his heart speed with the expectation of a possible conflict waiting for Mark and him. A small pang of anger began to rise in his throat, directed at the girls for putting them in this situation.

April stood and went to the front door, standing on her tiptoes to look through the peephole. She pulled back and looked at Melody; her palms remained against the whiteness that housed unknowns behind it to all the rest. “There’s no one there.”

Mark turned to Will and shrugged.  Who cares?  Will wasn’t as accepting. “What was it then?”

April returned to the living room, only to retrieve her glass before she entered the kitchen. “Just the wind. Anyone need another drink?”

“Yeah, we both do,” Mark said, speaking for his friend. He rose and followed April.

Another thump upon glass, much thicker sounding and from the kitchen area, spun Will around. April screamed, and he was limited to a view of her back profile, as the glass she was holding fell onto the linoleum and shattered. Only the larger pieces were visible on the textured, glossy surface.

Mark was standing on the opposite side of the island, staring at April in shock. His mouth hung open and his brow had furrowed; it was the same expression he wore when someone caromed off of him while in a bar—a violated surprise.

“April?” Melody asked shakily. She stood and entered the kitchen with Will following.

April did not answer. She was staring at the wall near the far corner, which housed a sliding glass door behind vertical blinds. A small dining table sat adjacent, adorned with woven place mats in conjunction with a decorative centerpiece. A chandelier hung above, with the pale brass—-the same finish as one belonging to a cheap new trumpet—-faintly reflecting the light from the living room. Candelabra bulbs were outlined behind their glass casings.

Melody put a hand on April’s shoulder when she reached her. The brunette had been looking down to prevent stepping upon the hazardous crystal rocks. April jerked to life and spun around at the touch.

“There’s something out there! I saw something move,” she pleaded. Her eyes were wide, and the same as an interrogated child’s with the premonition of a whipping. The young woman was searching for belief in her friend’s eyes.

This willed Mark into action. “Probably just a stray dog or something.” He stepped around the island and edged about the dining table. Finding double light-switches upon the wall, he flipped both of them upward with a simultaneous click. The chandelier blazed to life, looking older now that it was highlighted.

The long vertical blinds, a pale linen color, hung to the floor from a track above the sliding glass door. Mark moved to the end, finding the cord that was attached to a hidden pulley in the top molding. He pulled it one way, jerking the blinds tightly closed. Dropping the cord in frustration, he pulled the parallel length as the linen bars spread outward, revealing glass between the inside setting and a lighted deck. Melody prodded a reluctant April toward Mark, and Will came around the island to the dining table. 

Mark pulled the small matching rod down its track and flung the blinds open. He gasped and immediately began reeling backwards with no regard to the setting. As he collided with the dining table, it slid into the room several inches, and the young man almost tripped over a chair in his attempt to get away from the sight behind the glass.

Will focused on the creature, and everything else seemed to fade away. Mark’s uttering, the screams of both Melody and April as they ran into the living room, and even Will’s own breathing were insignificant to the unnatural image beyond.

It was no dog; it had most of the characteristics of a human, although it would never belong to the category: a head, with two eyes larger than any he had ever seen, most of a nose, a tiny mouth, two mangled ears; and a torso with two arms and two legs. The fingers were correct in number, although extended well beyond any average, and almost flat at the tips. Each foot could have possessed an additional length of metatarsals, with an imaginary tarsus having been adopted before the exaggerated arch. The physical version of the heel never touched the porch.

Each toe contained a malformed mass of protein surrounded by bluish-tinted nail beds. Ridge-shaped and layered, the distal ends of the nails sloped into acuminate curvatures that were more reminiscent of talons, than the ravaging claws of land-dwelling predators.

The skin was milky, nearly transparent, with veins etching throughout in a tattooed map. A red splotch covered the sternum just beneath the skin, possibly the remnant of an injury. The muscles were sinewy, and pulsed with every movement, even with the thing’s breathing-—which was obviously labored. The creature looked to be extremely malnourished. The total height from pate to soles could not have exceeded three and a half feet. 

The face was child-like in its development, mirroring the small body. A rounded jaw with thin lips cast a shadow above a skinny neck. The eyes were bulging golf balls; eyelids flicked closed-open like a frog’s, with no eyebrows above them. The nose was the most disconcerting factor; it looked as if damage had occurred while the cartilage had been forming. It sloped upward and to one side at the end, betraying large nostrils.

It turned its head to Will and opened its mouth as its eyes focused upon him. The young man felt like a heavy blanket was cast over him, holding a profane heat that brought sweat to his brow, and seemed to constrict his ribcage around his vitals. He noticed that the eyes of the creature were extremely dilated, even with the deck-light and the luminescence inside.

It—the child-like thing—moved upon seeing Will. It slapped its hands against the sliding glass door, causing everyone in the room to jump as the girls screamed at the sound, and began pulling its palms away as the fingers pressed outward with the pressure. Lines, in the form of horizontal tracks, littered the lanky fingers like a gecko’s.

It raised itself, lifting its feet as it swung slightly away from the glass. The claws scraped down as it began to climb, resounding inside as an uneven cacophony. Within a second, its eyes were level with Will’s. Its breath pulsed an opaque cloud onto the glass in front of its face. A line of drool slithered from its small mouth, which looked more like a navel than an actual orifice.

