Brian Keene: Urban Gothic

He probably shouldn’t have called them motherfuckers. Not the best way to win friends and influence people, in hindsight. The distant sound of gunshots rang out from several blocks away. Neither Leo or the others even bothered to duck. They were used to it. The noise was as common as traffic or sirens or pigeons or any other city sound. Leo’s older brother used to say that the sound of gunshots helped him sleep at night.

Now his brother was upstate at Cresson, serving twenty years to life on some bullshit charges. Leo wondered what sounds lulled him to sleep at night in prison.

“What are we gonna do?” Chris asked again. “We just gonna walk away and pretend we didn’t know they were here?”

“I like the sound of that,” Jamal said. “Better if we mind our own business. Safer that way. Know what I’m saying?”

Leo glanced at his friends, studying their faces. Then he turned his attention back to the house.

“I’ll tell you what we’re going to do. We’re gonna call the po-po.”

Markus laughed. “Five-oh ain’t gonna do shit. Might as well call in the National Guard.”

“You’re probably right,” Leo agreed. “But it ain’t right, letting them go in there. You all know the stories about that place. Any of you feel like going in to rescue them?”

Markus stared at the ground. Jamal and Chris glanced at each other. The others looked away.

“None of you want to play hero?” Leo teased. “None of you want to rush in with guns blazing?”

None of them responded.

More gunshots rang out, then faded. A sleepy, laconic sounding police siren started up from far away.

“Well,” Leo said, after a pause. “That’s okay. Because I don’t want to, either. Not in that place.”

He turned around and stared at the house again.

“Not in there.”

THREE

As the looming figure lunged into the foyer, Kerri and Javier backed away, nearly knocking over Stephanie, Brett, and Heather. Bits of Tyler’s hair, scalp, and blood dripped from the weapon the killer clutched in its gnarled hands—a rough-hewn chunk of granite the size of a watermelon. The boulder was affixed to a length of iron pipe. Together, they formed a crude but effective war hammer. Stunned, Kerri wondered how it was possible to lift such a thing, let alone swing it. Then her gaze turned to their attacker, and she wondered no more.

He drew himself up to his full height, raised the hammer, thrusting it before him, and bellowed—whether from rage or laughter, Kerri couldn’t tell. Perhaps both. He stood well over seven feet tall. His chest, arms, and legs were corded with thick slabs of muscle. His skin was the color of provolone cheese and covered with large brown moles and festering sores. Bloody saliva dripped from his open mouth, leaking around gums that had receded from his black, broken teeth. His breathing was harsh and ragged. His head was bald and misshapen. He glared at them with eyes that were almost perfectly round, rather than oval-shaped. His pupils were black. He was nearly nude, clad only in black garbage bags held together with frayed duct tape. They rustled as he moved. His penis—as big as the rest of him—bobbed and swayed, jutting from between the plastic bags. Kerri gagged at the sight. He was uncircumcised, and the foreskin looked infected. Pus dripped from the putrid member, splattering onto the floor. Worst of all was the attacker’s stench. It was revolting—sour milk mixed with feces and sweat. Kerri’s nose burned.

She noticed all of this in a matter of seconds, but it was the longest moment of Kerri’s life. Time seemed to pause.

Then it came rushing back with a wallop.

The hulk backhanded her, knocking Kerri off her feet. She slammed into the opposite wall and slumped to the floor. Spitting blood, Kerri spotted her cigarette lighter. Without thinking about it, she reached out and snatched it. The madman laughed. Kerri scrambled to get to her feet, but she slipped in a spreading pool of Tyler’s blood.

Their attacker laughed again. With his other hand, he swung the mallet. Kerri watched, cringing as Javier dodged the blow, narrowly avoiding having his chest crushed.

The five teens scattered. Shrieking, Heather ran to the end of the hall and flung open one of the doors, disappearing through it. The only signs of her passage were the bloody footprints she left in her wake. Javier shouted after Heather, but if she heard him, she showed no sign. While the figure menaced Brett and Stephanie, Javier kneeled over Kerri and thrust out his hand. She grasped it, and he pulled her to her feet. They ran down the hallway in blind panic, forgetting about Stephanie and Brett. Forgetting about Tyler. Even forgetting about each other. The only thing their minds comprehended was survival.

They followed Heather’s crimson trail through the open doorway. Kerri glanced back once and saw what was happening to Stephanie, but her feet kept moving.

Their friends’ screams faded behind them.

***

“Open, you fucker!”

Sobbing, Stephanie clawed at the entrance, trying to get back outside. She beat at the locked door with her fists. Tears coursed down her mascara-stained cheeks. She babbled a string of nonsense—jumbled prayers and pleas for her parents to come and get her.

Brett tugged at her arm. “Steph, come on!”

She shoved him away.

A massive shadow fell over them both, and the hammer whistled through the air. It slammed into Stephanie’s curled fist with a sickening crunch. Blood and pulp squirted out from beneath the stone. Stephanie wailed, gaping at the pulverized flap of meat where her hand had been. The attacker pulled the hammer back for another swing, and Stephanie flailed helplessly. Blood jetted from her crushed appendage. Brett moved to help her, but before he could, the man swung the hammer again. This time, the blow crushed Stephanie’s head.

Brett froze, helpless, feet rooted to the floor. All flight instinct had left him. He stared at Stephanie’s body, trying to understand what he was seeing. Put him behind a chessboard and everything was crystal clear. Give him a trigonometry problem and he’d solve it. Those things made sense to him. They had logic and order. Rules.

There was no logic here. No order. There were no rules that he could see and understand. Instead, there was some kind of monster (because it couldn’t be a man—no, his mind wouldn’t accept that this thing was human). It had killed Tyler. And now it . . .

Brett screamed.

Something was wrong with Stephanie’s face. He saw it as she slid down to the floor. Her features were mashed together. Her eyes and nose and mouth—they were too close. Her lips—lips he’d kissed just an hour ago—were smashed almost beyond the point of recognition. Her head wasn’t round anymore. Instead, it looked like a deflated basketball. The top of it was split open, and inside that red chasm was something that looked like curds of jellied lasagna.

Her brains, Brett thought. Oh, Jesus, that’s her brains.

Brett winced as the bile rose in the back of his throat. It burned. He glanced up at the killer.

The killer laughed a third time—hoarse and booming.

In that instant, Brett fell back on what he knew best—logic. This was nothing more than a puzzle. A real-life video game. All he had to do to survive was figure it out. As their attacker raised his bloody weapon, Brett ran through the possibilities. Then he did the last thing he hoped the monstrosity would expect—he raced right past it and flung himself into the room from which it had emerged. The man-thing roared, clearly enraged.

Even as he wept, Brett couldn’t help smiling.

Weren’t ready for that, were you, fucker?

He ran, charging across the room. Ahead of him was another door. It led deeper into the house. Brett dashed through it without hesitation, plunging into the darkness, heedless of where it might lead.