A Tale

As it made its way across the wooden floor of an age old apartment, the sound of 8 legs, two of which had been broken pushed it now massive and bloody body, towards me echoing the dark hallway. I had been told many times before and time and time again, failed to listen.

The events leading up to this moment of both fear and terror, have escaped me beyond my thoughts of reason. Braced and held far from any sense of logic ,rhyme or reason, I stand still before my obvious moment of death and pray that upon it, the image before me will not burn forever in the eyes of my soul. I didn't mean to have done the things I've done. I would give anything to have taken them back, born them no more and have stopped the seed of madness from which they came.

She slept quietly in that room next door, her small head full of dark brown hair draped over her face and covered most of the pink pillow she used to carpet her dreams. A blue moon had sent it's odd light rarely seen through the very room that was once my own. Flowered wallpaper now covered the plastered walls that once acted as a back drop for baseball posters, many of the players long since retired. Even the smell had changed. No longer the hint of dirt and pride from a winning game. Now only the fragrance of powder and sweet smells of strawberries, hung in the air like oil in water. The carpet had changed patterns too. Where were the images designed to enlighten me and feel me with the joy of ownership? Gone, they were. Gone was everything and replaced, was her. She had somehow become the center of their attention, their make believe princess soon to become queen. She continues to lay there, sleeping quietly in that special place where her dreams dance around her head, feeling it with lies and deception. I tried, oh how I tried to make them listen. I did everything to remind them of who I was in hopes that they would understand, but nothing I did helped, nothing worked. I even begged dad several times to listen to me, to take a moment to understand. But he like so many others, refused. They saw what they wanted to see, lead their lives based of feelings and not logic. My mother who had taught 8th grade math, could never in a million years add the numbers required to come to the obvious answer of the problem she had pushed through her womb and into this world. A problem indeed it was and to no one but me. They are fools, all of them. How blind they were not to have seen that so easily before them. Painted on eyes they must have, to have turned away from this horror. My friends too refused to listen, they like everyone else looked the other way. So it's come to this, and to me. It is I who have decided not to look away, not to turn from that which is set before me.

I had read of this somewhere I'm sure. They come only once per region and only to those with eyes that seem to turn inward and away. Blinded by thoughts that work overtime shadowing the rays of darkness allowing it to hide and grow with every passing year. There she was, sleeping so peacefully breathing from that nose my mother called cute, her small hands gripped into tiny fist clenched no doubt in ready for battle. I watched her eyes flicker beneath lids of skin and still that blue moon continued to glow. A small grunt came from an even smaller set of lungs captured in her miniature chest and she without opening her eyes, reached over to touch the cheek of her cotton soft face. I can't wait any longer, I know that now. The moment is upon me now, time waits for no one and I know inside my heart of hearts, she is it.

I clearly understood what I was doing. I was aware of what the end would bring me, of the horror that paved the awful road for which I would be forced to travel. Images of my victory now blended in with those of a girlie styled room now draped in a bluish hue. It was then that I noticed the moon. It had stopped rising, no longer moving upon it's nightly travel. I remember my thoughts and my mission. I had only minutes to perform what needed to be done. Should I fail, all would be lost to a world which she and those like her would rule. This can not be allowed to be. I must do it, must do it now.

She must have seen me, must have felt me through her dreams. I looked once around my old room and back to a set of small eyes staring up at me and now glowing green. Her hair had began moving like a million tiny black snakes swimming from her round point of origin. I tried to look away, I tried to focus my attention on that of the most important. My life for those who would never understand. The pink wool covers dotted with flowers began moving. Something beneath it was working it's way up and out. I looked again at a small and once wonderful face and staring back at me, was pure evil. Black liquid began making its way from the opening of what once was her mouth, it's thick and slow movement now covering the lower portion of her little chin. A chill came over me as I watched closed windows, open and release inward the chill of October's night air. It was coming, Hell had made its promise.

The sound of bones breaking had eclipsed my recent thoughts and drew my attention to the foot of the bed where she had grown to and was now expanding across. Her once small head had quickly grown to cover most of the pillow and was making it's way into a shape not human. Flesh split from the chest of her once small body and fell to the floor before me, with a wet sound. Blood soaked the sheets and worked it's way towards me and across the wooden floors, soaking it's way between the cracks. I backed away quickly and braced myself against the wall. From a canvas bag I removed a 12 inch knife and held it close. The creature continued to take form and grow, as the room took on a new change, the moon still remaining fixed in the window. Shadows danced upward from a bed now breaking apart from the increased weight.

It was then that it happened. I had told myself to expect it, to even prepare for it. But how could anyone prepare for it? The screams of horror that came from the twisted form that once was called beautiful from my mother, God's gift from a father. The time was near now, I only need a few seconds more. I turned once more to the window to gaze for the last time at a fixed blue moon now shinning brightly in a room once belong to me.

Again, I tried to cover the sounds of a million screaming cries of horror as they formed only inside my head. The echoes of evil bounced inside me and tried to work its way outward taking with it my thoughts of reasoning. Steam left my mouth in forms of puffs and circled clouds. The creature has almost grown to full size and I rushed it. The stainless steel blade now held in my hand was design for hunting and killing wild and powerful animals. Had the makers considered a creature of this kind? As I approached the beast whose sounds grew more inside me head, I could see it's legs leaning towards me. I thrust the knife forward, ripping through the mass of tissue, and shoved once more into the other. Its cries blared louder in my head and for a second, I thought my head would explode. I yelled out only to find my own voice had escaped me. The beast, the creature of evil had already begun to take bits and parts of my soul. I turned to see the door opened behind me and made my way for it. Thumping of mass and flesh shook the room as it made it's way towards me. Once it passed the window still filled with moonlight, I for the first time caught a glimpse of what was to come.

The knife for which I held was of only one use here. I can see that now. Despite my planning and arrangements, all had come full circle now. It was all to clear for me. The screams and cries of horror would have to be stopped. I could not allow this thing to continue its path in and through me. I needed to finish what I had started and once and for all rid the world of the horrors that had grown in this darken room once belonging to me. Again I reached up brought down the knife, cutting through flesh and partial bone. The creature again let out a scream through my head and again I cried, wanting to yell out. Within the night, the shiny blade flickered lit only by the moon remaining in the window as I tore away at the beast from a world of evil. Blood of both black and red sprayed upon my face and landed in the corners of my mouth. I spat it out and continued cutting inward and around at the creature climbing over and through me. Its heavy body pushed me to the floor and I struggled to get from beneath it. I could feel its heat from a body filled with anger and pain. Again I cut and again it released it's heat as we battled in the room I called my own. With arms cut from its now spiny legs and teeth, I drove one last stab at the center of its ever forming portion of its head and once in, turned the blade to its jagged edges and ripped outward, cutting the head and the main network of thoughts, of the beast born from darkness. I fell back and landed against the floor, hitting my head and knocking out the sounds of a million screaming cries. Silence fell within me and a sudden blanket of darkened light covered my eyes and blotted out my vision of the nightmare I once called life.

The End

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Author's Note:

Okay, I ask that you cut me some slack here. It's my first story in quite a while. It came to me only late this afternoon and I hadn't much time to put it together. It's funny how an idea comes to you and if you don't get it down on paper, it blows away and off in the distance, to those ever changing corners of your mind. I'll try a lot harder next time, I promise. In the meantime, enjoy your Halloween and I'll try to enjoy this moment we shared together. Now where the Hell did I put that knife.