Will turned to Mark and saw him statuesque, stunned into inaction. “Enough!” Will shouted, and he moved toward the blinds. Grabbing the narrow rod-control, he slung the blinds across the sight outside. He jerked the cord and the blinds slapped closed with a rattle, swaying against the strain placed upon them.

“What is that?” Will asked the question much louder than he intended, startling his companions.

Mark turned to his friend with an expression of terrified understanding. Without a word, Mark pushed past Will and ran into the living room. To the front door.

Will jogged after him, certain of his intent. Mark reached the front door and frantically unlocked it; his hands were shaking and Will had to fight the urge to offer assistance. Pulling the door into the room, Mark had to jump aside to avoid contact with it, having put it into dramatic motion.

There was another one against the storm door, calmly hanging from the glass. The eyes erratically searched the room, pupils constricting into black dart-tips against the inside lighting, curious and eager.

Mark slammed the door shut. He leaned back against the door, looking drained and defeated. “This can’t be happening.”

Both of the young men turned toward their hostesses, who were huddled together on the couch. There was nothing in the surprised and terrified faces to calm their fears.

Mark spun in place and unlocked the door. He pulled it open.

“Mark! What are you—?” Will yelled.

A strange expression had twisted Mark’s face around gritted teeth, and gave him a maniacal quality that frightened his friend. Mark snatched the door open and slapped the push-latch on the storm door and threw his weight against the glass. The door swung open with a shaky wail and screamed as the spring strained. The trespasser on the glass struck the railing around the small platform of the front porch, the impact at the back of the knees, and careened backwards, out of view.

Mark screamed at the creatures, his voice quivering with the adrenaline. Suddenly, the young man's yell caught in his throat, and as Will began to approach the opened door, Mark quickly returned inside, shoving his companion well into the room as he jerked the storm door closed, just prior to latching it. He slammed the front door and locked it. The fierce expression was replaced with the melted mask of desperation.

“There’s more than two.” He said, almost nonchalantly.

“What do you mean there’s more than two?” April asked accusingly.

Mark calmly walked to the window near the door. He pulled the mini-blinds up to reveal another face, one matching that of the harassing trolls' that had claimed the doors. He dropped the blinds back down.

“Oh God…” Melody muttered from the couch.

“How many?” Will asked.

“A lot,” Mark said, as though he didn’t believe it himself.

“I want them to go away,” April said. Her hands were claws, nails against her scalp, pulling her medium-length hair away from her face. She was staring at the floor with a clenched jaw, and breathing in a hard cadence. “Make them go away.”

“She’s right, Will,” Mark said. He turned toward his friend with an expression of faux concern. “We should just make them go away. It’ll be easy. We’ll just walk outside, and explain to them how they’re scaring the ladies.” He shrugged. “Then we’ll tell them to come back in a couple of weeks so we can have a virgin ready.”

“Stop it,” Melody said.

Mark threw his hands up in mock surrender, and walked to the recliner. He plopped himself into the chair, and craned his neck to gaze at the ceiling.

“What are you thinking?” April asked, with her eyes fixed on Will.

He shook his head as he met her stare. “I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do,” April said. There was a vibration to her voice, and Will thought it might be the early signs of a meltdown. “You have an idea.”

Will looked to his companion in the recliner, who seemed to be ignoring everything around him. Then, for some reason, he glanced at Melody. He opened his mouth to say something.

Another thump slapped the storm door. Melody and April screamed and Mark clenched the arms of the chair. Either the original peeping-tom had recovered, or one of its kin had assumed its place.

“Go away!” April screamed at the door.

“Great.” Mark said, wincing. He stood and went for a bottle of rum on the island. “Now I have a headache. Thanks, April.” He took a long swig.

“What is it, Will?” Melody asked.

Will shook his head. His eyes were aimed at the door. “Why don’t we call the police?”

April sobbed heavily, and Melody said, “Our cellphones don’t work in the house. They won’t get a signal. You have to be outside.

“You don’t have a house phone?”

She just shook her head.

Mark began laughing, and the chuckle behind his smirk became an amused wail. “Oh, that’s great,” he said, following the statement with a “fwoo” exhale, almost a whistle. “We should put the cellphones outside and wait for them to get Cancer.”

“Okay,” Will said, more to himself than the others in the room. “Let’s turn out the inside-lights; that’s probably the easiest route to take. If we can get past looking at one or two of them with the porch-light on, we can see what we’re up against.”

Mark and Will moved to opposite ends of the mobile home, flipping switches to encase the house in darkness. April released a shocked whimper when a loud thud resonated from the kitchen, shaking the glassware on the counter.

“Son of a—It’s just me! Ran right into the damned thing,” Will said, as his silhouette appeared in the faint glow of the living room. The only light now came from behind the blinds, which covered the window. A silhouette was etched in shadow as a reminder.

Mark went to the window and pulled up the blinds as Will met him. The thing outside looked about fervently. It was unable to focus upon anything within the house.

