Gary McMahon - Beyond Here Lies Nothing

“What’s all this about, then, Erik? You mentioned… you mentioned a job. Are you moving me up?” Under the circumstances, the combination of hope and expectation on the kid’s face was obscene. He’d do anything Erik asked; he might even kill someone he loved, if it meant worming his way into the boss’s favour.

Despite the grim situation, Erik almost laughed at the thought.

“First I have a few more questions.” He stood over the boy, his physique dwarfing Hacky’s slighter build to make him resemble a small child in the gloom.

“Yeah. Cool.” He took out a cigarette, lit it, and waited, his posture loose, resting most of his weight on one leg.

“That thing you found. You definitely didn’t tell anyone about it, even after you left me?” Erik moved into a fighting stance. He didn’t even have to think; it was an instinctive physical response whenever he stood this close to another man.

Hacky shook his head. “We told nobody. We ain’t stupid, man.” He grinned. His teeth were yellowed.

“What about tonight? Does anyone know you’re here? Lie to me and I’ll find out… and then I’ll have to hurt you to make an example.”

The grin dropped. He licked his lips. “No. Didn’t tell anyone. Everyone thinks I’m off shagging some bird, innit.”

“Good.” He moved closer and put one arm around the kid’s shoulder, turning them both so that they faced the rear of the Barn. “This place has seen a lot of bloodshed. So much combat that the violence has been absorbed into the wooden beams and uprights.” He walked towards the rear of the building, moving slowly, not wanting to spook Hacky, to put him on his guard.

He was aware of Monty’s presence inside his mind. Not pushing… not controlling. Simply guiding.

“I know.”

“Men have fought, men have fallen, and men have bled out into the dirt. I’ve learned a lot of lessons in my time, and above all else I’ve come to know that we all must look after ourselves. You can’t trust your friends, women come and go, and money gets spent all too quickly. All we have is these.” He held out both hands and made them into fists. “These are my gods, marra. I worship them, I make them offerings. These beauties will never let me down. I’ve tested them, to the limit.” He stared at his scarred knuckles, feeling a sense of awe. He was confused to discover that he had an erection.

There was a subtle movement in the shadows up ahead. Hacky didn’t notice; he was still staring at Erik’s fists, wide-eyed and hopeful. But Erik heard clearly the slithering sound of something moving briskly towards them, like a snake moving through tall grass.

“Listen to me.” He grabbed Hacky’s shoulders and spun him around so that his back was facing the rear wall. “I’ve been watching you for a while now, and what I’ve seen has pleased me.” He stared over Hacky’s shoulder. The darkness near the ground was shifting.

He closed his eyes.

“I have something for you. I have a role for you to play, and I think it’s very important. I don’t know why yet, or how, but I’m sure it’s vital to the outcome of some game none of us can see. Like moving a chess piece, sacrificing a pawn.” He lifted his hands, pulled them swiftly apart, and then slammed them together, with Hacky’s neck caught between them.

Hacky’s knees buckled immediately.

Erik pulled back his right arm and slammed it straight right into the kid’s face. He felt the bones break, the warmth of the blood as it splashed his hands. Hacky went down like a dead weight. He had no fight in him; he was weak, a puny specimen. Erik grabbed him by the collar with one hand and hit him again with the other… again, and again, and again. His cheekbones turned to chalk; his right eye bulged obscenely from its socket; a few of those yellowish teeth, stained red now, spilled amid a thick wash of bloody saliva from his mouth and onto the ground. He twitched a few times, and then was still. Erik laid him gently on the ground at his feet and stepped away.

Monty came darting out of the shadows and clamped onto the side of Hacky’s face, suckling. The kid opened his mouth and tried to scream, but a long, fat appendage slipped between his shattered teeth, filling his ruptured throat, and choking him. Hacky thrashed around on the ground, but Monty gripped tight, eating away at his face, demolishing the already ruined flesh. The baseball cap fell to the ground and rolled a foot or so away. Erik bent down and picked it up, stuffed it into his back pocket; a small memento of this strange night.

Then he took a few more steps back, away from the scene. He didn’t want to see this. The further he moved away, the looser Monty’s grip on his mind became and he began to forget the details of what he’d done. There was blood on his hands. He wiped it off on his jacket. The sounds Hacky made as the life was choked out of him were difficult to ignore, but he turned his head and stared at the old, makeshift boxing ring.

After several minutes, the struggling sounds ceased. They were replaced by sucking, slurping, smacking noises: all the sounds of feeding.

Erik tried to feel something but it wouldn’t come. The more he was exposed to whatever forces had warped Monty Bright’s body into this small, stunted monster, the less human he became. He knew it was happening, and this knowledge somehow made things worse. But still he could not experience any kind of genuine emotion.

It’s like watching a film , he thought. Or reading a book. I’m here… but I’m not here. I’m standing off to the side, not really part of what’s going on.

He turned around and made for the doors, shutting them behind him as he left the Barn. The night air was warm; in the sky, clouds were gathering, forming little clumps and clusters. The moon had finally reappeared, a partial face in the darkness, and the stars were coming out to see the show.

Better late than never…

The thought, when it came, felt like so much more than it meant on the surface. Things were shifting, breaking free. Somewhere, doors were opening — or had already been open for some time — and something was trying to come through, from another place entirely. He stared out over the landscape, the familiar fields and the dark hills beyond, and was sure that there were trees he’d not noticed before. Their branches moved, clutching like hands. They were black silhouettes huddled against the blacker sky, strange growths that had shot up while he’d been inside the Barn, allowing himself to be used as a weapon.

To Erik, standing alone there under a weird, vivid night sky, this felt like the end of something he’d not even realised had begun. For years now, he’d been blind. He had orbited this great black hole, taking from it what he could, and now the black hole was claiming everything, including him, turning it all into cosmic debris, blasting it all into black flame. If he could open up his chest, exposing his innards, he’d find bits of charcoal, a charred ruin. He was a shell; no longer a real man.

His whole existence, his perception of what it meant to be alive, had changed now that he’d met a monster.

“HI.” HE WAS standing on the doorstep like an unwelcome visitor — and perhaps that’s exactly what he was, despite what she’d said earlier on the phone. He was beginning to get used to the fact that she always made him feel uncomfortable, and he could never be sure if he was welcome or not.

“I suppose you’d better come in.” Abby stepped back, turned and walked slowly down the hallway, her bare feet soundless on the worn carpet. Her feet were dirty, as if she’d been walking in mud. He wondered what on earth she’d been up to.