Mark and Will crouched, almost in unison, with their heads on either side of the thing’s waist. Its arms were raised as it pulled itself against the window, but it did not tremble with the exertion. It may have been capable of holding that position for hours.

“Oh man,” Mark whispered, “they brought the whole family, didn’t they?”

The radius of light spread to a point approximately twenty-five yards from the porch, growing very faint in its outermost ring. A gnarled stump rested to the right of the scene, about thirteen yards from the mobile home. Around it was a congregation of almost twenty shadowed, humanoid atrocities. The larger specimens were holding the smallest in their arms like mothers with bundled babes.

More were sparsely scattered through the artificial light, frozen in progress toward the house as if uncertain of their own intent, like sleepwalkers awakened in mid-purpose. Small crowds were gathered around the climbers, apparently eager for the current clinger to relinquish its turn at the glass.

Will became fixated with an elderly looking specimen, which stood on the outskirts of the congregation. Obviously female due to her nudity, she possessed patches of long white hair and was missing an eye. The skin around the missing organ was mangled, drooping to cover the socket, and gave the female an appearance of great solemnity.

Finally, Will put a hand on Mark’s shoulder and gently pulled him back as he dropped the blinds. He turned to the brown-orange outlines on the couch.

“I don’t think they’re going away anytime soon. You’ve never seen them before?”

Will could barely discern the movement of Melody’s head as she shook it. “No, of course not.”

“So why are they here?” Will asked himself out-loud. The young man was desperately searching for a line of logic in the midst of the nightmare.

“I don’t know,” Melody answered quickly.

“Think we could make it to the car?” Mark asked.

“No!” April said loudly, with a shocked hurt in her voice. “I am not going out there!”

“I wasn’t talking about you, princess!” Mark exclaimed. He was annoyed at his idea being shot down so promptly. “You’re obviously doing a fine job of sitting there and wallowing in all this.”

“Hey!” Melody exclaimed. “There’s no reason to talk her like that!”

“Okay—okay.” Will stepped toward the shadows. “We need to remain calm. The one fact in our favor is that they are out there,” he pointed to the window, unsure if the people in the room could even see his movement, “and we’re in here.”

“That was touching,” Mark said facetiously.

“I think I’m going to be sick,” April mumbled. No one seemed to hear her.

“You know what I mean,” Will said. “That’s the way it is for the time being. I’m just worried they might—”

“Figure out a way inside.” Mark finished, nodding.

“Can we turn the lights back on?” Melody asked.

On cue, the living room light blazed, showing Mark at the switch. “Now what?”

Melody shrugged as she stood, and asked April a question. After April solemnly nodded, Melody proceeded to enter the kitchen as everyone watched, and opened the door to a utility closet. Disappearing inside for a moment, she exited with a broom and dustpan. She walked around the island, and began sweeping the glass that had been abandoned on the linoleum.

“Hey, April,” Mark said, through a smile. “Never have I ever been stuck in a trailer while stubby, little monsters tried to get at me.”

“Mark, leave her alone.” Will begged. ”Let’s determine a way out of here.”

“I’ve got an idea,” April said. She was glaring at Mark. “I say Mark runs out of the house and distracts them. Then the rest of us can leave and get on with our lives.”

“And by ‘lives,’ you mean picking up guys in bars so you can bring them back to this hell-hole, right?” Mark asked.

Melody returned to the living room and stood in front of April. Her eyes possessed an intensity that forced Mark to look elsewhere. “The only reason you are here is because you were with Will.”

The words slowly melted Mark’s smug expression into one of injury. It lasted only for a moment before his face pulled into a scowl, but everyone in the room witnessed it.

“Forget this!” Mark drained the rest of the rum. He tossed the bottle onto the couch—narrowly missing April—and strutted for the front door, digging his right hand into his pocket.

“What are you doing?” Will asked.

“Leaving. You can stay here with them.” The voice slurred as it spilled from numb lips.

“Mark! There is no reason to do this.”

Mark had one hand on the doorknob. He turned toward Will and swooned. “They can’t be any worse than those two.” He whipped his head toward the girls.

Will took a step toward him. Mark’s eyes narrowed and he shook his head. “Don’t do it, Will. I swear to—just stay right there and let me do this.”

With that said, Mark turned the knob and pulled the door back, stumbling minutely. He flung himself against the storm door, which framed a clinging imp within its aluminum border. Will ran behind Mark, and witnessed his friend as he charged off the porch, clearing the steps completely, and crashed into two more creatures while tumbling into the night. More horrors leapt at the door as Will slammed it shut.

“Do something!” April exclaimed. “You can’t let him do that! They will get him!”

Will ran to the window, ignoring her. He grabbed the blind-pull and tugged it with too much force. The mounts ripped out of the wall, spilling the horizontal slits to the floor. The deformed trespasser was still hanging onto the window; its pupils shrank as it saw Will. It screamed a violent wail, which he could hear through the glass.

Headlights blazed from the driveway after a period that seemed too long. “He made it!” Melody yelled. The young women had joined Will at the window.

The light beams pulled back as Will strained to view the left of the yard. All of the creatures outside turned their attention to the brash spotlights, even the one on the window.

Will expected to see the beams whip out of view as Mark sped away to obtain some form of help. Instead, they loomed larger, brighter in his pane of sight. The thing on the window flung itself away, into the yard, and was erased from view, along with countless of its peers, as Mark’s Camaro ripped across the scene contained within the window.

“Oh God,” April yelped. She turned away and walked into the kitchen. “I can’t handle this.” She was breathing erratically. Melody left Will’s side to comfort her.

The scene in front of the window burned red, encased within the effulgent light of the brakelights once the black car was out of view, and pink bodies were strewn about the yard. The survivors of the massacre bounded into sight, looking like tiny scientists assessing the aftermath of a lifetime’s work destroyed.

The revving engine sounded like a muffled roar through the thin walls. Mark wasn’t finished.

The Camaro charged again, in reverse. Will wondered briefly if the bodies would spring up, remade, as time traveled backwards. The vehicle moved shakily, not as fast as the initial run, and plowed meticulously through the curious survivors, sentencing them to the same fate.

The sounds of the car making contact with flesh and bones were shockingly meaty inside the trailer. Will realized that he had flinched as the Camaro passed his position at the window, and he opened his eyes when the reverberating chaos of a crash reached his ears. The trailer shook around them from the impact.

“He hit the house,” Melody said, just above a whisper.

The engine could be heard again, announcing the intent of its master. Louder, meaner, with no doubt that Mark was the one who fed it. The car shot forward into sight and spun awkwardly toward the driveway. The acceleration was too great for the tires to grip the earth, and the Camaro slid in the soil only to connect violently with the stump. The Camaro convulsed and then sat still against it. The taillights flickered, went out, flickered again, and became steady.

Will saw steam creeping up the trunk from its position at the front of the vehicle. He waited, uncertain of which sign he needed or which course he should take. He moved to the front door.

“What are you doing?” Melody questioned.

“I’m going to see if he’s hurt.”

“He’s getting out,” April chimed, from the position in front of the window. She had taken Will’s place.

The three remaining inside squeezed into a huddle as they watched the black door swung open. A foot flopped to the ground from the driver’s seat, and Mark spilled clumsily from the wreckage. He pushed himself up slowly, and staggered toward the mobile home.

Will went back to the front door and cautiously opened it. There had to be more. It would be too convenient for all the little harassers to have been in the path of the Black Death. The porch was clear of the horrors, although it had suffered its own demise. Mark must have plowed through it when reversing. It cantilevered over the ground with the front supports, two four-by-fours, hanging, broken and twisted. He pressed the storm door open, not allowing himself to be pleased that nothing was in sight except for Mark and the destruction.

“There goes my weekend,” Mark sighed loudly. He wore a gash on his cheek and a laceration on the bridge of his nose. He spun about and faced the crash as he backed toward Will. “I don’t even want to think about the—”

A mutilated sprite had prowled up to the Camaro. As Mark turned to the front door, it sprung, catching Mark’s shoulders in its hands as the talons tore into his thighs and hamstrings. Mark wore a desperate realization as he fell back, his attacker loosing a shriek that was answered by many of the same. The hidden predators were spurred into motion, and swarmed on top of the fallen young man.

Will was halfway to the pandemonium before he realized he was moving. He kicked the orgy of writhing bodies, hearing a juicy snap when his boot connected with something alive and fragile. Will then pried one small frame from the chaos, flinging it with the adrenaline feeding his fever. Finally, he saw Mark, struggling and punching against a horror on his stomach. It clenched Mark’s wrists within tiny, gnarled hands as the claws in its feet dug into his gut.

Will lifted the squealing, chittering thrasher by its thin neck. Throwing it onto the ground next to Mark, he brought a foot down upon its head. There was little resistance preceding the wet explosion, as the creature’s skull succumbed to the force from Will’s leg. Muscles shook relentlessly with seizure, and did not stop until Will had helped Mark to his feet.

They reached the porch when Melody burst through the door to help. Holding out her hand, the young woman fought to steady herself; the wooden ruins trembled with her weight. She crouched as Will lifted his injured friend by the armpits. The wooden support groaned, wanting justification for the punishment. Melody grabbed Mark and leaned back, pulling him on top of her as he swam with his arms, vying for momentum. 

 Melody screamed; her face became twisted with the physical exertion of the rescue and the sight in front of her. Following her line of sight, Will turned to see a bounding horror coming for him. He glanced down and grabbed a broken and splintered two-by-six, which had served as a step prior to the car's impact with the porch. The terrified young man swung the flat bat at the attacker, knocking the creature back and staggering it. The board hung loosely from the nail, which was lodged within its skull. Will didn’t wait to see if the thing recovered.

With his attention returned to the rescue of his friend, Will leapt toward the porch, allowing the edge of the platform to collide with his abdomen. The young man pressed his fingers into the spaces between the boards in an attempt to pull his body onto the platform; he had to resist the urge to grab Mark’s feet as they fought for purchase. The moment Will gained enough momentum to raise a knee onto the structure, he felt claws tear into his lower back, causing him to cry out while desperately vying to keep his progress.

Will’s position began to slip with the added weight, and he closed his eyes with the realization of being pulled to the ground, and the vulnerability that act entailed. Suddenly, the tearing sensation above his hips ceased. There was no extra weight attached to the young man, and he took advantage of the opportunity to climb onto the platform. Granting a quick look behind him before he dove into the home, Will saw two creatures fighting; one of the combatants wore the red pattern, located on its sternum, which distinguished it as the trespasser from the sliding glass door.

April was holding the door open for Melody, whom had Mark halfway through the threshold, when Will crashed into the crowd, sending April careening into the couch and Melody to the floor as he landed on Mark. He pulled his friend inside as Melody recovered to close the front barricade.

“Hurts,” Mark grunted, when Will peeled up his shirt.

Melody quickly fetched water, along with rubbing alcohol and peroxide, with towels that Will requested. April stood across the room and watched silently as they cleaned the blood from the stomach wound.

Two slashes out of ten were the deepest, the skin swelling up around the tears, and made a trench of glowing crimson as the towel soaked the excess blood. Mark growled through gritted teeth when the peroxide was poured. Using two rolls of ankle dressing, they wrapped gauze around the abdomen and propped the injured man on the couch. They pulled his pants down, white legs spilling out of black boxers, and dressed the backs of his legs.

The remaining creatures outside had recovered, which was apparent in the sounds upon the door, and the twisted spectacle in the window. The intent was harsher, violent and angry. A bold troll climbed onto the window, with another vying for berth below, pawing at the window and trying to gain a hold on the already occupied pane. The thing above kicked at it and stared down with curses upon its face.

Will watched Melody take the towels and leave the room. She returned, her steps heavy and vibrating the floor beneath Will. She brought a thick comforter with her, unfolding it as she went to the window. She spread it out and tucked it around the hook-plates that once held the mini-blinds.

They all stared at the blanket, knowing what was behind it. Finally, Will leaned back, stretching out on the carpet and putting his hands behind his head. Melody moved to the couch beside Mark; April remained propped upon the countertop.

No one spoke. They were defeated and out of ideas. Will closed his eyes, and Mark played with the dressings on his stomach. Melody rested her head on the back of the couch, while gazing at the ceiling.

Then the rain began to fall.

First it sounded as if great machinery were beneath them, a giant turbine creaking to life with a steady trembling, overtaking the mobile home. The sound of the drops on the tin roof seemed to slow, to individualize each impact. The clarity was soothing because it muffled the monsters’ intent.

Then the pounding stopped altogether. Will sat up straight and looked at Mark. His eyes were wide. Are you thinking what I’m thinking?

Will pressed himself to his feet and went to the covered window. He jerked the blanket away.

It was gone. They were gone. Will saw what he thought to be a pale body slinking into the wooded area at the end of the clearing.

He could only shake his head.

“What?” Melody asked.

“They left.” Will struggled to think, his brain was so tired and worn out. There was something weird…

“The rain.” Will mumbled. “The rain made them leave. Why?” Were they afraid of it? Or did it hurt them?

Mark coughed, and then said, “Maybe they were witches. Or clothes on the line. Mom always said you couldn’t leave those in the rain. Oh, maybe they were just paintings, oil-based of course.”

Will once again, and for the last time, went to the front door and opened it. He didn’t acknowledge Mark’s ramblings. No one in the room asked what he was doing; they watched because it was the only action to watch.

Will stepped into the beginnings of a dawn. He eased onto the protruding remnant of the porch, letting the precipitation fall over him. He looked around through squinted eyes, with the water trickling off his brow-line. The Camaro rested in battered defeat. The end of the porch was twisted and bent. Other than the two main evidences, everything appeared almost normal.

A sudden thought made him shiver: They took their dead.

“Now what?” Melody asked, when Will returned.

“We can’t call the cops; the Camaro is wrapped around a stump. We have enough alcohol in our systems to rival Mardi Gras—or Mark does. Even though the little monsters took the bodies, there’s a good chance that their blood is all over the car. I don’t want to explain that.

“We need to take Mark to the hospital, then everyone can get cleaned up at my place. You two,” Will said, to Melody and April, “should plan on moving. During the daytime. Mark and I will figure out what to do about the car, which probably has a busted radiator. If anyone wishes to call the police, please wait until we get the Camaro out of here. Hopefully, the rain will rinse off some of the blood before we have it towed.”

“That sounds expensive,” Mark groaned.

“That’s it?” April asked. “Those things attack us, and we have to move? Look at what they did to Mark!”

Will nodded. “Yes, but that was after he took matters into his own hands.”

“What are you saying?” asked Melody. There was no anger in her voice.

“I don’t think they meant to hurt us. One actually helped me, when I was trying to get back inside the house. I can’t get over the feeling that we made a mistake,” said Will. “A terrible one.”

The young man couldn’t bring himself to look directly at Mark. Deep inside, as the four young people helped each other down from the destroyed porch, Will understood that he would never see any of them again. Even Mark. Friendship could only exist as a testament to the nightmares which would follow.

PART 2: BORN AS CONSEQUENCE

*36 Years prior

The thicker branches scraped burning trenches across her scalp, while their more brittle kin clung to her hair with ultimatums of either relinquishing her red, dead cells to the woods, or carrying the severed remnants of low-lying limbs to her destination. The small deterrent forced Judith to bow her head to protect her face, as she ran blindly through the evening forest, and was a slight reprieve from harsher injustices.

She was unable to use her arms to prevent any damage to her face, for they were incapacitated with holding the infant. It remained confused and frightened, shrieking and screaming with a surprising loudness for a soul so insignificant. It was the reason for Judith's current pace, trying to outrun any ears that could distinguish the child's cries for what they were: evidence of insubordination.

Judith slowed her stride at the sound of moving water, and was thankful when the infant’s wails forfeited to sleep. Following the course of the creek, with only fulgent tendrils of movement visible beneath the light of a half moon, the midwife allowed herself to experience a small satisfaction at having progressed to the deemed checkpoint. While a careless stumble would have negated the rash behavior that Judith had been exhibiting since leaving the house, the only predominant factor of time for the young woman had been the speed of sound, and specifically, its involvement as to whether anyone inside the house had heard her plight.

Placing a hand beneath the infant's blanket, Judith sought evidence that it remained alive in spite of the diminished cries. The warm summer night held no competition with the inside of a womb, and to uncover it would certainly bring more rants. The chest moved, ever so slightly, and Judith almost began to cry at the smallness of it; the entirety of its premature torso could have been gripped within the circle made by connecting her middle finger and thumb.

The midwife crossed the creek when she arrived at a shallow pooling of water; the current had become stalled with the extra surface area. Her eyes having adjusted to the darkness, she searched the small bank for signs of the surviving children. There were no silhouettes that she could discern within the approximate tree line, and at the thought of being alone—abandoned in her time of need—the young woman let the satchel fall from her shoulder, and she carefully sat upon the rivage. At that moment, she experienced the first onset of hopelessness.

It would not be for the last time that evening.

Positioning the infant in her lap, Judith retrieved a bottle filled with warm water from the pack, along with a small tin containing powdered milk. Mixing both contents within the bottle, the young woman roused the baby and began to feed it. The mixture was too concentrated, and the infant immediately attempted to spit it out, becoming choked in the process. Judith had to place the baby against her shoulder to pat its back, and heard the others as they left the safety of the shadows.

They gathered around her; seven small children, of various stages of dilapidation and neglect, contained curiosity upon unattractive faces, and were possessed of timid movements that announced the intent to flee should anything startle them. Judith smiled and nodded at each one; they seemed strangely sincere with their nudity. She had only known of them for a brief length of time, approximately a month, but already felt a great sympathy for them that had the potential to become the foundation for an unequivocal empathy. Slowly lowering the child in her arms, Judith attempted to administer the bottle a second time. The infant took it, eating with a famished intent that was surprising when coming from something so new.

One of the children left the others and approached Judith. A small girl, missing one eye and several tufts of her long blond hair, crouched in front of Judith to admire the baby in the young woman's arms. The girl reached out and, just prior to her hand touching the baby, looked up and into Judith's eyes. The midwife nodded her approval, and the child began petting the infant, which remained wrapped in blankets. An amazed smile brightened the girl's face, and she raised her head to share it with the young woman.

The infant, quickly drinking its fill, turned its sleepy head from the bottle, with formula and saliva running down its chin. Judith used the corner of the blanket to wipe the baby's face, and scooted her body closer to the maternal child. Lifting the infant away from her body, Judith held it toward the girl, whom suddenly squealed in surprise and ran to a location behind the tallest observer in an attempt to hide. When the frightened girl peeked around the larger child, Judith motioned for her to return. After several minutes of repeating the game, the one-eyed girl returned to her position before Judith, and nervously accepted the infant, which appeared to be significantly larger when held by the child's thin arms. An expression of fear on the blond child's face was quickly replaced with one of satisfaction.

Judith stood and patted the girl’s shoulder. When the child looked up at her, Judith signed, “Gentle,” by tapping two fingers upon the back of her open hand, which was palm-down. The girl nodded that she understood, and Judith proceeded to turn her attention to the rest within the congregation.

“Take turns,” the young woman signed, referring to the task of holding the child. She went to the satchel, and retrieved from it the items she had brought with her from the house.

A primary concern of Judith's had been water and milk for the children, for she had known Clayton to dispose of waste within the woods and creek. Encompassing everything from medical to human waste, and even rotting tissue, the unlicensed doctor had resorted to that very course, one which followed his realization that burning it could alert distant neighbors to his practices. Any attention could eventually lead to investigations, and Clayton would do anything within his power to avoid such deterrents to his enterprise. In addition, he would often dump chemicals into the waterway, such as bleach and rat poison, due to the fact that strange rodents often invaded his dreams. The doctor saw the creek as a weapon against the malformed critters, and hoped to render them obsolete before they could reach the house. Judith realized that the state of the water could not be beneficial to the children's health, no matter how persistent they had been to escape fate’s selection in the past.

Placing the remainder of the contents upon a small blanket, Judith signed for them to "eat." She made a stern gesture over the meat products, emphasizing the importance of the ham and steak bits to the children. It was obvious that they were suffering the effects of protein deficiency—evident in the blond girl's brittle hair, but Judith was nevertheless impressed with their stubborn survival prior to their meeting. While it was difficult to determine their various ages, Judith estimated that one boy, the tallest child, could have been nearly four years old. He possessed a hideous scar at the base of his skull, just above his neckline. Judith recognized it as Clayton Robideux’s work, in the form of Metzenbaum scissors.

The suction catheter must have been broken that night.

Once the children had timidly moved to the blanket, Judith commanded their attention to the items in one corner, designated for the care of the newborn. After a brief display concerning the applications, Judith signed that she would return after she helped "sister." This was by no means a member of Judith's family, but the mother of the newborn, who was alone in the house except for the addiction-plagued doctor. The children had no words for "friend" or "woman," and could only relate through familial ties, such as those they had adopted with each other. Likewise, they could not understand "help" or "care," but acknowledged "love" to a base interpretation. It was that very word that the blond child signed to Judith as she left.

Judith began her return journey to the house, and her thoughts focused upon the future. Once Maria, the woman who had just delivered, had recovered and was able to leave, Clayton would most likely drive her home. During his absence, Judith would return to the children, and hopefully convince the little ones to forsake the woods for a life with her. It was impetuous, but Judith saw no alternatives with Clayton’s paranoia. Perhaps, once the children were healthy, they could be found appropriate families to which they would belong, and an existence perpetuating their humanity.

Reaching the clearing around the two-story house, Judith was torn from her reverie by the screams of Maria. The midwife broke into a sprint toward the back door, which opened into the rear rooms of the first floor, and was subtly but otherwise known as an improvised clinic. As Judith traversed the back porch, she felt distress at the audibility of the shouting, and the clarity of the woman’s words.

Maria wanted her baby.

Judith entered the house and ran into the room, almost slipping on the hardwood floor due to her wet shoes. Maria was thrashing about on a metal cart, with only a thin line of padding between the woman and the metal. A course, woven strapping confined her at each armpit while circling across her upper chest, and prevented her from rising from the platform. Her flailing movement had caused the cheap, paper gown to rise and tear, revealing the expelled afterbirth that had occurred in Judith’s absence.

“Maria, honey,” Judith said. She entered the room, and placed a hand beneath the woman’s head, using the other to push the sweat soaked hair away from Maria’s face. “The baby is gone. It’s over.”

“No! I heard her!” Maria exclaimed. “She was crying!”

Judith began to tell the woman that she was mistaken, that the cries she had heard were the derivative of a stressful—if not potentially traumatic—event, when the midwife's head violently snapped back. Someone had a firm grip on her hair from behind.

“What is going on, Judith?” Clayton asked.

“She thinks the baby is still alive, Clay. She must have been given too much morphine,” Judith said.

“She hasn’t had any morphine,” said Clayton. He began to pull her out of the room. “Why didn’t you wake me?”

The midwife grimaced at the man’s words. He had fallen unconscious prior to the procedure, a side effect of the morphine to which he was addicted. The man had not been as intoxicated as Judith had thought, or was becoming more tolerant of the opiate.

“I wanted to handle it myself,” Judith replied. They were now out of the room containing Maria, in the adjacent area of the kitchen.

“And did you?” Clayton asked.

“Yes.”

“You are lying to me!” Clayton slung Judith backward by the hair, offsetting her step as she went crashing into the stove. Standing over her in an opened dress shirt and jeans, Clayton appeared to be more sober than he had been in months.

Maria began screaming again.

“Where is the infant?” Clayton asked. His hands were clenched into fists.

“I disposed of it in the creek,” Judith yelled. “Just like you told me to do! Just like the others!”

Clayton calmly rolled up the sleeves to his dress shirt. “So who’s helping you?” He asked. Walking to the counter, the man picked up a striker from its position next to the Bunsen burner. “Is it the cops?” Clayton opened the valve for the gas on the supply line. “Are there pigs out there waiting for me?”

Judith watched him ignite the Bunsen burner. “No,” she said.

Clayton pulled a syringe out of his chest pocket. “A boyfriend, then? Some two-bit prick who whisks stolen babies away and cheats me out of my money?” He removed the cap from the syringe.

“There’s no one else.” Judith felt faint. It was all she could do to answer him.

Gently placing the syringe on the counter, Clayton firmly gripped his bicep with one hand, as he fervently clenched and unclenched the other hand. He appeared to have forgotten the present events, for he did not acknowledge Maria's screaming, and had ceased interrogating Judith. Once he found an appropriate vein in which to initiate the drug, he reached for the syringe.

Judith saw an opportunity to make him off-balance while he was distracted, as she was harboring an intent to flee the house. She had pulled into a crouch during the lengthy ritual of an addict, and exploded toward Clayton as he inserted the syringe of morphine.  The young midwife awkwardly caromed off of the man and landed on her left knee, feeling the impact resonate at her hip. Judith strained to reach her feet, but fell to the floor when she heard Clayton scream.

When the midwife had crashed into him, Clayton's lower back had connected with the edge of the counter, causing his upper body to arch backward as his arms extended behind him with the momentum. The action made his shirt drift away from his body, and it fell onto the open flame of the Bunsen burner. The intense flame immediately thrived upon the material, setting the fabric ablaze.

The man flailed about the kitchen in a panic; the syringe, from its berth within his forearm, executed tempestuous pirouettes with each drastic movement; and Clayton appeared to experience an extreme case of dislocation before finally making his way to the large cast-iron sink within the room. By the time water was expelled from the faucet, his hair was ablaze.

"Clayton! You need to lie on the floor and roll," said Judith. She attempted to keep her voice from wavering, and had to blink away the tears that had filled her eyes. "Roll on your back."

Placing his head into the sink basin, Clayton managed to douse the fire from his neckline to his hair. It was a small accomplishment, however, for the flames now covered his entire backside. The desperate man tried in vain to splash water to the burning areas. He began to roar as a shudder ran the length of his body.

Judith walked toward Clayton with the intent of aiding. As she approached, she noticed that the fire was no longer contained to the man; it had spread along the upper kitchen cabinets, and was surrounding them by the second. Black smoke covered any view of ceiling, and the heat had risen to an unbearable level. Judith quickly turned toward the room containing Maria, to see the woman watching in wide-eyed terror. She was no longer screaming.

Every artificial light ceased to exist with a fierce snapping sound; the fire had consumed the electrical wires. Shadows reached and stretched with newfound freedom, denied consistency by the erratic flames.

Judith tried to run into the room with the helpless woman, but the pain at her knee was so sharp that her leg almost buckled when weight was placed upon it. Gritting her teeth and purging the injury from her mind, she was limping out of the kitchen when Clayton grabbed her.

Fully ablaze, the black and reddened husk had wrapped his arms around Judith's legs, and flames were already ravaging her summer dress. She screamed and tried to pull away, kicking with her injured leg, but the hold seemed to only constrict and become tighter. Looking at her target, Judith could not determine whether Clayton's constant shrieking originated at his mouth, or his burnt and hole-ridden throat.

"You have to get out of here!" Judith yelled to Maria. "The children are in the woods. You have to get the children!"

The midwife's voice broke with the exertion, and a coughing fit consumed her. It was difficult to breathe with the amount of smoke, and as she struggled to swallow enough air, the stench of burnt flesh caused her to vomit.

Awakening from a split-second loss of consciousness, Judith realized she had fallen into a prone position. She rolled along the floor in attempt to extinguish the flames, feeling them dance upon every nerve in her body, while trying not to look at Clayton's body as she did so. What she did see, at the opposite end of the room from the consumed doctor, proved to be far more disconcerting than the burnt mound of flesh.

The Bunsen burner was resting upon the floor, and was in the process of being consumed by the fire. Clayton must have knocked it from the counter during the chaos, severing the gas connection that fed the utensil.

Judith turned her head toward Maria, with the intent to confess that the latter's infant remained alive, when that portion of the house exploded.

*     *     *     *     *

The tallest child had traversed the clearing, and had witnessed the events within the first level of the house, when the window onto which he was holding was forced into and through him.

The explosion propelled him nearly ten yards from the house, and he awoke to the sight of scissor handles, which protruded from his cracked sternum. Slivers of glass surrounded the visible portion of the tool, shimmering with the fire as it began to climb the outside of the house. Blood leaked from every penetration, revealing numerous injuries due to the glass window.

He tried to press himself to a standing position, but the world around him swooned, causing him to falter. Shrieking in frustration, he began excavating the shrapnel from his body.

The small hands of other children suddenly gripped his wrists, prior to moving his arms above his head. He fought them to no avail.

As his peers dragged the largest child into the forest, the captive envisioned an image of the woman—“Mother”—onto the view of the burning house. Drifting in and out of consciousness, the image stained his subconscious with an ethereal quality, in that the fire and woman became one. Although encased in flames, the appearance of "Mother" did not alter; she remained as pure as the memory allowed.

When the elder child regained consciousness, he found himself surrounded by the other survivors. The one-eyed girl was at the center of the congregation, holding the screaming infant. Rising to his feet, the injured child approached the female and baby.

He took the infant from the thin arms, and held it to his abdomen. The tool, still lodged within his chest bone, did not allow him to hold it properly.

The image of Judith returned as the elder child studied the infant. He looked to his companions, noting the vast differences in their appearance when regarding the infant's features. Although twisted with discomfort around shrieks of need, the face of the baby was beautiful, and it stirred within the elder child a terror of realization.

He moved quickly, lifting the bundled infant above his head as he sprinted toward the creek. The action was so swift that his companions hesitated, uncertain and fearful as they witnessed the brash objective.

Within seconds, the infant was out of the elder child's hands. The splash was surprisingly loud as it signaled the end of the high-pitched cries, and the silence that followed was short-lived.

The one-eyed girl leaped onto the elder child's back, gouging and tearing his backside as she climbed over him with feral vehemence. The scream she released was as fierce as it was mournful, filling the night with anguish.

The elder child watched the female crash into the water, becoming submerged before tearing to a standing position. The small blond child moved frantically about the pooled water, searching its contents for the infant.

Her screams would haunt the night.

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